Re: RE:Nova/Frontline

["ruth_weiner" <ruth_weiner@email.msn.com>]

No I didn't see the NOVA program -- I am a dreadful snob about TV and prefer
to get
information by reading published literature rather than by watching opposing
talking heads interspersed with nature shots.  In 1969, in a collection of
essays titled MAN AND RESOURCES, L. King Hubbert
suggested that lifestyle changes were necessary in order that we avoid
running out of fossil fuels.  I suspect he was (is) right, but who is going
to change lifestyle as drastically as is needed to significantly reduce
fossil fuel burning?  We can't even get people to subsidize mass transit.
And we continue to build public buildings that require
forced ventilation and air conditioning because such buildings are cheaper
to construct.  Having myself incorporated into lectures (and just general
conversation) some very modest life-style changes
(e.g., bicycling, turning off lights when you don't need
them, opening windows instead of air-conditioning) for about 30 years to
friends, colleagues, and students, and seeing absolutely no results from
this, I just think it isn't going to happen as long as the resources are
available
to use.  And I don't think the "threat" of global warming is going to make
it happen either.

Which brings me to an absolutely and truly heretical response to global
warming: namely, SO WHAT?  So the climate changes.  So some areas don't
freeze in winter.  So certain crop growing patterns change.  So this leads
eventually to a second ice age.   It isn't as if
the climate over certain parts of the world (e.g., large urbanized
areas) hasn't already changed because of human activity.   Moreover, the
global consequences of global warming may not be all bad and are certainly
going to come about very slowly.

Another heresy:  I don't believe we are, or should be, in a war against
global warming.  If the world (including the "developing" nations, who do
produce plenty of CO2) really significantly decreases CO2 production, it
would appear that the consequences of such a decrease are exceedingly
disruptive, especially if the decrease is fast.  For example, let us assume
we in the U. S. cut back electric power production (and consumption) to what
we get from hydro (and dams don't last forever), nukes, solar, wind, and
half of current biomass (yes it produces CO2) and half of the fossil fuel
power production.  That would give us about 70% of the electricity we now
use.  If you don't think that's disruptive, try it at home (and no cheating
with flashlights) (and candles produce CO2 also when they burn).

Nuclear power is certainly a partial solution, but I doubt nukes can
entirely substitute for carbonaceous fuels, or even for half of the
carbonaceous fuels used today, and not because of regulatory constraints.

Suppose we cut gasoline consumption in half.  What do you do most of your
driving for -- going to work, I'll bet.  Are we prepared to restructure our
communities so that people can get where they need to go without cars?  Are
driving vacations to national parks going to be the prerogative of the very
wealthy who can afford gasoline?  Are you prepared (as I have done for
decades) to bicycle to work, to the grocery store, and on other errands?  Do
you have the time?  Are your employers willing to give you the time?

Are we prepared to drastically curtail long distance travel, or also limit
it as a luxury for the very wealthy?

Are we prepared to curtail the availability of synthetic fabrics, plastics,
household appliances, paper, steel, copper, refrigeration, just to name a
few products of the advanced industrial revolution?

I don't think so, or not unless and until we are forced to, and the
developing nations won't take kindly to it either.  Let me propose my final
heresy: how can we accommodate global warming?  There's lots of time to
think about it, and nukes are certainly part of the picture.

Ruth Weiner
ruth_weiner@msn.com
-----Original Message-----
From: Johansen.Kjell <Kjell.Johansen@wepco.com>
To: Multiple recipients of list <radsafe@romulus.ehs.uiuc.edu>
Date: Wednesday, April 19, 2000 11:53 AM
Subject: RE:Nova/Frontline


>This message is in MIME format. Since your mail reader does not understand
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>Having followed the global warming issue since the 70s I was gratified to
>hear nuclear recognized as an option to combat global warming by most of
the
>interviewees, Greenpeace notwithstanding.  It is obvious that we can not
>dump hundreds of millions of years worth of sequestered CO2 into the air
and
>not expect some change.  As for increased CO2 being benefical to plants,
yes
>and no.  There is a difference between the C-3 and C-4 photosynthetic
>pathway and I do not remember which is better served by higher CO2
>concentrations.  There would be a definite shift in crop yield and in the
>areas most suited for crop production.  I remember back in the 70s that the
>=
>



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