sudden rise in carbon dioxide levels

[baratron]

Yesterday on the front page of the Independent there was a worrying report detailing that Atmospheric levels of carbon dioxide (CO₂ ), the principal greenhouse gas, have made a sudden jump that cannot be explained by any corresponding jump in terrestrial emissions. In short, the Mauna Loa observatory, which is the place for greenhouse gas study, has found a peculiar rise in carbon dioxide levels that does not correspond to a rise in emissions, or to a known atmospheric or meterological phenomenon like El Nino. I read the report with a sense of impending doom.

Some of you know I used to be an atmospheric scientist. Went nuts before getting my PhD, but I did spend a long time reading about global warming. I went to no end of talks by eminent atmospheric scientists and meterologists, and I have some idea who to believe. As soon as someone as ... sensible... as the Mauna Loa team start suggesting this might be evidence of the climate change "feedback" mechanism, I start thinking Oh My God. Put it this way, the kind of people who run the IPCC are professional sceptics. If they are being as upfront as to make public declarations, we really should worry.

Richard wondered if it could be a statistical blip - a rare high value for no apparent reason except the normal distribution. But published atmospheric measurements are always heavily averaged. Measurements which are recorded daily, hourly or every few seconds get averaged into yearly, monthly or daily-average results. Also, running means are often used, whereby the reported value for day x might be an average of the values for six months either side of day x. A lot of care is taken to eliminate systematic errors (caused by malfunctioning monitoring equipment - or simply running up against the limit of that machine's accuracy) and baseline drift (where the 0 line gradually shifts over time). And just to make us absolutely certain this is unusual is the fact that most atmospheric variables don't follow a normal distribution, but instead a log-normal or fractal distribution with a high value of kurtosis, which means that more than 90% of the values lie to the left of the mean and just the odd "extreme event" is on the right (I could give you references, but I'm feeling decidedly weird about digging up my thesis for a LJ post). Extreme events are usually explicable by looking at emissions or weather conditions or some combination of the two - this is the first time I've heard of a completely inexplicable extreme event.

This isn't a terribly coherent report, and I'm sorry. It's the sort of issue that could make me nonfunctional with depression if I tried to think about it too much. That's why I'm not trying to do research anymore, and why I never tried to go into the scientific civil service - because I've read enough EU and UK government expert reports to see just how many years it takes for the actual government to even start listening to its own expert groups, let alone do something. I get through life by worrying about the things that are in my power to change, and trying not to worry about the things that aren't. I can write to my MP and MEP, try to avoid using fossil fuels, walk everywhere I can and take public transport where I can't, buy organic and fairtrade food, and recycle everything that I possibly can. But I can't single-handedly make the government make tough decisions that'll cost them a lot of votes. I wish I could :/

Meanwhile, Radio 4 reports that, mindful of the heavy fines the EU will impose if we don't send enough waste for recycling, some European regional authorities are collecting recycling from households - and then sending it to China for processing. Can we say entirely missing the point? I think so.

Comments

[erik]

collecting recycling from households - and then sending it to China for processing. Can we say entirely missing the point? I think so
In the 80s, the City Of Chicago started a "recycling" program. You could (and still can) buy special blue bags for your recyclables, which were collected separately and "recycled."

I don't know what they are doing with the stuff now, but in the 80s the facilities simply didn't exist to deal with that volume of recyclable waste. So what the city did with it was take all that recyclable stuff, conscientiously collected by the citizens...grind it all up...and mix it with toxic waste until the toxic waste was dilute enough to be disposed of through normal channels.

[epi-lj.livejournal.com]

Now, if it increases despite no corresponding increase in emissions, does that mean it's now totally out of control, or would decreasing emissions still help a lot?

I'm always amazed by the justifications that can be used. I won't even get into corporate / industrial emissions, because that's a whole huge ball of wax. However, in terms of personal emissions, taking cars for example, there seems to be this idea that *any* justification is enough. "Why do you need that Ford Super Dominator that gets 1.6 kilometres to the litre and spews an entirely new kind of greenhouse gas never before discovered?" "Oh, well, I go camping and I have all this equipment." You know, at what point does someone's desire to have a comfy ride three or four times a year to go camping take precendent over the need to cut down on emissions? Yes, it's a better justification than not having a justification at all, but why don't we have an idea that this is a really important issue, perhaps eclipsing most justifications? "You could just rent a bigger vehicle for $50 for the weekend when you go camping." "$50 four times a year? All that hassle? Feh." So $200 a year and a few trips to the dealership apparently outweigh any environmental needs. "What did you do when you used to drive the Civic Hatchback?" "Oh, you know, we managed to get all the stuff in, but it was really cramped." Okay, so being cramped for a few hours four times a year also takes precendence over any environmental concern.

I also like how there's no trail of back-responsibility. "Why do you need that gargantuan eco-destroying vehicle?" "Oh, because I have four kids." Like, there's no train of thought there that connects that having four kids was a choice and a choice that led to a wide variety of ecologically irresponsible consequences, some of which include adding more people to the population than are being taken away, some of which include having to buy a less ecologically sound vehicle. (Although there's also little way to say, "Why didn't you just buy a station wagon instead of the largest SUV known to humankind?")

[baratron.livejournal.com]

We so clearly share a brain - on this and many other issues :)

[epi-lj.livejournal.com]

You have my condolences. ;)

[damerell.livejournal.com]

We may as well try decreasing emissions because if it doesn't work we're completely fucked either way.