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Politics : The Environmentalist Thread -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: miraje who wrote (10027)	2/27/2007 5:55:35 PM
From: Wharf Rat	Respond to of 36917

Fact: Water vapor is by far the largest greenhouse factor. Yes, indeed. It's called a feedback gas. Temperature dependent. Water vapour: feedback or forcing? Filed under: Climate Science Greenhouse gases Climate modelling FAQ— gavin @ 7:51 pm Whenever three or more contrarians are gathered together, one will inevitably claim that water vapour is being unjustly neglected by 'IPCC' scientists. "Why isn't water vapour acknowledged as a greenhouse gas?", "Why does anyone even care about the other greenhouse gases since water vapour is 98% of the effect?", "Why isn't water vapour included in climate models?", "Why isn't included on the forcings bar charts?" etc. Any mainstream scientist present will trot out the standard response that water vapour is indeed an important greenhouse gas, it is included in all climate models, but it is a feedback and not a forcing. From personal experience, I am aware that these distinctions are not clear to many, and so here is a more in-depth response (see also this other attempt). realclimate.org ================ CO2 (which, BTW, is superb plant food). Yeah, for poison ivy Message 22498265 but not too good for the food supply... Climate Change Surprise: High Carbon Dioxide Levels Can Retard Plant Growth, Study Reveals The prevailing view among scientists is that global climate change may prove beneficial to many farmers and foresters at least in the short term. The logic is straightforward: PLANTS need atmospheric carbon dioxide to produce food, and by emitting more CO2 into the air, our cars and factories create new sources of plant nutrition that will cause some crops and trees to grow bigger and faster. But an unprecedented three-year experiment conducted at Stanford University is raising questions about that long-held assumption. Writing in the journal Science, researchers concluded that elevated atmospheric CO2 actually reduces plant growth when combined with other likely consequences of climate change namely, higher temperatures, increased precipitation or increased nitrogen deposits in the soil. Message 22615993 ================ The world's agricultural livestock account for about 17% of the methane in the atmosphere. findarticles.com In "Methane Emissions from Animals," Lerner, Matthews, and Fung (1988) estimate that of the annual global production of 400 to 600 Tg (1Tg=1 million tons) of methane, enteric fermentation in domestic animals contributes approximately 65 to 85 Tg. ciesin.columbia.edu CO2 is 7. 5 GT/year...as in Billions, with a B. If you want to worry about methane,it's also a feedback gas... Message 23238963 One answer 10 silver BBs...replaces 100% of electricity, 50 % of transportation fuels in 15 years. If I have added their numbers correctly, cuts all GHG and 13 mil BPD of oil... popsci.com Next