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Politics : Politics of Energy -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sam who wrote (9025)	6/4/2009 10:25:12 PM
From: Hawkmoon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 86356

Yes.. no doubt there will be acidification of the oceans if the WRONG KIND of algae are permitted to grow. The tons of nitrates and other fertilizers we're pouring into the oceans do not foster diatomic phytoplankton most inclined to sequester CO2 at the ocean floor. That's why it's KEY to capture the carbon via phytoplankton, and develop the means to transit to the ocean floor in a solid form (waste product). Hence, the use of ocean salps to harvest phytoplankton, consume it, and deposit the carbon via their feces to the ocean bottom. And AGAIN, if the oceans are so acidic, then why are phytoplankton (diatoms) blooming like crazy when you fertilize them with a bit of iron powder and silica? Hawk

To: Sam who wrote (9025)	6/5/2009 8:35:27 AM
From: RetiredNow	Respond to of 86356

Sam, I've tried this tack with Hawk before. He doesn't believe in such a thing as feedback systems and won't admit that rising CO2 from human causes is acidifying the oceans, which is causing the decrease in phytoplankton, which reduces the ocean's ability to absorb CO2, which accelerates the rise in CO2 in our atmosphere and leads to further phytoplankton loss. It's a great example of a malicious cycle that once started is hard to break out of. That's why they call it a feedback process. Hawk instead believes that it is runoff from our farms into the oceans that is causing the decline. While no doubt partially true, it doesn't pass the sniff test as a major root cause, just maybe a minor contributory cause. Scientists have known for a long time about these feedback mechanisms. It's why you have geometric curves and why scientists are increasingly alarmed. These things don't deteriorate on a straight line, they have a compounding effect and accelerate over time, so that when the bad effects start happening, they start coming at us with increasing speed.