Doctor Jolly wrote on Jun 29^th, 2011 at 9:18am:


Generally I like your attitude. We should be adapting, and we can adapt to some extent. We're in reasonable shape in Australia given that we know all about irrigation - and we're going to need a lot more of that. Given that  the predictions and records to date show that in general the drier areas will get drier and the wetter areas will get wetter, these are additional factors that need to be taken into account. You'd have to be very picky about which rural land you bought.

There are of course certain limitations to adaptation. I tend to think that future energy limitations and phosphate supply limitations will be the main problem. If we had boundless energy, we'd be able to desalinate all the water we need. If there were no limitations on fertiliser manufacture, we'd be able to cultivate a lot more land area.

There are two areas where I think we can and should adapt. They will both go a long way to solving some of the problems, but getting widespread support will be difficult.

We need to bio-engineer a new type of foram that will grow a calcite shell and die quickly thus expediting the removal of carbonate from the upper ocean levels. Nature can't do it fast enough, and such forams and corals did exist as recently as 20-30 million years ago. We may be able to genetically reconstruct these. Some kind of genetic self destruct mechanism to kill them off after they have done their job may also be useful.

Trees are ok as far as they go, but the effort needs to go into tropical forests rather than temperate planting. Temperate pine forests can actually have a warming effect by reducing overall albedo. Darker areas absorb more heat.

There comes a stage where forests in some drier areas turn from net carbon capture to net carbon release, so if we know that things will get drier, we should concentrate on tree planting in areas where they are likely to survive long term.

We should also be looking at developing crop seeds ahead of time that will survive the changing conditions.

Emma wrote on Jul 5^th, 2011 at 4:49pm:


Well if we rely on natural biology, we'll all be dead. Judging by international efforts on carbon mitigation to date, the future will probably be punctuated by desperate and expensive last ditch efforts.

There are the armchair greenies who call for everything to be natural, but they have lost touch with the reality of the situation.

It's a kind of tunnel vision. It's like insisting that only environmentally friendly water based paint be used to paint the ship when in fact there are bigger issues - the ship is sinking.

People decry the use of artificial sweeteners and claim that sugar, being a natural substance is better. The counter point is that sugar is one of the few high purity chemicals that is used as a foodstuff, is highly processed and anything but natural, and drinking the same volume of drinks with sugar instead of artificial sweeteners will lead to an increased risk of heart disease, diabetes, cancer and the rest - an increased risk of morbidity that is at least 100 times greater than that associated with the artificial sweetener.  

Then there is the "natural is always good" misconception. Well Taipan venom is a 100% natural organically produced substance, but I think I'll steer away from adding it to my tea for the moment.

In the same way, many of the catch phrases of armchair greenies are  simplistic ... and dangerous.

As always, it's a question of answering the hard questions....honestly.  

I agree with your last point with one exception. If we put in a fraction of the effort that we put into warfare, we'd fix the problem in 10 years. We wouldn't have to wait for eventually.  

The 10 + billion people might be a bit off the mark, but he's accurate enough in stating that higher latitude soils are thin, infertile and unsuited to large scale crops. To take an example, you couldn't grow mass cultures of crops in the soils of Hudson Bay even if the temperature was higher, and it's simplistic to think that you can just displace the crops 100 kilometres or so closer to the poles for every degree of temperature rise. Other climatic effects also come into play.

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Climate Change.  How to benefit from it ?



"...Traffic across the Alpine passes, as shown by the transmission of culture, became important about 1800 B.C. when (due to global warming) the Brenner Pass first became traversable, and reached a maximum at the end of the Bronze Age and in the early Hallstatt period, or about 1200-900 B.C. The valley settlements of the late Hallstatt period developed independently apparently in complete isolation, and traffic across the passes was at a minimum ( due to global cooling ) There was a slight revival at the end of the La Tene period and in the early Roman Empire (200 B.C. to A.D. 0 ) but it was not until between A.D. 700 and 1000 that this traffic again developed on a considerable scale (due to global warming) There was a re-advance of the glaciers in the western Alps about A.D. 1300, followed by a retreat to a minimum extent in the fifteenth century ( due to global cooling ) Near the end of the sixteenth century the glaciers advanced rapidly and about 1605 they overran settlements which had been occupied since the beginning of history. About the same time the glaciers advanced in the Eastern Alps, Iceland, where they almost reached the moraines of the late glacial stages, and probably in other parts of the world and the period from 1600 to 1850 has been termed the “little ice age.” There were minor maxima of glaciations about 1820 and 1850 since then the glaciers and ice sheets have been in rapid retreat in all parts of the world..."








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Since 'climate change' means whatever the commentator-of-the-time wants it to mean, how can anyone speculate on how to benefit from it, when they can't even define it?

... wrote on Jul 6^th, 2011 at 1:36pm:



Wesley, this is not really the thread for you.  We are talking about the scientific meaning.  Not some crack pot homo shock jock meaning.

Doctor Jolly wrote on Jul 6^th, 2011 at 1:42pm:



That's your problem - not willing to delve into your understanding of the topic, past blind adherence to the mantras of your climate change messiahs, like Gore and granaut.

Do I deny the modern lifetyle wreaks havoc on the ecosystem? Not at all....but I do question the motives of those who push hardest for a brand new tax, and roll my eyes at their willingness to subject every man woman and child to a brand new tax, yet in most cases will not make even the simplest chnage to their lifestyles to this end.