Winter Banter Thread

[USCG RS]

I love snow and cold... But I wouldn't hate a mild winter for my heating bills sake... 

[Snowshack]

33 minutes ago, WestBabylonWeather said:

Nuclear power is a great alternative but big oil won’t allow it. I mean here on Long Island we had shoreham and it never even went online they squashed it 

Not to defend big oil, but I think Three Mile Island killed Shoreham.   

[Dark Star]

3 hours ago, bluewave said:

Yeah, that’s outsourcing of emissions as our emissions have been in decline. But at least we have much cleaner air here with more natural gas instead of dirty coal. Automobile emissions have really improved with much less smog than we had years ago. Emissions and global temperatures didn’t rise that much from 1880 to 1980, so we were still able to get the historic cold in the 1970s. But with the rapid increase in emissions in Asia due to all the manufacturing and population growth, the temperatures have really taken off since the 1980s.

https://www.climate.gov/news-features/climate-qa/if-carbon-dioxide-hits-new-high-every-year-why-isn’t-every-year-hotter-last

If I remember correctly, the US leads all developed nations with the biggest net decrease in greenhouse gas emissions?

 

[NorthShoreWx]

2 hours ago, BxEngine said:

Yes. Previous snow has nothing to do with a storm ruining how people feel christmas should feel. 

That's what happens when I don't post much in the summer.  I miss all the important terminology changes.  Is weenie still a word?

[gravitylover]

1 hour ago, MANDA said:

Good grief.  This thread is sinking faster than cement shoes in the Hudson.

 

56 minutes ago, chrisNJ said:

I don’t post often but isn’t there already a climate change thread?  I work in the environmental field and know a little about the warming and it’s reality but We have pro mets posting great thoughts about model runs and analysis and it’s getting lost in all the banter. 

^^ Banter being the keyword. Sorry, I don't make it out of the regional subforums very often and forgot that there's one for cc. I guess I'll stick to saying stupid s**t here and avoid ideas that are likely without merit. 

[wishcast_hater]

It’s very simplistic. CO2 is a greenhouse gas. And we are putting said gas into the atmosphere at an unnatural rate. The end 

Nothing is simple. We live in an extraordinarily complex eco system. Trees convert our CO2 into oxygen, volcanoes output more CO2 than decades of what our cars emit. The past was warmer than the present and cars weren’t around. It’s not simple at all.


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[Juliancolton]

Hot take: I'd rather have a snowy March than a snowy December 

[eduggs]

7 minutes ago, Juliancolton said:

Hot take: I'd rather have a snowy March than a snowy December 

March snow melts fast. It drips off trees, melting the snow beneath. It becomes dirty snow and mud. December snow lasts. It can form a snowpack. It's festive.

[mannynyc]

How come the same model on Tropical Tidbits and Pivotal Weather looks so different? Here's the 0z GFS as an example.

[Juliancolton]

32 minutes ago, eduggs said:

March snow melts fast. It drips off trees, melting the snow beneath. It becomes dirty snow and mud. December snow lasts. It can form a snowpack. It's festive.

Valid, but I can't bring myself to worry about snowpack around here. It's a lost cause most of the time. (And, incidentally, I haven't surpassed my March '18 depth since then.) 

I like the longer and brighter days for enjoying what falls. There's something magical about hiking or snowshoeing right after a spring snowfall, when everything's caked in snow and the sun warms your face as it climbs. It's fleeting, but more intensely beautiful imo. And, crucially, a strong send-off to winter makes the coming warm season feel less daunting. Sure, the inverse could be argued - snow is better when there are more snow chances on the horizon - but if I had to choose...

[Rjay]

1 hour ago, Juliancolton said:

Hot take: I'd rather have a snowy March than a snowy December 

Oof

[LibertyBell]

6 hours ago, Juliancolton said:

Valid, but I can't bring myself to worry about snowpack around here. It's a lost cause most of the time. (And, incidentally, I haven't surpassed my March '18 depth since then.) 

I like the longer and brighter days for enjoying what falls. There's something magical about hiking or snowshoeing right after a spring snowfall, when everything's caked in snow and the sun warms your face as it climbs. It's fleeting, but more intensely beautiful imo. And, crucially, a strong send-off to winter makes the coming warm season feel less daunting. Sure, the inverse could be argued - snow is better when there are more snow chances on the horizon - but if I had to choose...

Thats how I feel about April snow!  It's also special because you know it's the last one of the season.

[LibertyBell]

14 hours ago, bluewave said:

Yeah, that’s outsourcing of emissions as our emissions have been in decline. But at least we have much cleaner air here with more natural gas instead of dirty coal. Automobile emissions have really improved with much less smog than we had years ago. Emissions and global temperatures didn’t rise that much from 1880 to 1980, so we were still able to get the historic cold in the 1970s. But with the rapid increase in emissions in Asia due to all the manufacturing and population growth, the temperatures have really taken off since the 1980s.

https://www.climate.gov/news-features/climate-qa/if-carbon-dioxide-hits-new-high-every-year-why-isn’t-every-year-hotter-last

Natural gas is just a euphemism the dirty and corrupt fossil fuel companies use-- it's really methane which is FAR worse than CO2 is as a greenhouse gas.  We really need to get off all of them and nuclear fission (specifically thorium) and fusion when we finally have it are the only real answers.

 

Our air still has a lot of air pollution and air pollution is the number one shortener of life on the planet-- ahead of even tobacco smoking.  It's a much worse problem in the summer (we have a lot of bad air quality alert days.)  NO2 air pollution from car exhaust is a real problem and we need a faster switch to EVs!

Air pollution is even more of a problem in minority communities-- for example in West Oakland where diesel is used the life expectancy is a full 9 years shorter!  The air pollution is a big problem which is why we see high rates of asthma and lower life expectancies.

I am glad you addressed the overall largest problem of all (for pretty much everything) which is population growth and population density.  The UN forecasts that to stabilize by or before 2100, let's hope that happens.

 

 

[LibertyBell]

14 hours ago, WestBabylonWeather said:

I used to be here

then one day it clicks that 2+2 = 4

injecting a greenhouse gas into the atmosphere will do greenhouse things. We better stop. 

What is the answer to 1/0 and why is it different from the answer to 0/0?

 

[LibertyBell]

14 hours ago, Juliancolton said:

Yeah, and it's not like it was just some abstraction that we have to accept on faith. The big synoptic storms have been there. The cold air was around. 

Yep but this is also why people complain about the 80s.  The big storms were there and the cold air was around.  It's not random luck though, there are reasons why patterns like this are different from what we had in the early to mid 2000s and the early and mid 2010s

[LibertyBell]

14 hours ago, bluewave said:

Yeah, that was the big announcement during the week.

 

 

People call solar energy an "intermittent" source of energy-- why?  The sun is powered by fusion and is always on all the time.  You just need to be able to access solar energy in space and send it down here.  We can maybe actually do that one day in the not too distant future by capturing solar energy in space and converting it to another form of energy, storing it and then sending it down here (as microwaves.)

[LibertyBell]

12 hours ago, bluewave said:

2-3C of warming by later this century will be tough to avoid. But maybe nuclear fusion can become viable and cheap enough within the next 50 years to prevent 4-5C of warming. Fossil fuels will still be our primary energy source for decades to come. 

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-61802802

Their 17th annual status report draws on over 600 experts to produce a snapshot of what is really happening in terms of renewable energy. 

The study says that the transition to renewables, in essence, has stalled. The use of coal, oil and gas continues to dominate total energy consumption.

The share of renewable energy has moved in the last decade from 10.6% to 11.7%, but fossil fuels, all coal and gas have moved from 80.1% to 79.6%. So, it's stagnating," said Rana Adib, the executive director of REN21. 

"And since the energy demand is rising, this actually means that we are consuming more fossil fuels than ever."

 

This is only because political leaders are corrupt and are bought and paid for by the fossil fuel cartels-- the transition should have been occurring a lot faster than it is.

Renewable fuel is now cheaper and produces higher paying jobs and is far healthier too.

 

[LibertyBell]

12 hours ago, gravitylover said:

I'll go with the warming climate being influenced by humans but not because we're sloppy and emissions are too high. If we had paid attention and kept population growth reasonable and within the water and food production limits rather than watching it go over 8 billion people that need things it might have been manageable. What was the global population in ~1970?

Thank you!  This has very negative impacts on health and the environment too.  Population growth is projected to stabilize by or before 2100 but that may be too late.  We are now using all the resources the planet produces in a year in just six months.  The 1970s was the last time that was in balance.

 

[LibertyBell]

12 hours ago, MANDA said:

Good grief.  This thread is sinking faster than cement shoes in the Hudson.

This is an important discussion that needs to be had.  Far more important than snow.

[LibertyBell]

15 hours ago, brooklynwx99 said:

lots of people don't understand that a great pattern only increases odds

so there might be a 2-5% chance on any given day in Dec 15 - Jan 15 that NYC sees over 6" of snow. in this pattern, it's more like 40-60%, which is astronomically better, but you still have room to fail. it's not a guarantee, and we've gotten unlucky

it's not luck though it's the same pattern we had in the 80s when it was cold and didn't get much snow between 83-93.  There are nuances in the pattern that prevented it.  There are cold and rainy patterns too and nuanced reasons why they happen.

 

[Snowlover11]

another page of liberty bell posts I think he needs his own sub forum.

[LibertyBell]

15 hours ago, Rjay said:

I would take this look every December.  

Not necessarily.  We've talked about December 1989.  You need a lot more than cold to get snow.  Being a results oriented person I would rather have December 1995, December 2000, December 2002, December 2003, December 2009 or December 2010 over this by far.

This is just  a milder version of December 1989.

 

 

[LibertyBell]

15 hours ago, Rjay said:

I still think there's a threat after Christmas before we warm up 

Yup "climo" favors the timeframe between Dec 26-30

 

[LibertyBell]

13 hours ago, Swaneyb said:

Serious question what caused all of the ice to melt in the north east after the last ice age. I'm sure the answer is temperature rise. What caused it to rise? Climate change. Earth is billions of hears old and humans have been here a micro second of that time. Hard to believe for me co2 from humans is doing that when the earth has gone through non stop drastic temperature changes


.

Big difference by human caused climate change is the rate of rise, which does not give nature time to adjust.  The rate of rise is much higher now and will continue to increase.

 

[LibertyBell]

11 hours ago, gravitylover said:

 

^^ Banter being the keyword. Sorry, I don't make it out of the regional subforums very often and forgot that there's one for cc. I guess I'll stick to saying stupid s**t here and avoid ideas that are likely without merit. 

Not without merit, there are scientific studies that have been done on them and proved that you are correct.

[North and West]

Natural gas is just a euphemism the dirty and corrupt fossil fuel companies use-- it's really methane which is FAR worse than CO2 is as a greenhouse gas.  We really need to get off all of them and nuclear fission (specifically thorium) and fusion when we finally have it are the only real answers.
 
Our air still has a lot of air pollution and air pollution is the number one shortener of life on the planet-- ahead of even tobacco smoking.  It's a much worse problem in the summer (we have a lot of bad air quality alert days.)  NO2 air pollution from car exhaust is a real problem and we need a faster switch to EVs!
Air pollution is even more of a problem in minority communities-- for example in West Oakland where diesel is used the life expectancy is a full 9 years shorter!  The air pollution is a big problem which is why we see high rates of asthma and lower life expectancies.
I am glad you addressed the overall largest problem of all (for pretty much everything) which is population growth and population density.  The UN forecasts that to stabilize by or before 2100, let's hope that happens.
 
 

I know you’re going on your daily HAM postings, but there’s something off about EVs.

I’m not against them - I’m a big believer in that we shouldn’t be using oil/petrochemicals as an energy source if possible, since they’re so applicable in so many other aspects of modern life - but EVs are not without their own negatives. I say this as someone who hopes to have a plug-in hybrid or full EV as their next car.

I was in the Buick dealership recently getting my Enclave serviced (great vehicle for a family of four) and noticed the Hummer EV. Guess how much it weighs? 9800 pounds! My Enclave is 5600 lbs. by itself. 9800! How much of that is rare earth metals? Where does that go once the usable life of the car is done? How much energy is used to produce and ship that vehicle?

In summation, very few things are black and white.


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[LibertyBell]

17 minutes ago, Snowlover11 said:

another page of liberty bell posts I think he needs his own sub forum.

I get very passionate about environmental issues, health and population growth, etc. it's stuff I've been interested in since I was like 11 or 12.  Maybe even earlier.... I remember getting into nature when I was in 3rd grade and getting a book that was about all the different phyla of animals and always watched a lot of PBS,  they have some GREAT documentaries I've been watching since I was a kid.

 

 

[North and West]

I get very passionate about environmental issues, health and population growth, etc. it's stuff I've been interested in since I was like 11 or 12.  Maybe even earlier.... I remember getting into nature when I was in 3rd grade and getting a book that was about all the different phyla of animals and always watched a lot of PBS,  they have some GREAT documentaries I've been watching since I was a kid.
 
 

Positive economic growth and education has correlated to better health and lower population growth (so much so that many advanced economies have plateaued or are shrinking due to smaller proceeding generations; best example is Japan).


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[LibertyBell]

2 minutes ago, North and West said:

I know you’re going on your daily HAM postings, but there’s something off about EVs.

I’m not against them - I’m a big believer in that we shouldn’t be using oil/petrochemicals as an energy source if possible, since they’re so applicable in so many other aspects of modern life - but EVs are not without their own negatives. I say this as someone who hopes to have a plug-in hybrid or full EV as their next car.

I was in the Buick dealership recently getting my Enclave serviced (great vehicle for a family of four) and noticed the Hummer EV. Guess how much it weighs? 9800 pounds! My Enclave is 5600 lbs. by itself. 9800! How much of that is rare earth metals? Where does that go once the usable life of the car is done? How much energy is used to produce and ship that vehicle?

In summation, very few things are black and white.


.

You're very right to be concerned, since these are big issues.  Current mining is not always done ethically and there needs to be a better way of doing it without impacting the environment and the people who live where it's done.  I was excited to read about underwater mining by autonomous drones which doesn't disturb the environment nearly as much nor does it negatively impact sea life.  The issue is that with a higher adoption rate of EVs we will need to scale this up and then we'll see what happens to the environment.  I'd like to see the development of solid state batteries which should reduce the need for rare earths (they are also in your cell phone batteries, which is like present day EV in terms of battery chemical composition.)

On top of that a more recent issue has developed which is that these vehicles become a fire risk when it floods (lots of reports of this during Hurricane Ian in Florida.)  All of this needs to be ironed out before they can be adopted on a larger scale than they currently are.

 

 

[LibertyBell]

2 minutes ago, North and West said:

Positive economic growth and education has correlated to better health and lower population growth (so much so that many advanced economies have plateaued or are shrinking due to smaller proceeding generations; best example is Japan).


.

Yes, this is exactly the right way to do it.  We're even seeing a slowing down of population growth in developing nations because of this.  I like a proper balance which would be around 2 children per family, but not forced in any way, by family planning and education and better economies.