EGY LEVÉL
Bela Liptak
5-10-24
Igazad van Zoltán, tényleg talán túl sokat foglalkozom a klima változással kapcsolatos terveimmel, találmányaimmal és nem eleget az HL főcéljával: a magyar kultúra ismertetésével és a magyar érdekek szolgálatával. De azért tudnod kell azt is, hogy én nem csak az HL-en, de az összes általam elérhető platformon és médián ezt teszem, mert egzisztenciális feladatnak tartom, hogy az emberiség időben ráébredjen a jelen állapotook tragikus voltára, s ez alól a magyar társadalom sem kivétel. nálunk is itt az ideje példáúl a földgáz égetés abbahagyásának.
Tudom, hogy sokan vannak akik nem , értenek egyet velem vagy a nyelvtudás hiánya miatt nem érem el őket, de azt is tudom, hogy az HL résztvevői között is akad aki egetért vagy terjeszti irásaimat akár baráti körben, akár média platformokon vagy forditásban ujságokban, magazinokban. Ezért most is mellékelem a Control Magzin június számában meglelenő irásomat, melyet talán elküldhetsz diákaidnak.
Más sóval én osztom Vörömarty "Ront vagy javit, de nem henyél" tanácsát.
Béla bátyád
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Controlling the Roadmap to the Future
Last November my new book titled "Controlling the Future", which is intended for company libraries, was published by ISA (https://www.directtextbook.com/isbn/9781643311425). The book describes the contributions our automation profession can make to control such non-industrial processes as the evolutions of AI and the stoping of global warming. I wa recently interviewed abot it (Figure 1) as follows:
Why is this textbook important?
We have entered the post-Holocene period that is called the Anthropocene Epoch, because in this period the life on Earth started to be influenced by us humans. This influence impacts both our physical and cultural environments: In our physical world we are burning through our resources at an unsustainable rate, while in our cultural environment we are allowing AI to do ll that it can instead of limiting it to do only what it should. In this sense, we have reached a fork in the road of human evolution and now have to decide, if we are going to continue on our present road, - with a big "DEAD END" sign on it - or if we will finally take control of our future by turning onto the other road. In this book, I am presenting a roadmap for this other one, which will protect the only home we have and lead us to a clean and sustainable future (Figure 1).
Figure 1: In our "Future Control Loop", the manipulated variable is the flow of money through our "control valve", because the best "actuator" for our actions is through our pocket books.
What is unique about your textbook?
Many books have been written about the "human footprint" on Earth and about the changes needed to make this "footprint" less harmful. These books were either written by specialists who have unique knowledge of only some particular aspect of global conditions (rise of sea levels, fierce storms, loss of forests, droughts or biodiversity), or global cultural environments. Another group of authors usually describe some new equipment or design that can impact these large and complex processeses. Both of these type of books are very valuable, but neither of these groups deal with the totality of these large multivariable processes.
My book does not fit into either of these categories. What I am is a knowledgeable author about the total behavior of processes,which I have been studying for over a half century. Therefore, I can analyze mutivariable processes in their totality, by reviewing their capacitances, inertias, accelerations, time constants, feedbacks, tipping points, integral accumulations or interactions among their component sub-processes. As such I can determine the overall dynamic behavior (personality) of all processes, including such ones as AI or climate change.
I am also different, because I am neither an "alarmist", nor a "denialist". When analyzing a process, I am interested only in the factual data that describe the past behavior of the process and based on that determine the controls needed to direct its future behavior.
What are some of the key points the reader can take away from this book?
The Human Factor: Humans respond quickly only if their pocketbooks are impacted. Therefore they must not only be convinced that conversion to green energy is good, they must also experience that the conversion brings good jobs and profits to all, because lower energy costs and support by subsidies, carbon taxes and other incentives will also occur, once the voters demand it.
Global Heat Balance: The temperatures of all objects stay stable, if the quantity heat entering them is the same as the heat leaving. Therefore, if we want to stop warming, it is equally effective to reduce the amount of heat entering our planet or the effect of increasing the amount of leaving the Earth. This increase can be achieved by increasing the amount of heat the Earth reflects back into space. Yet, as of today the focus is solely on reducing heating by de-carbonization while the potentials for cooling are neglected. They should not be! My calculations show that increasing the albedo of the Earth ("whitening the human footprint") would be as effective in reducing global warming as de-carbonization.
Energy Storage: The energy from most green sources is only intermittently available. Therefore, it must be converted into continuous through storage. Batteries are not large or safe enough to meet this storage requirement, particularly if we consider that the existing grid is old and undersized, while the electric load is expected to triple in a decade. Therefore, permanent and new solutions to meet the need for green energy storage are needed and hydrogen storage is a natural solution. The salt cavern storage of green hydrogen is already functioning. For example a major installation is under construction at Delta in Utah. Here, as much green hydrogen will be stored as 25% of all the battery capacity in the USA[1](11.1 TWh ).
Can we afford the cost of the green conversion?
At the end of WW2, the grant loans of the European Recovery Program (Marshall Plan) amounted to about 5% of the American GDP. They were paid back by the end of the century and resulted in a 25% rise in the GDP of Europe. Today the global GDP is about $100 trillion and roughly 1% of that sum would be needed to pay for de-carbonizing our energy economy and thereby, for keeping the global warming from exceeding about 2.0°C..
I believe that this temperature limit can be met, because the free market forces are already supporting our this goal, as evidenced by the continuing drop in the cost of renewable energy and by the increase in the share of green energy in the total energy mix (Figure 2).
Figure 2: *Global average of costs of energy (LCOE) from a variety of sources, not considering the role of subsidies (Source: Statista: OurWorldinData.org)
Green energy is not only cheaper, but also less dangerous and quicker to deploy than is fossil. In addition, the cost of fossil fuels will continue to rise, because of both shortages and the coming energy wars. Still I am optimistic, because public opinion is changing and I believe that the coming generations will be as smart as were our stone age ancestors who switched to using bronze, not because they ran out of stone but because bronze was better. I hope that we will follow the example of our ancestors and therefore will leave fossil fuels where they are.
Conclusions
My main message is that today the atmosphere would be black if greenhouse gases had color and that the weight of the stuff we have put up in the air is greater than everything we have ever built on the surface of the planet (Figure 3).
Figure 2: For the last one million years the CO2 concentration of the atmosphere never exceeded 300 ppm, today it is 425.4 ppm
Similarly, my message also emphasizes that we have already lost one or two thirds of our biodiversity, more than half of our coral reefs or forest areas (equaling twice the area of the United States), and that the melting of ice has already lowered the reflectivity of the Earth by 0.5W/m2), etc. Therefore, my main message is, that we have little more than a decade to get serious about stopping global warming, otherwise it will rise to over 2.5°C, making the regions near the tropics unlivable and resulting in an unstoppable wave of migration, that can destroy our civilization. Yes, this is my main message, but I also have an equally important message, namely that we know how to fix things[2] and that we have "roadmaps" like this book of mine that describe how to go about this fixing.
Béla Lipták
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[1] As of the end of 2022, the energy capacity of the utility-scale battery storage systems for electricity generation in the USA was 11.1 TWh (.(https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/electricity/energy-storage-for-electricity-generation.php) |
[2] Inventions like my RFC (the "artificial tree", consisting of the four components of and electrolyzer, a fuel cell, a hydroen tank and a heat pump), when made affordable by miniaturization and mass production will guarantee that Anthropocene Epoch will not spell the end of the post-Holocene period of our planet.