Re: Radical thinking

[John Nissen]

Hi Robert,

As Guterres said, we face global boiling and it is terrifying.  You neatly summarise the kind of terror we will face without determined cooling intervention. 

It would be absolutely insane not to deploy cooling intervention now.

The emissions reduction strategy has not worked, is not working and will not work.  The radical thinking required is to grasp the nettle of geoengineering.  There is now absolutely no doubt that climate change has become dangerous [1].  There is no way that emissions reduction can cool the world, certainly not on any meaningful timescale.  Cooling intervention is an absolute necessity if there is to be any prospect for a decent world for our children and grandchildren.  We need to be loud and clear about this.  Shaun and Sir David have made a start in the public domain, albeit not picked up by the journalists [2] [3].  There needs to be a forthright debate.

The Arctic should be the place to start the cooling; partly because of the tipping points activated there and partly because, with mid to high latitude SAI, the Arctic is the quickest, safest, cheapest, easiest and least controversial place to start the cooling - like a low hanging fruit.  But most of all, cooling the Arctic would have a rapid effect on reducing extremes of heat and other weather.

Robert, you claim to be a realist but actually you are a defeatist.  You think that we will inevitably fail to halt and reverse global warming, and we should tell our leaders so.  That would be a self-fulfilling prophesy.  It's never too late to try: we owe it to our children and grandchildren. 

Cheers, John

[1] This "dangerous climate change" has always been the point at which to resort to geoengineering according to those who have been postponing geoengineering, such as Damon Matthews and Ken Caldiera, see their PNAS paper in 2007:

Geoengineering (the intentional modification of Earth’s climate) has been proposed as a means of reducing CO2 -induced climate warming while greenhouse gas emissions continue. Most proposals involve managing incoming solar radiation such that future greenhouse gas forcing is counteracted by reduced solar forcing. In this study, we assess the transient climate response to geoengineering under a business-as-usual CO2 emissions scenario by using an intermediate-complexity global climate model that includes an interactive carbon cycle. We find that the climate system responds quickly to artificially reduced insolation; hence, there may be little cost to delaying the deployment of geoengineering strategies until such a time as ‘‘dangerous’’ climate change is imminent.

https://www.pnas.org/doi/pdf/10.1073/pnas.0700419104

[2] Shaun Fitzgerald in the Briefing Room (BBC Radio 4) said that geoengineering was extremely controversial but needed to be considered, e.g. using MCB.

[3] Sir David King was also on BBC radio, mentioning the 4 Rs: which included Repair.  However he did not explain the significance of this.

On Sat, Jul 29, 2023 at 5:09 AM 'Sev Clarke' via Healthy Planet Action Coalition (HPAC) <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

Robert,

We seem already perched to begin a downwards spiral into autarchy, but that is not a reason to lessen our efforts to cool the world and so extinguish development of the spiral. As a combination of MCB efforts and my Buoyant Flakes concept appears more achievable in the short term than other methods, particularly when vulnerable, small island states could individually or collectively decide to deploy them locally to increase their ocean albedo, cool their waters, save their corals, and improve their fish stocks, one way we might bypass the IPCC’s wilful blindness and FF obstruction might be by persuading them to run transparent experiments, then cautiously gated deployments. Already some reputable R&D groups are planning to run periocosm experiments to determine likely effects - though they seem to lack the “can-do” approach of trying several different flake and spray nozzle formulations and approaches at once.

Sev

On 29 Jul 2023, at 6:40 am, Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi folks

I feel the need to shake things up.

The entire climate change discourse everywhere, including in these groups, is focussed on the global response, albeit that this is then often sliced up into national contributions.  The objective of this global response, in the words of the UNFCCC Constitution is to ‘prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system’, although when this was written in 1992, it was expected that that could be done by the ‘stabilization of greenhouse gas (GHG) concentrations in the atmosphere’.

Since then, emissions have increased by ~70% per year and continue to grow year on year with no sign yet of peaking, greenhouse gas removal (GGR) has been added to the policy mix to bolster efforts to stabilise atmospheric GHGs, although no significant GGR has yet been done and the amount now required suggests that it is implausible for it to be scaled quickly enough to have the climate impact necessary to avert the dangers from anthropogenic interference in the climate system.  Albedo enhancement (AE) offers real potential to deliver the UNFCCC objective but it is not on the international political agenda and has been routinely dismissed by IPCC and many influential NGOs.  The paradigm shift required for AE to emerge as a realistic policy option is not in sight and probably requires even more severe ravages from climate change before it becomes so, ravages that might happen until the situation is irretrievable.

Each day more bad climate change news confronts us.  Whether it’s new climate records or new science showing that the climate is even more fragile than previously thought, there is no escaping from a sense that we continue to be moving backwards, that climate change is advancing faster than we are.  At what point do we ask ourselves, what if we can’t stop this, what do we do then?  I’d like to ask that question now.

To keep this brief, I’ll make several convenient assumptions.  The scenarios I’m considering are those where systemic collapses have begun seriously to disrupt human lives.  I’ll leave it to you fill in the blanks but broadly speaking, BAU has become impossible.  Supply chains are broken.  Large areas of previously inhabited land are uninhabitable.  Crops failures are widespread.  Starvation, migration, drought, pestilence and armed conflict are rife.  Global trade ceases to be able to sustain economic activity at anything like earlier levels.  Developing nations are stricken by collapse of their already fragile internal socio-political systems.  Developed countries are just beginning to understand how little resilience they have when critical resources are denied them.

Are we not approaching the time when we have seriously to contemplate these scenarios?  I think so.  It is much easier to predict the vulnerability to collapse of a house of cards but much more difficult to predict when it’ll collapse, and even more difficult to predict precisely how the cards will fall when it does.  The way to minimise risk is in advance to build as much resilience into the system as possible.  In scenarios where the established geopolitical structures and global supply chains can no longer be relied upon, it will be necessary to look closer to home to fulfil people’s needs.

This is the world of autarky.  Is it time for our governments to start preparing for autarky by building up internal systems that are as independent as possible of imported resources and as robust as possible against attempts by others to steal our local resources?  In many situations autarkies could be formed with friendly neighbouring states; the EU could be a paradigmatic example.  These local agglomerations would have a wider range of local resources making it easier to be self-sufficient.

The sooner we prepare for that brave new world, the less our fellow and future citizens will suffer.

This might not be the version of a healthy planet we were hoping for, but if it’s the best we can get, should we start giving it some thought?  Pursuing this might also be a wake up call for the laggards.

Regards

Robert

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[Robert Chris]

Hi John

I am absolutely not a defeatist.  And I am also not a magical thinker.  I have no way to predict the future and few people thirty or so years ago did a very good job at predicting where we are today in climate or even climate policy terms.  It isn't defeatist to contemplate failure, it's prudent.  The notion that we will get this sorted because the alternative is unthinkable is just another form of denial.

My mantra is that the greatest surprise of all would be a future with no surprises.  The nature of surprise is that it isn't foreseen.  The nature of prudent planning is that you create maximum resilience even for the unpredictable.

If you put all your efforts into pursuing the optimal policy for the most desired future, how do you cope when the future turns out differently, as it always does?

This is not an argument for not doing all the things we talk about to cool the planet.  It is an argument that that's not all we should be doing.

All that said, you are right that I do think we will fail to halt and reverse global warming.  That is not a prediction.  It's my judgement based on the available evidence.  Like you, I hope I'm wrong.  Unlike you, I fear I might be right and I'd get some comfort from knowing that people were also preparing for that eventuality.  This is routine risk management.  It's about building redundancy into the system so that as bits of the system fail, alternative pathways are immediately ready to pick up the slack.  That's how prudent managers keep complex mission critical systems running 24/7.  We do it routinely for telecommunications, for banking, for military preparedness and many other applications.  But humanity has never been called on to do it collectively at global scale.  We're being tested.  And we're being tested in an economic and political context in which redundancy in public services is regarded as wasted resource and is to be stripped out wherever it is found.  But less redundancy = less resilience.  A major socio-economic paradigm shift is needed and history suggests that that rarely happens until the vested interests' vested interests have been sufficiently undermined for their efforts to cling on to what they have, to be overwhelmed by the forces of change.  I don't see that happening yet, at least not at sufficient pace.  And if that's not tough enough in an anarchic geopolitical world, the physical and behavioural changes needed in almost every aspect of everyone's lives will be extraordinarily difficult to deliver at the speed and scale necessary.  Ditto, geoengineering in whatever form it takes.

It isn't defeatist to recognise the nature of the problem you're facing.  However, it is naive to imagine that the problem is amenable to a technological fix.   Technology has a vital role, but it is far from being sufficient.

Finally, I want to disagree fundamentally with the idea that being realistic about our predicament and embracing the possibility of failure is a self-fulfilling prophecy.   This may be your opinion, to which you are obviously entitled, but my view is that open discussions, rather than just scare-mongering, about what failure really  looks like is more likely to jolt people into realising how serious the problem is, and spur them to action.

Regards

Robert

[Anderson, Paul]

To John first and then a reply to Robert:

 

John wrote two points: 

A.  “Robert, you claim to be a realist but actually you are a defeatist.  You think that we will inevitably fail to halt and reverse global warming, and we should tell our leaders so.” 

 

PSA:  It is not that we will inevitably fail, but that we HAVE ALREADY FAILED because we are the  cause of our current situation.    AND WE CONTINUE FAILING as a species (or global population) by making things worse while congratulating ourselves on small and insufficient “successes”.   And a leader who will say such thoughts will not be an elected leader very long. 

 

B.  [John wrote:]  “That would be a self-fulfilling prophesy.  It's never too late to try: we owe it to our children and grandchildren.”

 

PSA:  Agreed, it is never too late to try.   And our grandchildren will say that also as they try under horrible conditions (famine, water shortages, rising sea level, wars, economic collapse, etc.) while looking back at our current times and pointing out how the  generations alive today truly FAILED.   And their grandchildren (3 to 4 generations from ours) could be saying the same thing about them.   FAILED in the past will  be the norm while those alive keep trying to survive.   SOME will survive, but they will have lives unrecognizable unless compared with impoverished subsistence farmers of the 1800s or earlier lifestyles in harsh environments.  Imagine no rock concerts, no professional sports, no easy transportation when and where you want it, no industrially produced “essentials” on shelves in stores that no longer exist to cater to our every desire.  Education will decline.     

 

That brings me to  Robert’s two good questions, but in reverse order:  

2.  “Or is it [the bleak future] so far into the future that we don't care that we don't have strategy for it?”

PSA:   We do need to care, but we should note that humans know and personally care about 5 generations only, with themselves in the middle.  Great grandchildren and  great grandparents are rather remote to our lives.  And the great-greats are beyond our experience.  I cannot realistically imagine the conditions of the surviving humans in the year 2150.   They will be trying to not fail at their efforts for survival.   Somehow we (collectively all of society) need to care now about having the best strategy, but our collective society is so fragmented that it just keeps failing.

Robert’s other question:

1.  “Is the future scenario I’m describing sufficiently implausible that we don’t need to bother having a strategy for it?” 

PSA:  We must work for a full solution, not for small ways to protect our loved ones in the highly unknown future.   Money in the bank will not assure protection / survival.   Moving poleward  will not assure survival.   Nor will building bunkers with food supplies and defensive weapons be useful.  We must focus on avoiding / preventing  what is coming if we do not act..

 

Rephrasing the question:  What could we do now to help those future generations who will face what is so likely to come because the planet is getting too hot to have sustainability of desired lifestyles?    Short response:  Be MUCH MORE RADICAL.   And blast apart the “moral hazard” roadblock /argument that is used to stifle alternative thinking.   We need experimentation NOW for the various types of albedo enhancement.   Not crazy mass deployment, but serious pilot efforts. 

 

Paul

 

Doc / Dr TLUD / Paul S. Anderson, PhD

Email:  psan...@ilstu.edu       Skype:   paultlud     Mobile & WhatsApp: 309-531-4434

Website:    https://woodgas.com see Resources page for 2023 “Roadmap for Climate Intervention with Biochar” and 2020 white paper, 2) RoCC kilns, and 3) TLUD stove technology.                        

 

From: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of John Nissen
Sent: Saturday, July 29, 2023 9:55 AM
To: Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com>
Cc: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>; Shaun Fitzgerald <sd...@cam.ac.uk>; Sir David King <d...@camkas.co.uk>; Ken Caldeira <kcal...@carnegie.stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: Radical thinking

 

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[John Nissen]

Hi Paul,

Yes, I muddled the use of "we".

As a society "we" have indeed failed, because we've relied on the IPCC and their emissions reduction only strategy.  We have believed that geoengineering was intrinsically dangerous and not worth the risk.  We have believed that global warming and sea level rise could be kept within reasonably safe limits, so geoengineering was not necessary.  We have been told that keeping below 1.5C was desirable to prevent the activation of tipping points, yet IPCC kept quiet about tipping points having already been activated.  We have been lulled into a false sense of security.  The fossil fuel industry must be partly to blame: they wanted to maintain the status quo, and this is what they have done remarkably successfully, leaning on governments when necessary.  Human nature also comes into it, with wishful thinking superseding rational argument.

So now "we", as a group of individuals in PRAG and HPAC, have some messages to get across to society:

• global warming is much more dangerous than had been realised;
• global warming and climate change could be reversed with a determined effort;
• reversal may take time and may not be entirely successful, so society will still have to prepare for continued warming, climate change and sea level rise, together with the disruption that these will cause (as Robert points out).
  

This reversal involves geoengineering, hitherto widely considered as a last resort.  But the required geoengineering techniques are essentially benign and their cooling effects have all round benefits for ecosystems as well as humanity (at least I believe that is true for mid to high latitude SAI).

Cheers, John

[Clive Elsworth]

Paul I totally agree.

 

It’s as if we have been driving at 100 mph towards a brick wall that is out of sight over the horizon. Our agreed strategy so far has been to take our foot off the gas, but now we go over the brow of a hill and suddenly we see the wall only 100 yards away. Do we alter our strategy to apply the brake or not? That is the question.

 

The metaphorical brake is albedo enhancement, as you say. Ideally we would do that by a combination of increasing low-lying haze and cloud cover and brightening clouds, mainly outside the polar regions. If we can’t get that to work in time it looks like we’ll need to do stratospheric aerosol injection. If that doesn’t work, we’re f*****.

The question for me is: can we bear to discuss and learn the relevant technical subjects that are currently unfamiliar to us?

 

Clive

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[rob...@rtulip.net]

RC: on your point that “the same structural weaknesses that have prevented effective action to date, will continue to prevent effective action”.

 

That is far from likely.  Capitalism is motivated by profit.  Its leading thinkers can rapidly come to the view that a stable climate is needed for trade security and social licence to operate, and therefore we need solar geoengineering. This simple message has not been articulated with enough clarity, due to the confusion produced by the assumption that cutting emissions is the main climate agenda.

 

Rather than “structural weaknesses”, the main blockage is ideological ignorance, which can readily dissolve when confronted with compelling facts.

 

Rather than dwell on negativity, constructive faith in the ability to create a viable future should be the psychological focus as a basis for hope and organisation.

 

As Buckminster Fuller said, “You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” 

 

Regards

 

Robert Tulip

 

From: planetary-...@googlegroups.com <planetary-...@googlegroups.com> On Behalf Of Robert Chris

Sent: Sunday, July 30, 2023 1:42 AM
To: John Nissen <johnnis...@gmail.com>
Cc: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com; Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>; Shaun Fitzgerald <sd...@cam.ac.uk>; Sir David King <d...@camkas.co.uk>; Ken Caldeira <kcal...@carnegie.stanford.edu>

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[Robert Chris]

Hi Robert

Of course, ideological ignorance is a plausible explanation for the historical blockage.  It isn't an explanation that I find convincing.  There's plenty of research that shows that, at least in our private behaviours, knowledge that those behaviours might cause us harm is not a sufficient driver for those behaviours to be abandoned, if we also consider that they offer us benefits that we'd be reluctant to sacrifice.  The behaviour of the fossil fuel sector over the last several decades is precisely that being played out in the public domain.  There is simply no way you can argue that the key players were ignorant of the basic science over that period.  This is the so-called information deficit model - see here for a paper on its application to climate change.

I also fundamentally disagree that the blockages are not structural.  It's past midnight and this is too big a question to explain in detail here, but suffice to say that our current predicament is not the result of one or two bad actors, it's a systemic feature of capitalism that has been supercharged by the Reagan/Thatcher turn to more or less global neoliberalism.

I am also deeply disappointed by your and others' claims that I am 'dwelling on negativity'.  I am all for exhorting the troops to fight to win, but any good general will also be reflecting on what might go wrong.  The failure to do that means that when things don't turn out as you'd like, as they so often don't, you're totally unprepared for what you are then confronting.  I regard a failure to reflect on the negative to be nothing short of reckless.  A maxim to live by is that when faced with choices with uncertain outcomes, so long as you can cope with the downside, you can let the upside look after itself.  That requires you to think about what could go wrong and make sure you know how you'll handle it.

Buckminster Fuller's remark is one of those clever constructions that sounds good but has little substance, and what substance it has is not relevant to devising and implementing effective global scale responses to climate change.  If, on the other hand, you feel it has a profound message, the old model that needs replacing is capitalism, at east in its current form.  I look forward to hearing how you propose to render that obsolete on a climate-relevant timescale.

Regards

Robert

[rob...@rtulip.net]

RC: please let me clarify.  It is arguable that not only the oil companies but also the IPCC have been “ignorant of the basic science over that period.”

 

The “basic science” is not just the anthropogenic causes of global warming, which are of course well known by massive consensus.  It also includes the far more controversial and difficult topics of the economics, sociology and engineering needed to assess response scenarios that could achieve desired results.  On that score, the deliberate exclusion of albedo enhancement has grossly distorted the consensus view of basic science, producing the false conclusion at COP27 that emissions must halve by 2030 to stay below 1.5°C.

 

Climate Action Tracker produced a range of scenarios for COP27, all fully informed by consensus science, and assuming no action to increase albedo in their 1.5°C compliant paths.  They are shown in the graph I have made below.  What they reveal is that the most likely scenario, extrapolating current trends, termed “Policies and Actions – High”, would not see CO2e fall below 50 Gt/y until 2085, six decades away.  What is most likely without action on albedo is that the world will continue on this dangerous trajectory until political and economic collapse force a revision.  The CAT “optimistic” scenario would require massive expensive difficult and risky economic and social transformation against strong opposition, and still would see GHGs rising at half the current dangerous rate in 2050.  It is generally recognised that the “pledges and targets” scenarios are a pack of lies and spin based on electoral calculations rather than any practical plans.

 

As you have observed, just knowing the cause of global warming does not inspire vested interests to reform, much as was noted in your recent conversation about the causes of the end of whaling.  The “ideological ignorance” is not about carbon, it is about albedo.  There certainly are structural economic barriers to action on carbon, but the only barriers to action on albedo are in people’s minds.

 

The gap to stay below 1.5 can only be filled with solar geoengineering.  This is basic science. Action on carbon will take a much longer than the UN is suggesting. 

 

The “old model that needs replacing” is not capitalism, it is the sclerotic IPCC consensus that excludes action on albedo.  A focus on establishing an International Albedo Union to assess how we can best brighten the planet presents an optimistic pathway that can dissolve the political blockages in a cooperative and constructive and effective scientific way.

 

Regards

 

Robert Tulip

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[Herman Gyr]

Robert, 

You are my Noah - may I be your carpenter?

“German philosopher Günther Anders (1902—1992) was the most profound and radical thinker to have reflected on the major catastrophes of the twentieth century. Rather than weighty systematic treatises, Anders preferred shorter pieces on current issues, sometimes written in the form of a parable. More than once, he will have told in his own way the story of the flood. 

“Noah was tired of playing the prophet of doom and of always foretelling a catastrophe that would not occur and that no one would take seriously. One day,

he clothed himself in sackcloth and put ashes on his head. This act was only permitted to someone lamenting the loss of his dear child or his wife. Clothed in the habit of truth, acting sorrowful, he went back to the city, intent on using to his advantage the curiosity, malignity and superstition of its people. Within a short time, he had gathered around him a small crowd, and the questions began to surface. He was asked if someone was dead and who the dead person was. Noah answered them that many were dead and, much to the amusement of those who were listening, that they themselves were dead. Asked when this catastrophe had taken place, he answered: tomorrow. Seizing this moment of attention and disarray, Noah stood up to his full height and began to speak: the day after tomorrow, the flood will be something that will have been. And when the flood will have been, all that is will never have existed. When the flood will have carried away all that is, all that will have been, it will be too late to remember, for there will be no one left. So there will no longer be any difference between the dead and those who weep for them. If I have come before you, it is to reverse time, it is to weep today for tomorrow's dead. The day after tomorrow, it will be too late. Upon this, he went back home, took his clothes off, removed the ashes covering his face, and went to his workshop. In the evening, a carpenter knocked on his door and said to him: let me help you build an ark, so that this may become false. Later, a roofer joined with them and said: it is raining over the mountains, let me help you, so that this may become false.1

The whole quandary of someone who predicts catastrophe, as well as the ingenious way of getting out of one's predicament, is inscribed in this magnificent parable. The prophet of doom is not heard because his word, even if it brings knowledge and information, does not fit with the beliefs of those to whom it is addressed. It is often said that if we fail to act in the face of catastrophe it is because our knowledge is uncertain. Yet, even when we know something for sure, we are unable to believe what we know. As to the existence and consequences of global warming, scientists have known where things stand for over twenty-five years and have told us so. They are preaching in the desert. Their predictions are doubtless tainted with considerable uncertainty, but that is not the reason why we do not budge.”

https://www.wisdomportal.com/ReneGirard/MourningTheFuture.html

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On Jul 29, 2023, at 4:33 PM, Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[Robert Chris]

Well said, Ye.  I've awoken this morning to RobertT's clarification and came to the exact same conclusion.  Albedo enhancement is a necessary sticking plaster, or perhaps tourniquet would be a better metaphor.  There is no doubt that in the short term it is needed to keep the patient alive.  But, in the longer term the underlying cause of human influence on the climate system has to be moderated.  I don't envisage a time when humans will be able actively to manage the entire climate system by engineering out the accumulating emissions from unending economic growth.  Albedo enhancement cannot be a permanent panacea to offset the impact of those emissions.

The policy question that needs to be answered is how AE and continuing emissions work together to determine the future rate of warming and then, hopefully, cooling.  The time difference in their surface cooling impacts and the regional climate impacts of a climatically significant amount of AE, make this a non-trivial question.  We need to be aware that when we talk about 1.5C or 2C or more of warming, and corresponding amounts of cooling, we're talking in terms of global 24 hour averages.  Those averages might be well constrained but that doesn't mean that local weather patterns will be, and it is local weather patterns that determine habitat, human experience and agricultural yields.  So yes, AE is necessary in the short term but we should not lose sight of the fact that for AE to cool the planet sufficiently, it will need to be supported by a whole stack of other social policy interventions to maintain human health and economic well-being.  That immediately takes us back into the domain of economic policy and geopolitics which have been the source of the continuing blockages in climate policy, and maybe a reason why that continues.

A further consideration is that if, as we agree, smoothing off the environmentally unacceptable rough edges of capitalism is a long term project, the sooner it starts the better.  To argue that the impact of such changes will occur only after several decades so we don't need to worry about them now, is to do what we've been doing with climate policy for decades, pushing the problem and its costs onto the shoulders of future generations.  That reopens the moral debate abut each generation's responsibility for planetary stewardship.

The bottom line for me is that all these issues are intertwined in a complex web.  While policy response are generally focussed on one issue, we need simultaneous policy responses across the board.  We have to approach these questions in parallel not serially.  Our determination to get AE onto the agenda should not be at the expense of maintaining pressure on emissions.

Regards

Robert

On 30/07/2023 10:11, Ye Tao wrote:

Roberts, no need to argue when you are talking about different timescales.  Disposing of capitalism is analogous to reducing atmospheric CO2; both are essential for long-term survival (beyond 2100), but neither can possibly be achieved in this universe given its basical physical laws and emergent ones governing societal function.  

Let's instead focus on making sure that we educate people and governments about the efficacy and co-benefits of local solar radiation optimization.  Even for advocates of SAI, your best bet to get people and governments to accept SRM as a viable policy alternative is through successful MEER projects.

YE

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[Robert Chris]

Hi Ye

I hadn't seen this addendum before I sent my reply to your earlier email.

If you can state so categorically that neither (significant AE cooling and significant changes to capitalism's environmental impact) can possibly be achieved within the next years, which seal our fate,  What is that fate?  Is this the defeatism that I was charged with?  What should we be doing now to lessen the rigours of that forthcoming fate for as many people and other life forms that we can?

Regards

Robert

On 30/07/2023 10:24, Ye Tao wrote:

I need to specify "neither can possibly be achieved" within the next years, which seal our fate.

On 7/30/2023 5:11 AM, Ye Tao wrote:

Roberts, no need to argue when you are talking about different timescales.  Disposing of capitalism is analogous to reducing atmospheric CO2; both are essential for long-term survival (beyond 2100), but neither can possibly be achieved in this universe given its basical physical laws and emergent ones governing societal function.  

Let's instead focus on making sure that we educate people and governments about the efficacy and co-benefits of local solar radiation optimization.  Even for advocates of SAI, your best bet to get people and governments to accept SRM as a viable policy alternative is through successful MEER projects.

YE

On 7/30/2023 12:58 AM, rob...@rtulip.net wrote:

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[Robert Chris]

Hi Ye, I'm glad that you think that cooling can be 'delivered in time'.  Can you say a little more about the undesirable future you want cooling to be in time to avoid?

I'd also be interested in your views on my concerns about our focus on global average metrics obscuring impacts on lived experience that may still be seriously disrupted, and how this should inform our approach to cooling.

Regards

Robert

On 30/07/2023 11:34, Ye Tao wrote:

Hi Robert C, you are not defeatist; you were simply providing projection based on empirically observed past data.  AE cooling most certainly can be achieved in time.  I was saying that CO2 reduction cannot.

Top-down disposal of capitalism is unlikely without a global war that destroys the industrial base necessary for any form of AE cooling.  Our hope lies in the bottom-up creation of coops, worker-owned social businesses, catering to life essentials, and preserving the supply chains necessary for AE.  Hopefully the bottom-up transition happens in large-enough numbers and rather rapidly to keep economic functions as the power of the ultra rich wane together with global total energy consumption.

Ye

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/b8eefea1-69ba-1c3c-99f8-18db243a34ec%40gmail.com.

[Ye Tao]

Roberts, no need to argue when you are talking about different timescales.  Disposing of capitalism is analogous to reducing atmospheric CO2; both are essential for long-term survival (beyond 2100), but neither can possibly be achieved in this universe given its basical physical laws and emergent ones governing societal function.  

Let's instead focus on making sure that we educate people and governments about the efficacy and co-benefits of local solar radiation optimization.  Even for advocates of SAI, your best bet to get people and governments to accept SRM as a viable policy alternative is through successful MEER projects.

YE

On 7/30/2023 12:58 AM, rob...@rtulip.net wrote:

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/03c601d9c2a2%248b90e680%24a2b2b380%24%40rtulip.net.

[Ye Tao]

I need to specify "neither can possibly be achieved" within the next years, which seal our fate.

On 7/30/2023 5:11 AM, Ye Tao wrote:

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/0ca7a4de-1173-cf9a-a516-daf027aa4057%40rowland.harvard.edu.

[Ye Tao]

Hi Robert C, you are not defeatist; you were simply providing projection based on empirically observed past data.  AE cooling most certainly can be achieved in time.  I was saying that CO2 reduction cannot.

Top-down disposal of capitalism is unlikely without a global war that destroys the industrial base necessary for any form of AE cooling.  Our hope lies in the bottom-up creation of coops, worker-owned social businesses, catering to life essentials, and preserving the supply chains necessary for AE.  Hopefully the bottom-up transition happens in large-enough numbers and rather rapidly to keep economic functions as the power of the ultra rich wane together with global total energy consumption.

Ye

On 7/30/2023 6:20 AM, 'Robert Chris' wrote:

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/b8eefea1-69ba-1c3c-99f8-18db243a34ec%40gmail.com.

[Ye Tao]

Hi Robert C,

Well, the 'undesirable future' would involve everything you enumerated before: supply chain collapse, loss of homes and habitat, famine, diseases, unmanageable migration, conflict, etc.  These are ongoing processes that will increasingly dominate the local news in the coming decade.

Global average resembles nothing that people are experiencing on the ground.  There are regions experience cooling, and there are regions where excess rain is the issue, not warming or drought.  Climate impacts are thus functions of location and time. That is why we need to enable diverse, fast-on-off local responses with a versatile tool kit.  If COVID-enabled weather and climate studies taught us anything, it is that that GHG mitigation delivers no local benefits beyond cleaner air; it exacerbates extreme heat, drought, and flood without AE.    SAI also cannot deliver customized local responses, too slow to respond to extreme events, and thwarts local attempts to become energy self-sufficient.   So it is up to MEER, MCB, and perhaps large-scale sea-ice restoration to populate the diverse tool kit.

Spacial heterogeneity extends to regional scales, making it important to coordinate and focusing available global resources on key regions like the Arctic and glaciers where impact are already advanced, and consequences of further exacerbation, deadly.  That is why I think one of the most important discussion currently ongoing is the potential for sea-ice restoration.

Ye 

[Robert Chris]

Ye, am I confusing something here, I seem to recall that primary production is of the order of 100GtC/yr, not 1GtC/yr?  Or was that a typo?

Regards

Robert

On 30/07/2023 13:43, Ye Tao wrote:

Hi Rob,

1) That Sir David King correctly points out the biological potential of the ocean does not lead, as a logical conclusion, to that ecosystem stressed by current and intensifying anthropogenic drive can reverse its downward trend without anthropogenic assistance.  On the contrary, a total stop to human activities would most certainly bring about a rapid increase in EEI, doubling down on what we have witnessed since 2020 lockdowns and maritime fuel regulations.

2) "Humans have reduced living biomass on the planet roughly by half, from 1100 Gt to 550 Gt" does not seem correct.  For the simple fact that primary production has been providing partial, order 1 Gton/year carbon sequestration as an ecosystem service, suggest an increase in total living biomass.  There certainly seems to be a roughly halfing of vertebrate biomass, but most of the biomass is not animals.  Please point me to the relevant references so I can learn more.

3) Left alone, total land surface area suitable for reforestation via agricultural abandonment will shrink due to intensifying drought and fire.

Ye

On 7/30/2023 8:25 AM, rob de laet wrote:

Hello everybody, greetings from Bogota,

while I am following this thread as much as I can, I keep thinking about how anthropocentric this dialogue is, forgetting the elephant in the room and that is the power of nature and the living planet that once revived is perfectly able to regulate its own temperature, nutrient cycles and other measures to protect life. While I don't exclude the possibility of geo-engineering as a way to help resolve the fast accelerating climate chaos, I would focus first of what nature can do for us. Sir David King is in this thread and said that restoring the biological activity of the oceans could sequester several tens of gigatons of CO2 per year. Reviving the oceans can be done within years, recovering whale populations within decades, which is important for the upwelling of nutrients to feed the algae, as are copepods. We know how to do that and this would help a lot with food security as well in the times ahead. I would call this bio-geo-engineering or biomimicry. Algae can impact cloud formation through the production of organic compounds that get ejected into the atmosphere, often through sea spray. Some of these organic compounds can act as cloud condensation nuclei (CCN), which are particles around which water vapor condenses to form cloud droplets. This has been clear from the CLAW hypothesis. Colder oceans are far more biologically productive, which can be stimulated fast.

The land based ecosystems currently do about 8 Gt, while if we would regenerate those ecosystems and transition to regenerative agriculture and in the warm regions to agroforestry, we could double that. But as we all know CO2 is just a part of the problem, the larger problem is land use change leading to disruption of the water cycles, destroying living biomass, decreasing cloud formation over land, precipitation, the export of thermal radiation into outer space and the weirding of weather patterns. 

Humans have reduced living biomass on the planet roughly by half, from 1100 Gt to 550 Gt and with that severely reduced the temperature regulation capacity of the planet which is primary ruled by photosynthesis in its interaction with water and CO2. Cooling the Arctic, and regrowing the Arctic ice and reverse melting on Greenland would definitively be in the top five of my list of priorities, and here some direct measures to increase albedo may be possible, including cloud brightening and possibly increasing precipitation, but the larger impacts can be gotten from restoring biological activity. 

How fast nature recovers after humans have left, is clear from this paper about the largest genocide in history, the temperature globally dropped after tens of millions of Native Indians died caused by the viruses and bacteria the colonists brought along, collapsing agriculture, gave forests a chance to regrow and cooled the planet by about 0,15 C within decades. Now this has all been attributed to CO2 sequestration but of course the far larger impact was the increase of evapotranspiration, cloud formation and rain over North America. It was soon reversed again by more human activity. 

Earth system impacts of the European arrival and Great Dying in the Americas after 1492. 

We have little chance to reverse the situation and avert global collapse of societies, which has already started in several places around the world. Nature will recover fast after our numbers have dwindled and the planet will start cooling itself again through the rebound of living biomass, but that is obviously not the intention of this group, it is to SOS.

Grateful for being in this group, hoping that ecocentric or gaiacentric thinking will be part of the total solution set in this group. 

Wishing you all a wonderful Sunday. 

Rob de Laet 

Member of the Eco Restoration Alliance

Fellow of the Global Evergreening Alliance

WhatsApp: +55 71 992617846

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/aad28ce5-af96-3ee8-7cfb-46655972fa57%40gmail.com.

[Tom Goreau]

Rob is right, we’ve destroyed about half the biomass in the world, but obviously there are no good pre-human measurements. It is true that there is a small increase in global biomass at this time, largely because of reforestation of abandoned agricultural lands in Europe, and North America.

 

From: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>
Date: Sunday, July 30, 2023 at 8:44 AM
To: rob de laet <robd...@yahoo.com>, rob...@rtulip.net <rob...@rtulip.net>, 'Robert Chris' <robert...@gmail.com>
Cc: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>, 'Planetary Restoration' <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>, 'Shaun Fitzgerald' <sd...@cam.ac.uk>, 'Sir David King' <d...@camkas.co.uk>, 'Ken Caldeira' <kcal...@carnegie.stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: [prag] Re: Radical thinking

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/aad28ce5-af96-3ee8-7cfb-46655972fa57%40gmail.com.

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[Robert Chris]

Got it!  I misread what you'd written.  I now see that you were talking about 1GtC/yr of carbon sequestration, not 1GtC/yr of C drawdown from primary production.

Regards

Robert

On 30/07/2023 13:58, Ye Tao wrote:

Hi Robert,

I am talking about NET flux.   The total land sequestration flux is about 3 Gton carbon per year.   I don't know how that divide into living biomass vs detritus.   I think order 1GtC/yr going into living biomass is a good guesstimate.

Seems many are confused, apparently.  I bet Peter F's proposed 50 Gton  per year OIF drawdown rate is from assuming that respiration, which is also order 100GtC/yr, would magically stop working.

Ye

[H simmens]

Hi Ye,

In light of your earlier comment “Let's instead focus on making sure that we educate people and governments about the efficacy and co-benefits of local solar radiation optimization” what can be learned from the concentration of greenhouses in Almeria as a model for food production and localized cooling? (See below)

(I was reminded of Almeria while watching a feature on television this morning that praised the greenhouses there, without once mentioning the cooling effect.) 

Herb

“Since the 1980s, Almería in southern Spain has developed the largest concentration of greenhouses in the world, covering 26,000 hectares. The greenhouses reflect so much sunlight back into the atmosphere that they are actually cooling the province, Spanish researchers have found. 

While temperatures in the rest of Spain have climbed at rates above the world average, meteorological observatories located in the so-called sea of plastic have shown them moving in the opposite direction, with a decline of 0.3 degrees per decade. 

The strange phenomenon had not gone unnoticed in scientific circles, and now a study has suggested a plausible explanation: the white colour of the plastic reflects sunlight into the atmosphere as if it were a mirror, and it slows the warming of the surface. In this way, the greenhouses at a local level offset the rising temperatures associated with global warming.“

Herb Simmens
Author of A Climate Vocabulary of the Future

“A SciencePoem and an Inspiration.” Kim Stanley Robinson
@herbsimmens
HerbSimmens.com

[Tom Goreau]

There are dozens of books and papers on the subject (don’t have handy here), that have estimated the loss of biomass from very different points of view.

 

Bill Ruddiman’s books are the best introduction to how land use changes affect the atmosphere, which came from studying deep sea sediment cores.

 

On top of that you need to remember that we have lost about half the soil carbon wherever forests have been converted to farmland or pasture land, and soil has 2-6 or so times more carbon than biomass!

 

Almost all grasslands were once forests whose recovery was prevented by systematic re-burning to “manage” wildlife.

 

In particular we’ve destroyed around half the wetlands, whose soil carbon is richest.

 

To get a grasp of historic changes in forest biomass everywhere you have to compare the very first accurate descriptions with the second, because the second described a landscape already largely destroyed or well on the way.

 

And in some places, such as Europe or China, the first written descriptions are way too late; who documented the great forests that covered most of Europe or China before they were burned down, long before Plato’s time when they were only a folk myth marked by dried up springs, whose goddesses had lost their homes?

 

For example the world’s richest soil, the Chernozem (“black earth”) of the Ukraine, the world’s richest soil, is black with biochar from the ashes of a vast forest whose memory is lost.

 

But we can infer a lot of that prehistory by integrating the right marine and lake sediment records, a vast field of interdisciplinary field of its own.

 

From: Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>
Date: Sunday, July 30, 2023 at 9:58 AM
To: Tom Goreau <gor...@globalcoral.org>, rob de laet <robd...@yahoo.com>, rob...@rtulip.net <rob...@rtulip.net>, 'Robert Chris' <robert...@gmail.com>
Cc: healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>, 'Planetary Restoration' <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>, 'Shaun Fitzgerald' <sd...@cam.ac.uk>, 'Sir David King' <d...@camkas.co.uk>, 'Ken Caldeira' <kcal...@carnegie.stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: [prag] Re: Radical thinking

Hi Tom,

A doubling compared to current biomass is a lot of mass! Is that based on the assumption that current agricultural land were mostly forested at carbon densities comparable to or above the current global average?  To me it feels on the larger side since only 1/3 of land surface area has been converted, and total ocean biomass perturbation is likely proportionally smaller.

Any papers to suggest?

Thanks

Ye

[Tom Goreau]

Here’s a 30 kilometer long reflective paradise of greenhouses in Almeria, Andalusia, Spain:

 

 

From: planetary-...@googlegroups.com <planetary-...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of H simmens <hsim...@gmail.com>
Date: Sunday, July 30, 2023 at 10:33 AM
To: Ye Tao <t...@rowland.harvard.edu>
Cc: rob...@rtulip.net <rob...@rtulip.net>, Robert Chris <robert...@gmail.com>, healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com <healthy-planet-...@googlegroups.com>, Planetary Restoration <planetary-...@googlegroups.com>, Shaun Fitzgerald <sd...@cam.ac.uk>, Sir David King <d...@camkas.co.uk>, Ken Caldeira <kcal...@carnegie.stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: [prag] Re: Radical thinking

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[rob de laet]

Hello everybody, greetings from Bogota,

while I am following this thread as much as I can, I keep thinking about how anthropocentric this dialogue is, forgetting the elephant in the room and that is the power of nature and the living planet that once revived is perfectly able to regulate its own temperature, nutrient cycles and other measures to protect life. While I don't exclude the possibility of geo-engineering as a way to help resolve the fast accelerating climate chaos, I would focus first of what nature can do for us. Sir David King is in this thread and said that restoring the biological activity of the oceans could sequester several tens of gigatons of CO2 per year. Reviving the oceans can be done within years, recovering whale populations within decades, which is important for the upwelling of nutrients to feed the algae, as are copepods. We know how to do that and this would help a lot with food security as well in the times ahead. I would call this bio-geo-engineering or biomimicry. Algae can impact cloud formation through the production of organic compounds that get ejected into the atmosphere, often through sea spray. Some of these organic compounds can act as cloud condensation nuclei (CCN), which are particles around which water vapor condenses to form cloud droplets. This has been clear from the CLAW hypothesis. Colder oceans are far more biologically productive, which can be stimulated fast.

The land based ecosystems currently do about 8 Gt, while if we would regenerate those ecosystems and transition to regenerative agriculture and in the warm regions to agroforestry, we could double that. But as we all know CO2 is just a part of the problem, the larger problem is land use change leading to disruption of the water cycles, destroying living biomass, decreasing cloud formation over land, precipitation, the export of thermal radiation into outer space and the weirding of weather patterns. 

Humans have reduced living biomass on the planet roughly by half, from 1100 Gt to 550 Gt and with that severely reduced the temperature regulation capacity of the planet which is primary ruled by photosynthesis in its interaction with water and CO2. Cooling the Arctic, and regrowing the Arctic ice and reverse melting on Greenland would definitively be in the top five of my list of priorities, and here some direct measures to increase albedo may be possible, including cloud brightening and possibly increasing precipitation, but the larger impacts can be gotten from restoring biological activity. 

How fast nature recovers after humans have left, is clear from this paper about the largest genocide in history, the temperature globally dropped after tens of millions of Native Indians died caused by the viruses and bacteria the colonists brought along, collapsing agriculture, gave forests a chance to regrow and cooled the planet by about 0,15 C within decades. Now this has all been attributed to CO2 sequestration but of course the far larger impact was the increase of evapotranspiration, cloud formation and rain over North America. It was soon reversed again by more human activity. 

Earth system impacts of the European arrival and Great Dying in the Americas after 1492. 

We have little chance to reverse the situation and avert global collapse of societies, which has already started in several places around the world. Nature will recover fast after our numbers have dwindled and the planet will start cooling itself again through the rebound of living biomass, but that is obviously not the intention of this group, it is to SOS.

Grateful for being in this group, hoping that ecocentric or gaiacentric thinking will be part of the total solution set in this group. 

Wishing you all a wonderful Sunday. 

Rob de Laet 

Member of the Eco Restoration Alliance

Fellow of the Global Evergreening Alliance

WhatsApp: +55 71 992617846

On Sunday, 30 July 2023 at 12:14:05 CEST, 'Robert Chris' <robert...@gmail.com> wrote:

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/aad28ce5-af96-3ee8-7cfb-46655972fa57%40gmail.com.

[Ye Tao]

Hi Rob,

1) That Sir David King correctly points out the biological potential of the ocean does not lead, as a logical conclusion, to that ecosystem stressed by current and intensifying anthropogenic drive can reverse its downward trend without anthropogenic assistance.  On the contrary, a total stop to human activities would most certainly bring about a rapid increase in EEI, doubling down on what we have witnessed since 2020 lockdowns and maritime fuel regulations.

2) "Humans have reduced living biomass on the planet roughly by half, from 1100 Gt to 550 Gt" does not seem correct.  For the simple fact that primary production has been providing partial, order 1 Gton/year carbon sequestration as an ecosystem service, suggest an increase in total living biomass.  There certainly seems to be a roughly halfing of vertebrate biomass, but most of the biomass is not animals.  Please point me to the relevant references so I can learn more.

3) Left alone, total land surface area suitable for reforestation via agricultural abandonment will shrink due to intensifying drought and fire.

Ye

On 7/30/2023 8:25 AM, rob de laet wrote:

[Ye Tao]

Hi Robert,

I am talking about NET flux.   The total land sequestration flux is about 3 Gton carbon per year.   I don't know how that divide into living biomass vs detritus.   I think order 1GtC/yr going into living biomass is a good guesstimate.

Seems many are confused, apparently.  I bet Peter F's proposed 50 Gton  per year OIF drawdown rate is from assuming that respiration, which is also order 100GtC/yr, would magically stop working.

Ye

On 7/30/2023 8:47 AM, 'Robert Chris' wrote:

[Ye Tao]

Hi Tom,

A doubling compared to current biomass is a lot of mass! Is that based on the assumption that current agricultural land were mostly forested at carbon densities comparable to or above the current global average?  To me it feels on the larger side since only 1/3 of land surface area has been converted, and total ocean biomass perturbation is likely proportionally smaller.

Any papers to suggest?

Thanks

Ye

On 7/30/2023 8:55 AM, Tom Goreau wrote:

[Ye Tao]

Thanks!   I will check out Ruddiman's work.

The soil part would make sense if we are talking about total terrestrial surface carbon loss: biomass+soil organic carbon. 

Given a 0.3-0.4 tonC/hectare-year soil accumulation rate, scaling to global reforestation by banning agriculture would provide 1-2 GtonC/year global soil carbon sequestration rate (5E9 hectare of agricultural land).  The Anthropogenic problem of CO2(atm) is one which nature would require centuries to solve, long after the perpetrators will have died out.

Ye

[Ye Tao]

Hi Herb,

This inadvertent field experiment offers tantalizing hints that it may be possible to build local oasis that remain agriculturally productive even as sounding land masses 'Venusiforms.   I think our closest shot at eventually "colonizing Mars" would be to race towards preserving as many and as large as possible of these local oasis, and attempt to merge them by lateral expansion in an actual Terra(re)forming program.

I was not able to find in situ temperature time series of the inadvertent experiment and was not able to reach the lead author on some of the publications.  That is why we are hoping to setup a hectare scale experiment in the near future to more rigorously compare before and after air temperatures at 3 vertical heights and on the order of 100 locations within and outside of the perturbation area.

Ye

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[rob de laet]

Hi Ye, 

thank you for your answer. 

Regarding 1: I would not at all opt for stopping human activities, but redesigning them, especially with regards to fast reduction of toxic chemicals which destroys the capacity for rebound of ecosystems and smart application of knowledge to regenerate ecosystems and design& create climate resilient landscapes with a focus on water retention, biomass increase, biodiversity protection and multi species food production. Bio-geo-engineering through ocean fertilization would be one of the things we need to do right away and ocean systems are much faster at recovery than land based ones. We could pay the 600 million small holder families in the Global South for this transition on land and increase their earnings in the process, which could also slow down climate migration. Personally I think we should couple the exit from oil and gas to the redesign of the food system, otherwise you collapse the system via another path: rising food prices = revolt = weaking of society's capacity to react to the climate chaos, which is a vicious cycle. We need to stop focusing solely on getting emissions down. 

Re 2: new biomass creation per year, net primary productivity is estimated at roughly 100 Gt of carbon, so there is really room to move here as the carbon in human emissions is about 10 Gt/y. I think this is a reasonable source for current quantities: Biomass (ecology) - Wikipedia. This article would be a reasonable first source for the original amount of biomass, estimated at 1000 Gt during the Roman empire. Human domination of the biosphere. Again, let me stress that the largest climate impact of living biomass is NOT CO2 sequestration but the management of the water cycle: evapotranspiration, cloud formation, precipitation, wind/biotic pump creation and thermal radiation into space, partially through heating up the tropopauze and stratosphere, partially through direct radiation at the 10 Mu frequency, at condensation of that vapor at cloud level. Increasing evapotranspiration by about 10.000 km3 per year would probably have more than enough combined effect to stop the planet from heating up. This can be done through the regeneration of ecosystems on land and in the oceans. If we would start today, at scale, we would see the calming of the weather within years and an end to the heating up of the planet in maybe 20 years. Specific strategic actions would have to be taken to stop the melting of the cryosphere and reverse the destruction of the tropical rainforests.

Re3: Indeed, if left on its own dehydration will follow, but with smart micro management of the water cycle we can do a lot. The trampling hoofs of a great herd alone can wake up a desert because of the water that stays in the small indentations, reaching dormant seeds in stead of running off hard baked soil, to mention just one example. Slowing down the run off of water worldwide is the first measure to help increase biomass production by rehydrating the land masses. There is no one size fits all, it needs local solutions to local problems.

Let me mention one example on why Spain is drying out, which is now solely attributed to warming temperatures: Millan Millan, a Mediterranean climate expert, grew up with his father teaching him how to read weather patterns and track storms in the maqui of southern Spain. Years later, he was asked by the European Commission to investigate the disappearance of afternoon storms in the Western Mediterranean Basin, which were key to keeping precipitation up. Through his research, Millan discovered that land-use perturbations over historical time, accelerated in the last 30 years, were rendering the land unable to support the region's climate, leading to the vanishing storms and drying up of rivers. Nothing was done with this study, but could still be revived. 

Hope this is of any use. 

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/af2f11e2-15d5-70b5-9b7e-7ba82e56e010%40rowland.harvard.edu.

[Ye Tao]

Hi Rob

1) totally agree with the need to transition to an regenerative agriculture-focused civilization.  But that transition would prove impossible without local solar radiation optimization.

2) It is wrong to cite and consider the 120 Gton primary production in isolation.  Until the 117 Gton of respiration could stopped, we are left with 3 GtonC to work with.

3) Micromanagement of small plots of land in one's backyard will have no measurable global impact.

Ye

[rob de laet]

Hello Ye, hello everybody,

1) agree, but Nature Based Solutions can be a great help here. 

2) understood, like in a body, the biosphere should be observed as warm blooded being regulating its bodily function. I am an adept to the Gaia theory. 

3) I micromanaged a 150 ha piece of land myself and the changes were incredible and incredibly fast, temperatures came down, springs came back, birds flocked to the small valley. During the last regional drought, this place was the only one in the region with still sufficient water. 

From that experienc I designed the transition through financing the actions of 600 million small holder farmers in the Global South. That is a lot of hands with the people who know how to work the land. if on average they would make the transition on half a hectare, the increase in evapotranspiration/cloud formation/small water cycle management on 300 mio ha (something the size of India) would be enough to reverse a lot of extreme weather and together and combined with ocean based measures would stop the further heating up of the planet. 

Apart from the game-changing climatic effects this program brings increased food and water security, biodiversity protection, increased income for maybe two billion people, slowing and maybe as much as reversing political instability and climate migration and increased well-being as linking all these people to the internet can give access to high quality education, training, health care and digital finance. That covers roughly all the SDGs. 

kind regards,

Rob de Laet 

Member of the Eco Restoration Alliance

Fellow of the Global Evergreening Alliance

WhatsApp: +55 71 992617846

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/healthy-planet-action-coalition/f505ef86-bc65-b5e5-d54c-1d761a0bfa37%40rowland.harvard.edu.

[Ye Tao]

If we could mobilize all 8billion to start manage our per capita 0.5 hectare of agricultural land, then humanity would truly have a bright future!

Cheers,

Ye

[Bruce Melton -- Austin, Texas]

On global carbon stock degradation -

Erb 2017 - About half of carbon storage across Earth has been removed by humans… (meta study) "Vegetation currently stores around 450 petagrams of carbon. In the hypothetical absence of land use, potential vegetation would store around 916 petagrams of carbon, under current climate conditions. This difference highlights the massive effect of land use on biomass stocks. Deforestation and other land-cover changes are responsible for 53–58% of the difference between current and potential biomass stocks. Land management effects (the biomass stock changes induced by land use within the same land cover) contribute 42–47%."
Erb et al., Unexpectedly large impact of forest management and grazing on global vegetation biomass , Nature, December 20, 2017.
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature25138

It is also important to understand that most forests around the world are likely in collapse and emitting, and the same can likely be said for about half of our Earth systems. Lenton 2019 and Mckay 2023, as well as Rockstrom 2023 all suggest that tipping is broadly active across the planet. Activated tipping is the same as Earth systems collapse activation. Because Earth systems are only modest sequestration systems, collapse likely flips them to emissions. Irreversible tipping (almost always referred to as simply "tipping" in the literature) comes at some point after collapse initiation when the system is so degraded it cannot self-restore if the perturbation that caused the collapse to begin is removed.

On Ruddiman -

In early Texas Spring this year, Truthout.org published an epic article I produced that speaks of Ruddiman's work on the Early Anthropocene, and the whole story on retreat of glaciers from after the Little Ice Age to today. I believe the final had nine before and after photo sliders of glacial retreat. All of Ruddiman's important works, plus others (like Erb 2017 above) are included in the references.

Glacier Retreat, Climate Change, and Why the Little Ice Age Ended

Melton, ClimateDiscovery.org
January 31, 2023, Full article with summarized references
https://climatediscovery.org/glacier-retreat-the-little-ice-age-and-climate-change/

(An abridged version only linking references was published on Truithout.org on February 7, 2023, with the title –
Melting Glaciers Show Why Climate Targets Below 1.5°C Are Needed,
Earth’s systems can restore themselves, but not if global climate policy permits 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming.)
https://truthout.org/articles/melting-glaciers-show-why-climate-targets-below-1-5c-are-needed/

107 in Austin today ~ ~ ~

-Melton

Bruce Melton PE
Director, Climate Change Now Initiative, 501c3
President, Melton Engineering Services Austin
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To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/planetary-restoration/BY3PR13MB49949F1F60BEABCA0002BE9FDD04A%40BY3PR13MB4994.namprd13.prod.outlook.com.