Thread: Global Warming Reversible?

Is global warming reversible in any way, or can we only slow its progression?

We can reverse it all right, but it would take quite awhile, because we haveto stop it first. And with today's leaders, I don't think we close.

kill all the whales :winki am joking on that) but from what i understand plankton soaks up way more co2 than trees by a massive margin

I've heard theres talk in pumping co2 into the sea bed, but theres concerns about leakage, but thats where all the natural gas has been stored naturally for years, not the perfect solution.

Originally Posted by captaincaveman

kill all the whales :winki am joking on that) but from what i understand plankton soaks up way more co2 than trees by a massive margin

I've heard theres talk in pumping co2 into the sea bed, but theres concerns about leakage, but thats where all the natural gas has been stored naturally for years, not the perfect solution.

Seriously, I grow as much vegetation as I can on my property, we have a portion of solar and wind power. I have put a highly reflective roof on the shed (last year) and on the porch, and a bay window. That I calculate will buy the world about another second.

Originally Posted by billco

Originally Posted by captaincaveman

kill all the whales :winki am joking on that) but from what i understand plankton soaks up way more co2 than trees by a massive margin

I've heard theres talk in pumping co2 into the sea bed, but theres concerns about leakage, but thats where all the natural gas has been stored naturally for years, not the perfect solution.

Seriously, I grow as much vegetation as I can on my property, we have a portion of solar and wind power. I have put a highly reflective roof on the shed (last year) and on the porch, and a bay window. That I calculate will buy the world about another second.

i leave my lawn ages before i cut it. does this help

As long as you don't burn the trimmings, that just put's all the CO2 absorbed during growth back into the atmosphere, Try bagging it up and putting it in the attic, this will help with insulation and the next people in will have to pay the carbon tax! 8)

Originally Posted by billco

As long as you don't burn the trimmings, that just put's all the CO2 absorbed during growth back into the atmosphere, Try bagging it up and putting it in the attic, this will help with insulation and the next people in will have to pay the carbon tax! 8)

I leave the clipings when I cut my lawn. Or at least what's left of it after intense hours of playing soccer.

yes ...so worms...that breath out co2 can cosume them...or bacteria which produce co2...good one...

Can we stop this global warning? Yes we definitely can. Its only whether we want to do it or not. Right now, the mentality is that we are not focusing on reducing greenhouse gases yet. I am advocating complete focus on reducing carbon dioxide levels below 300 ppm. IF we do that, we will have a stable Earth to live on.

Say for example, introduce laws to ban all incandescent light bulbs. That alone would dramatically reduce the amount of power used for lights and it will reduce greenhouse gases. If one country does it, it might not mean a lot, but if everything single First World country changes all light bulbs to fluroscent light bulbs-much more energy saving, there will be a huge reduction of greenhouse emissions..


Another example, cut back dramatically on use of coal powered power stations and switch to lower carbon emissions sources of fuel. Make use of as much solar powered electricity and wind powered electricity as much as possible. Every single rooftop can have a solar cell on it to heat water. Every single high rise buildings can have windmills on top of it to catch the wind.
This is another huge cutback in greenhouse emissions already.

Thirdly, introduce laws that all new production cars must fufil low carbon emissions quota.

Fourly, change deserts into thriving rainforests. If we do that, there will be new sources of carbon intakers.

IF every single one of us, helps to reduce greenhouse gases emissions as much as possible, even how much what i say above sounds impossible, if we can do it, we will suceed.

Its only a matter of willingness. We certainly got the capability and technology to do that.

Global Warming is more of a global climate change
evidence from ice has shown climate change has happend many times
its most likely that humans do comtribute to this change

walking to work, bikeing, ect. can and will help local air quality
however stoping global warming or climate change or whatever you want to call it is like stopping a elephant will a sheet of paper

its going to happen

however things will become "normal" after time, just as it has in the past

To NJ14. Are u suggesting we should just sit back and wait while our civilisation is utterly wiped out by global warming? Which causing already so much harm to our land and killing so many.

Originally Posted by Cytosine12

To NJ14. Are u suggesting we should just sit back and wait while our civilisation is utterly wiped out by global warming? Which causing already so much harm to our land and killing so many.

God no, humans have pretty much taken a crap on the enviroment.

I think its time that we dig out head out of the sand and see what we have done.

I dont think its Global climate change that is harming the earth and such.

Evidence in ice samples has shown that there has been global shifts in tempiture many times in earths history.

I do think that humans are speeding up this up greatly.

What we should be worrying about is the toxic waste that is being put in the enviroment.

Most concerning to me is bioaccumulative waste like murcury.

This is not to say that we should sit back and wait, I think more money should be going into alternete energy than oil, to reduce co2 output.

So no, im not suggesting that we sit and wait.
We need to stop freaking out, get it together, and work as a world to stop pollution on all fronts.


With this all said, i suggest looking up the evidence that supports the theory that Global Climate Change is a nateral event.

Global warming is pretty easy to reverse, with current technology, means, and relatively little cost. We know very well that floating a lot of fine particles in the atmosphere leads to thick & widespread cloud cover and record cold temperatures. We know the effect fades without awful long term consequences. We have bombs don't we?



The gentle way would be to let half our farmland return to dustbowl & tumbleweed... over my dead body.

Sometimes I think environmentalists must be pastoralists, that they can't see what agriculture has done to the land.

Originally Posted by Pong

Global warming is pretty easy to reverse, with current technology, means, and relatively little cost. We know very well that floating a lot of fine particles in the atmosphere leads to thick & widespread cloud cover and record cold temperatures. We know the effect fades without awful long term consequences. We have bombs don't we?



The gentle way would be to let half our farmland return to dustbowl & tumbleweed... over my dead body.

Sometimes I think environmentalists must be pastoralists, that they can't see what agriculture has done to the land.

am i right in thinking that what you want to do is detonate an exposive device to send particles in to the air?

great idea, ever heard of a impact winter, sure it will cool the earth,this would not have long term effects, other then kill us, along with all life on earth

even if a bomb was not used, the end would be the same

Originally Posted by Nj14

great idea, ever heard of a impact winter, sure it will cool the earth,this would not have long term effects, other then kill us, along with all life on earth

I do believe moderation is possible. I'm wanting just the volumes associated with volcanism... not heavy enough to bring an ice age. This would be an ongoing effort, and needn't be very consistent. We may begin tentatively, measure our effect, and change the rate and production sites every decade or so.

The idea that we should mitigate the effects of one man made pollutant by deliberately injecting particles of another (sulfates are usually proposed) into the atmosphere seems to me to be entirely the wrong approach.

We didn’t know what CO2 would do when we started burning fossil fuels on a large scale. With sulfates we can predict some of the consequences, which include increased acid rain, and damage to the ozone layer. But the biggest objection is that it would amount to a license to continue and even increase producing CO2, which in turn would require more sulfate, in a continuing laddering-up of the problem. Then, what if we were forced to stop injecting sulfate for some unpredictable reason? The CO2 is there for the long term, while the sulfate will be rained out or otherwise depleted. A sudden forced stop to the sulfate injection could mean a sudden rapid global temperature increase that our descendants would have to cope with.

Great Discution,
But , What about Ozone layer ? Is that reversible ?

Originally Posted by Bunbury

The idea that we should mitigate the effects of one man made pollutant by deliberately injecting particles of another (sulfates are usually proposed) into the atmosphere seems to me to be entirely the wrong approach.

We didn’t know what CO2 would do when we started burning fossil fuels on a large scale. With sulfates we can predict some of the consequences, which include increased acid rain, and damage to the ozone layer. But the biggest objection is that it would amount to a license to continue and even increase producing CO2, which in turn would require more sulfate, in a continuing laddering-up of the problem. Then, what if we were forced to stop injecting sulfate for some unpredictable reason? The CO2 is there for the long term, while the sulfate will be rained out or otherwise depleted. A sudden forced stop to the sulfate injection could mean a sudden rapid global temperature increase that our descendants would have to cope with.

What I'm suggesting is we mechanically eject exactly that mix of soils that was naturally blown off before we carpeted the dry lands with erosion-resistant crops and fodders (e.g. prairies, and extreme examples with California, Israel). So a region like modern Saskatchewan would figure how much surface particle agriculture artificially withholds, and set about literally blowing that volume off the surface. The blend would be similar to what wind would have taken naturally. This is merely compensating, in a crude though fitting way (I think) for our footprint.

We could employ different strategies to restore wind erosion, while simultaneously enjoying our vast stretches of wheatfield, planted pasture, etc. Farmers could plow up erosion strips, rotate them. Simulated volcanic explosion is just one strategy we already know effective.

The basic suggestion is, that since our greatest impact has been - and will continue to be! - reduced wind erosion of Earth's surface, we might compensate by enhancing erosion from some concentrated areas.

Lots of issues with this idea. Here's one to begin with:

our greatest impact has been - and will continue to be! - reduced wind erosion of Earth's surface

Are you sure this is right? The dustbowl that you already mentioned was the result of agriculture and put megatons of dirt into the atmosphere - a huge example of the very opposite of what you claim. Modern farming is better at conserving the topsoil, but are the prairies more erosion resistant under crops than under natural grasses? I'm skeptical.

Another thing that comes to mind is that the soil locks up huge amounts of carbon in partially decomposed organic matter - humus - far more than is locked up in vegetation. Throw that into the air and its decay to CO2 will be accelerated, while depleteing the quality of the soil at the same time.

Finally, when we've done chucking our topsoil ino the air what will we grow food in?

Edit: Finally finally (just thought of another one) what if the dirt lands on Antarctica or Greenland? It reduces the albedo and accelerates the melting, and we don't want that to happen do we?

I'm thinking this is a Very Bad Idea, but maybe you have some information to share that suggests otherwise.

Well, it could be a very bad idea. The main thing is, it's an Idea, and advertises an aspect of climate change (also natural regulation) that I find ignored.

Sometimes I hear about the problem of desertification. The deserts are growing, or trying to. This is seen to be a bad thing that we should combat. And we do.

I think that our understanding and response to growing deserts - and perhaps even global warming - is not unlike our traditional reaction to fever. We used to see this symptom as the problem and we'd try to cure patients by lowering their body temperature. Now we understand the body raises temperature purposely to cook off an illness. We understand the cure is in that symptom we used to combat. Gosh we used to think (and many people still do!) that a "cold" is caused by "feeling cold". I'm guessing our comprehension of climate is as muddled today as medicine was fifty years ago. Can't help noticing the parallels.

Not sure I quite follow your argument. Are you saying humans are an illness that the planet is trying to cook off?

LOL. I hope not.

What I'm suggesting is that warming may have once been countered by desertification, because increased dust would naturally result from increased temperature. And it appears our efforts over the last century have worked to remove that balance. This is our visible footprint as seen from space. We've created a planet rich in vapour but poor in particles, so, heat no longer brings clouds.

Ah, got it. So perhaps we should stop trying to clean up diesel engine exhaust, remove the baghouses from power plants and forget about smokeless technology for oilfield flares? That ought to do the trick.

hat about breaking CO2 into C & O2? We breath O2, C goes to industry?

hat about breaking CO2 into C & O2? We breath O2, C goes to industry?

This is what plants do. Unfortunately if the C goes to industry in the form of wood and coal it gets converted right back to CO2.

Stopping deforestation, and reforesting already deforested areas would be better.

Originally Posted by Bunbury

Ah, got it. So perhaps we should stop trying to clean up diesel engine exhaust, remove the baghouses from power plants and forget about smokeless technology for oilfield flares? That ought to do the trick.

I guess it depends on the ...er, quality... of soot. Western Canada's pioneer & exploration days, we had forest fires every summer. The air was often smoky, from the fires. These were natural caused, or set purposely by Natives for the future berry crop - had been doing this thousands of years presumably. Now we don't allow forest fires. What's the logic? This is simply humans presuming to know better.

See, just because we don't like a facefull of smoke does not mean it's unnatural. Just because we like a mossy old growth forest, does not mean it's especially valuable in the scheme of things.

Now we don't allow forest fires. What's the logic? This is simply humans presuming to know better.

This is changing. I believe most forest fire suppression these days is aimed at saving houses that have been built where they shouldn't have been built - a questionable use of resources.

But you're right that fire suppression over the years has caused a problem for us today, with forests being denser than they would be naturally. This exacerbates other pre-existing problems too, such as the pine bark beetle problem in Colorado, and I'm sure it's occurring up in western Canada too. The lodgepole pines on the Western Slope will all but disappear. The reasons are complex but probably include a number of factors: climate change has meant the hard freezes to -40 C (and F) don't occur any more and the bugs survive the winters in greater numbers; trees are too close together and the bugs can too easily move from tree to tree; forestry in the early 20th century destroyed the forests' natural variety of tree species, leaving only lodgepoles to grow back, the beetles' favorite food. The green forests are turning red, then grey and there doesn't seem to be much we can do about it.

I am convinced that THE single biggest solution to storing Co2 is permanently sequestering it NOT on the bottom of the oceans, NOT underground where it is WASTED, but in our soils where it becomes economically important and agriculturally essential! ABC's Catalyst has covered this, and even Tim Flannery loves it. Some even think it could sequester ALL mankind's Co2 emissions if just an area the size of France were farmed in this method!

It's called biochar, and I've collected some more links here. I've met many scientists now considering biochar to be the essential missing ingredient for some farming fuel, food, and fixing global warming all in one hit. If this is true, why would we waste money and essential Co2 pumping it to the bottom of any ocean or underground vault?


Hi NJ, there is talk of artificially dumping sulfur high in the sky. It's expensive, and might have other disastrous effects we haven't considered, but they are considering it and many other ideas. Check out "Geoengineering" under wikipedia. For more also see "Can Dr Evil save the world" at Rolling Stone magazine, image below.