Plans

Dear Blogger

I just visited your website and thought you might interested in a campaign that I’m working on called 350.org.

As you probably know, 2009 is the most important year for climate change in our history. In December, world leaders will meet at the United Nations Climate Meetings in Copenhagen, Denmark to pass a new international climate treaty. The problem is, if the treaty was negotiated today it would be woefully inadequate.

On October 24, 6 weeks before the Copenhagen meetings, 350.org is planning an International Day of Climate Action. Our goal is to have thousands of events at iconic places all over the world — the Taj Mahal, the Great Barrier Reef, on the melting glaciers of Mt. Kilimanjaro — to call for strong action on climate change. We just launched our campaign a few weeks ago, and already over 600 events are registered in 50 countries. Here’s an animation that explains a bit more of our campaign:

Why 350? According to the latest science, 350 ppm (parts per million) is the safe upper-limit of C02 in our atmosphere. But 350 is more than a number — it’s fast becoming a symbol of a global movement.

It would be great to have your help spreading the word.
Thanks

Emily

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Dear Brave New Climate

You are probably aware of most of the opinions below, but some of them are I think of interest and less well known.

Mr Avi Polymorph

CLIMATE CHANGE and INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION 2.0

The present actions and plans of governments will not be enough to prevent a temperature increase of 6 degrees Celsius at some point in the next few decades after fifteen years’ time. This will occur unless there is a complete halt to use of coal, oil and natural gas within the next year to five years.

In the absence of a nanotube-materials space elevator (for deploying space-based micro-thin mirror systems for sunlight reduction) carbon filter systems (so-called “trees”) can be used to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, but this would currently be very expensive at the vast scale needed. Gregory Benford has proposed distributing dirt (diatomaceous earth) into the stratosphere above the Arctic sea, for reflectivity temperature reduction, similar to the effect of a volcanic explosion but environmentally friendly. The projected cost for a test is a quarter of a billion dollars. There is also a similar notion for utilizing sea water spray from ships. Either proposal if implemented could incrementally and safely delay climate change as did previous pollution-generated acid rain reflectivity.

As of last year, thin-film solar power, proprietary to US and European companies, is far cheaper than black coal. Clean coal will be more expensive than black coal. This means capitalists will abandon coal as an energy source once fuller hydrogen distribution and storage mechanisms are in place. It also means energy costs will be reduced. Nations with lesser sunlight will suffer financially and have to import energy in the form of hydrogen. Coal and oil are useful sources for carbon fibre, carbon nanotubes and plastics, so coal owners will not lose all the value of their resource. The US, China, the middle east, Australia and Africa, for example, all have extensive sources of solar power, via thin-film, chip and developmental technologies (leading to the most efficient source of solar power, quantum dot technology, which can siphon two thirds of the energy of sunlight).

Cost savings for taxi, bus and truck operators will result from carbon fibre components and hydrogen, battery, air pressure and flywheel systems. Cost savings for airplanes will result from gravity-assisted mixed dirigible/airplane hybrids. Shipping needs will be reduced in the 2020s due to the development of nanotechnological assemblers/engines (also known as molecular manufacturing).

Assemblers provide individuated and distributed industrial production mechanisms, in a changeover from single-product mass assembly systems, as popularized by Henry Ford. It should be noted that the products of the first assemblers will include computers and robotics. Development of assemblers in the US has been delayed due to previous opposition from sceptics, led by John McCain in the US Senate and scientist Richard Smalley. Current European funding is minimal and sudden Chinese research into the field has accelerated massively. Projected costs for producing a working basic assembler are one billion dollars over fifteen years or less if computing power continues to grow at current levels.

Orbital solar power via microwave transmission would be open to all technologically developed nations, but only if a nanotube-materials space elevator is built, and only if access is provided by the relevant country or consortium of countries, as the first such elevator is predicted to receive 90% of all space traffic, as limited by the number of carriages on the initial line. NASA has led initial research and Japan has recently declared ambitious interest.

Fusion power systems are being established by the ITER/DEMO consortium of key wealthy and emerging wealthy nations. This will not happen until the 2020s due to lack of sufficient funding and lack of multiple development tracks. Fast-tracking fusion by governments would result in the development of the first 100 reactors being brought forward from the 2050s to the early 2020s. There are sufficient fusion fuel sources for tens of thousands of reactors. Fusion power reduces the cost of electricity massively.

Fusion power, in conjunction with assemblers, will reduce world poverty. Fusion power could help power carbon filter systems to quickly remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

There are limits to the renewability of geothermal power but tidal, sea, wind and temperature differential power systems could, if developed in concert with a level of attention similar to that provided in time of war, each provide as much power as is currently consumed.

Climate change cannot be rationally considered in isolation from technological and economic developments that are proceeding even as we debate. Technological developments are producing the new industrial revolution, Industrial Revolution 2.0, in a fashion akin to that of the period between 1870 and 1915. During this period iron and steel production, mass assembly and railroad technology, in conjunction with electricity, led to an explosive growth of trade and the middle class. If governments can debate and lead the issues to come, driven by the necessity of avoiding catastrophic climate change, we can achieve a safer and pleasanter world for all.

Avi Polymorph
403 St Georges Rd
North Fitzroy
VIC 3068
AUSTRALIA

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