Dan’s Wild Wild Science Journal

Everyone in this country has politics on the mind these days. No matter how you vote, everyone agrees it is an historic election.

While both candidates have said they support clean coal, I wonder exactly what that is!

I see lots of ads on TV and online about clean coal. These ads are sponsored by lobbying groups hired by the coal industry.

You can clean up the air pollution coming out of coal. You can drastically reduce the amount of soot, and sulphur, and other pollutants coming from coal fired power plants. Most plants have almost no emission controls at all. Why? Isn’t the clean air act requiring it?

Here is a dirty little secret. The Clean Air Act in 1972 required power plants to install emission controls when they rebuilt their plants. So they have not rebuilt them in 30 years! Well they have, but they have managed to use the acts wording to replace just about everything in the plant, without having to add emission controls!

The only way to make coal truly clean is to mine it in such a way that we do not totally ruin streams, and massacre millions of acres of hardwood forest. If you have not seen what is currently happening to the mountain tops in West Virginia, then you cannot really understand how dirty, and damaging coal is.

Let’s just pretend for a minute that we figure a way to stop lopping off mountains, and polluting streams with toxic materials. We still have the problem of Carbon. Coal is carbon and when you burn it, CO2 goes into the atmosphere. Until we find a way to capture that CO2 and store it, coal will still be very, very dirty.

In spite of the junk science on talk radio, and online, almost every expert on climate on this planet now believes we have less than 30 years to begin reducing our emissions. The world’s leading climate scientist Dr. James Hansen of NASA believes we have even less time than that. He thinks we are on our way to an ice free planet if we do not do something is less than 20 years!

The Sierra Club has a nice site explaining the options here:

http://www.sierraclub.org/sierra/200701/coal.asp

It MIGHT be possible to capture the CO2 and mine coal in a way that is sustainable to our environment. Current estimates put the cost of coal done right at a price more expensive than wind, and solar.

So the next time you see one of those clean coal ads on TV, or online, Or either presidential candidate says they support clean coal technology. Just say what I tell my Environmental Science class at a local college. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS CLEAN COAL. Period.

One last thing. I have mentioned James Hansen several times in this journal. Jim Gandy, a good friend of mine, and one of the best Meteorologists on TV in Eastern America, got an interview with him last Friday. You can see the raw video courtesy WTLX here

Later,

Dan

I am planning on a bigger post later in the week about the public perception on Climate Change. The story is embargoed until 23 October, but it is worth talking about.

For those of you who read my blog from here, in the Mid South part of North America, I will give you a heads up. It looks like the first widespread frost is on the way for Sunday night. I thought it was possible earlier Tuesday, but I said nothing on air because I wanted to see another model run, or two.

Well, I am fairly convinced of it now. A bit earlier than usual too.

I know what your thinking. Could this mean we are in for a hard Winter?

The only correct answer to that is maybe!

In spite of some heroic efforts, the attempts to forecast the weather 3-8 months in advance have not been very successful. The NOAA folks who try to do it work at the Climate Prediction Center in Washington. One of the people involved in the NOAA Long range forecast units published an article in a journal awhile back that was brutally honest. (I am trying to find it but for the life of me, I cannot remember where I read it! It may have been in Science, if not then an AMS journal)

It basically said that there is some skill when we have an El Nino, or a La Nina in predicting the upcoming Winter. In years where there is neither (Like this year) then the skill is almost absent.

One big exception though. It seems that out West, and in particular more Northern areas of the West, there is a trick. Add a degree over the 30 year averages.

Why does this work??

Because climate change is not just something that might happen in the future. It is already underway. The temps. have risen the most in the North, and Western USA. Here in the Southeast, very little change.

One last thing to mention. NASA’s launched the IBEX misison to study the solar wind. One of the Physicist’s involved is Dr. Dave McComas. He was a kid in Wisconsin who had such severe dyslexia, that he really did not learn to read well until the 4th grade. He apparently still has trouble with spelling. Thanks to a fabulous teacher and a spirit of never giving up, he has become a rather famous Physicist.

So, if there is anyone out there reading this who has a learning disability, just remember Dave McComas. He had one heck of a problem, and now he works for NASA!

Later,
Dan

The folks at the Jet Propulsion Lab in Pasadena have put online an excellent new site on Climate Change. Now to be honest, I have just done a quick glance through it, but it has some new and interesting material. It is built for students and other non scientist sites to be able to visually see how the planet is being affected by climate change.

Make no mistake, this is no longer something in the future. The effects are widespread, and are increasing every day.

The Arcitc ice animations are especially interesting, but I liked the widget for my MAC. It allows me to keep some vital climate statistics at my fingertips. So check it out.

While I am talking about the web and NASA, let me add something else in here. NOAA and NASA are government agencies.  Funded by we the American taxpayer. Just my opinion here, but both organizations have put a tremendous amount of material online. They run some of the greatest web sites on the planet.

In most countries around the world, getting real time satellite or radar images is only for those who pay a steep fee. Getting climate data is almost impossible. Not here.

NOAA puts so much material online that you really have to be an expert to find it all! That is not there fault, there is just so much of it. The people who work for NASA and NOAA have IMHO done more than any government agency to give value back to the citizens that pay their salaries.

People in other countries go to these web sites too. We do not charge them, but think of the shining example we set for the rest of the world. There is virtually no other country on earth where you can call up real time high resolution weather radar for free.  (Canada being a notable exception).

You folks in Canada should be equally proud of Environment Canada’s web sites. They were a bit behind NOAA, and NASA, but are RAPIDLY catching up!

Together they set a real example for the rest of the world. NASA’s new cliamte web site is at

http://climate.jpl.nasa.gov/

Later,

Dan

I have taken a break from things for the last two weeks. Most of that time I spent in the United Kingdom. Anyone who knows me doesn’t have to ask what my favorite city is.

They already know it’s London.

In the cult classic movie 84 Charing Cross Road, there is a line that says something along the lines of “people go to London looking for different things”.

Some go looking for the London of great literature, the London of Charles Dickens or Samuel Pepys. There is the London of Sherlock Holmes, and Queen Victoria, Perhaps they go looking for the London of Beatles fame, or chic “Cool Britannia”.”

I took a stroll Thursday night, from Waterloo Underground (Near the London Eye and Big Ben across the river) all the way down to the Millennium Bridge. I then stared across the river with Christopher Wren’s masterpiece St. Paul’s looming high in the twilight across the Thames. During the dark days of the blitz, Churchill ordered St. Paul’s protected at all cost. If it burned, many thought London might as well.

While walking, I heard no less than 4 languages besides English.

London is truly the crossroads of the World.

My wife says I should do a web page for those visiting London for the first time.

It can be daunting navigating any city of 7+ million. Add to this the language barrier. Churchill was right that the USA, and UK are two people only separated by a common language. I can tell some funny stories about learning the British definitions of subway, central reservation, and pram.

London is very expensive. Especially now that those of us coming from the sates are converting a third world currency. It takes $1.70 to buy one British pound (£). A good cheap hotel room will cost you around 100£ per night so you can do the math.

If you want to stay at the County Hall Marriott overlooking Big Ben, and the Houses of Parliament, that will set you back 300 quid a night (£). The back side of the same building houses the Premier travel Inn at 90£ per night, and while you will not look out at Big Ben, your gonna save a lot of money and believe me that is where the British people who are visiting their capital on business or pleasure are staying!

Walking along the South Bank, or across St’ James’s Park on a sparkling Autumn evening is pure heaven to me. St. James’s Park has been a park for over 400 years. I was very conscious of the fact that I was enjoying the soft Autumn sunshine, and cool breezes like so many, many generations of people before me. Some great, and famous, but most long lost to history, as I shall one day be.

If you think a 140$ per night hotel room entitles you to a full American breakfast with ice in your cokes, and a huge hot shower, then London is probably not for you. If someone speaking another language makes you nervous instead of curious, stay home.

If you’re like me, and love meeting people who have had a different life experience. If you think of yourself more as a citizen of Earth than any one country, then London is for you. If you go looking for the London of Dickens or Pepys, or Holmes, then the movie is right -

IT’S THERE.

God save the Queen,
Dan