ApocaDocuments (4) for the "Resource Depletion" scenario from this week
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Wed, Aug 17, 2011
from OnEarth:
NRDC: Acidic Oceans
Q&A with NRDC senior scientist Lisa Suatoni: How closely is ocean acidification related to global climate change?
Ocean acidification and global climate change are two -- independent -- impacts of rising atmospheric CO2 concentrations. When fossil fuels are burned, carbon dioxide is produced. Approximately two thirds of that CO2 goes into the atmosphere, where it causes global warming; the remaining third is absorbed by the world's oceans, where it causes ocean acidification. Two problems, one culprit....
The Arctic is predicted to be corrosive to some types of shelled organisms in the next 10 to 30 years....
As we speak, roughly one million tons of CO2 are being absorbed by the oceans every hour. And the source of this pollution -- global emissions of greenhouse gases -- is expected to rise, rapidly. By mid-century, the average atmospheric CO2 concentration could easily reach double the pre-industrial concentration, and so could the drop in ocean pH. That means the problems we are seeing in the Pacific Northwest oyster industry are most likely going to get worse and spread elsewhere. Although they've held off disaster for now, the oyster hatcheries will need to continue developing techniques to protect their "crop" from the shifting chemistry of the sea.
What can we do about acidification on a larger scale? Is there a way to get the ocean's chemistry back into balance?
There is no way to artificially restore the chemistry of the world's oceans to pre-industrial levels. It will happen naturally as the ocean water mixes with the deep sea sediments, which act to neutralize the enhanced acidity, but that takes thousands of years. The only broad-scale solution to ocean acidification is to reduce and stabilize carbon dioxide emissions right now to keep things from getting worse.
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I bet we'll just innovate ourselves out of needing the ocean!
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Tue, Aug 16, 2011
from Bloomberg:
EPA's Outdated Tests Leave American Cars Guzzling Gas: View
At issue is how federal regulators calculate each automaker's Corporate Average Fuel Economy. Obscure as these CAFE ratings may be, their public policy impact is vast. Whenever the U.S. government tells automakers to boost their CAFE scores -- as it did this summer -- it transforms the next generation of cars Americans drive.
The trouble is, the tests used to gauge fuel efficiency don't reflect the way we actually drive, especially on the highway. The government's highway test involves a top speed of 60 mph, an average speed of 48.3 mph, no use of heaters or air conditioners and an achingly slow initial acceleration in which it takes more than a minute to go from zero to 50 mph....
It would be one thing if this exercise in pokey driving produced equally distorted scores for all models. But the outmoded CAFE process risks short-changing cars with smart fuel- saving features in favor of others that are engineered for the test....
Under the current tests, the stated goal of 54.5 mpg by 2025 is a number that will be achieved only on paper, car experts say.
In practical terms, hitting the CAFE target is likely to produce a more modest 40 mpg to 42 mpg in real-life driving, analysts say. ...
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These are the consequences of the No Automobile Left Behind Act.
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Mon, Aug 15, 2011
from MSNBC:
Arctic voyage to study ocean's changing acidity
The world's oceans are getting more acidic, and a new mission to the Arctic will help scientists figure out what this means for delicate marine life.
For the second straight year, scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) will embark on a research cruise aboard the U.S. Coast Guard vessel Healy to the Arctic Ocean on Aug. 15 to collect water samples and other data to determine trends in ocean acidification from the least explored ocean in the world.
What the scientists learn from the data collected during the seven-week cruise will provide an understanding of the extent to which the Arctic Ocean 's chemistry is changing and detail potential implications for carbonate species -- such as phytoplankton and shellfish -- that are vulnerable to greater ocean acidity created by climate change.
"Ocean acidification can have broad global impacts on industry, ecosystems, tourism and policy, so it is of vital importance to determine trends and whether impacts are already occurring in oceans around the world," said USGS oceanographer Lisa Robbins. ...
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Who knows? Maybe acidity is good for marine life!
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Mon, Aug 15, 2011
from Indian Country Today:
Navajo Aquifer Concerns May Prove True
For years, Native opponents of a massive strip mine on Black Mesa in northern Arizona have said longstanding extractive practices of Peabody Energy Corp. (formerly Peabody Western Coal Co.) have depleted a major aquifer on which they depend and a recent analysis seems to bear them out.
"The mining-related impacts on the aquifer are more significant than have been recognized or acknowledged," said Dr. Daniel Higgins, who performed the analysis as part of Arid Lands Resource Studies, graduate interdisciplinary programs, University of Arizona, Tucson....
The aquifer Higgins studied for more than five years provides drinking water to Native communities and is a source of water below Black Mesa that feeds sacred springs. Opponents object to the further industrial use of the pristine aquifer water....
But it's not like a bank account, he explained,"because being able to see any change or reversal (in aquifer depletion) is going to take a tremendous amount of time in a large aquifer. The impacts will get worse before they get better--it's not like flipping a switch."
A federal geochemical analysis in 1997 determined that 90 percent of the water in the N-Aquifer is 10,000 to 35,000 years old. "Technically, that 90 percent of the water is not replenishable on a human time-scale but only on a geological time-scale," he said. ...
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"Industrial use" and "sacred springs" mix like coal and water.
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