Climate Change and Real Science

I’ve written recently how promoters of the man-made climate change concern tend to dismiss those who want to continue the debate as being unscientific and deniers. But some of the real impediments to dealing with greenhouse gases don’t come from a lack of science. The solutions are based in science but find stumbling blocks in popular trends and fear mongering.

Two or three current articles lead to this conclusion. 

The latest idea to come out of the UN to reduce our carbon footprint is to eat less meat. If everyone adopted a vegan lifestyle, putting all the cows, pigs, chickens and sheep out of work, they claim we could effect a significant change. But this Reason Magazine article crunches the numbers and the results are disappointing. “In their 2017 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences study, agronomists Robin White and Mary Beth Hall reached a similar conclusion [to several others], calculating that the total elimination of animal husbandry would reduce U.S. emissions by 2.6 percent.” 

In other words, nagging the public to reduce or even completely stop eating meat pursues a negligible effect on climate change. Of course, the facts should not stand in the way of the popular feel-good trend, where the burger giants are playing to the crowd by offering Impossible Whoppers and McVegans. A big pain yields little gain.

On another front, strong arguments in favor of nuclear power as a means of producing electricity without releasing carbon dioxide into the air fall on deaf ears. Increasing the number of nuclear reactors would be the ideal solution to climate change. In addition to the lack of pollution, they have a much smaller physical footprint than other sources such as wind and solar. 

But say the word nuclear and people panic. They start talking about Chernobyl, Fukushima, and Three Mile Island as if they were typical rather than extreme outliers. “These are the only major accidents to have occurred in over 17,000 cumulative reactor-years of commercial nuclear power operation in 33 countries.” The World Nuclear Association summarizes the safety by saying, “The evidence over six decades shows that nuclear power is a safe means of generating electricity. The risk of accidents in nuclear power plants is low and declining. The consequences of an accident or terrorist attack are minimal compared with other commonly accepted risks. Radiological effects on people of any radioactive releases can be avoided.”

To counter these facts the uniformed cite the problem of nuclear waste. The truth is that “all the used fuel ever produced by the commercial nuclear industry since the late 1950s would cover a football field to a depth of less than 10 yards.” That’s one single football field for the entire world. Furthermore, much of it can be processed for reuse as they do in France and “after 7,000 shipments total of used fuel by the worldwide nuclear industry since 1970, there have been no leaks of radioactive material or personal injuries.”

The biggest truth is that people refuse to consider it as an alternative due to unfounded fear. In Germany the anti-nuclear movement kicked into high gear with mass protests after Fukushima promoting a phase out of nuclear energy by 2022 while still moving off fossil fuel-based energy generation. Should America follow this wanting-my-cake-and-eating-it too philosophy?

The final piece came from an interview published at foreignpolicy.com featuring research to growing better vegetation. 

Plants naturally draw CO₂ from the atmosphere. “Every year, humanity emits 37 gigatons of carbon dioxide; photosynthetic life can process and capture nearly half of that amount.” The theory is that plants can be made a little more productive. Since the amount of carbon dioxide released naturally is so much greater, plants operating at only a 2% or 3% increase in efficiency could pick up the other half of human emissions.

One problem is that the effort to “come up with a cost-effective and efficient way of actually pulling carbon dioxide down from the atmosphere and sequestering it down into the soil—where it should be” requires genetic engineering to create this “Ideal Plant.” If breeding could do it, it would take much longer. Many people and governments would have to overcome their irrational fear of GMOs, but that should be much easier than the alternative, the standard of living hardships that would result from severe reductions in energy availability.

The answers to fighting climate change likely come from real science, not a pick and choose kind of science that follows the fear mongering and fashions of the day.