DrWark’s Recent Comments

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  Lighten up Graham

  OF COURSE CO2 concentration is cumulative and the resulting temperature rise is not instantaneous! That's my point!

  But since it is NOT instantaneous, what is the correlation between change in CO2 production and change in mean global temperature (dT/dC)? And the time delay (constant = 1 yr, 2 yrs, or 10 yrs?). And why does a 5-year average temperature slope deviate from the CO2 slope ONLY during those decades?  Could it be that CO2 isn't the only culprit? If there are other significant global warming culprits, what are they and at what rate do they contribute? Or were we simply not measuring any of this accurately 50 or 150 years ago?

  Answer these questions with some real scientific rigor, then pop off.

  BTW, I'm pretty easy to google.

  Ignorance is bliss. Happy plonking.On The global warming dilemma posted 3 years, 6 months ago 14 Responses

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  French discipline

  sunflower
  I guess you didn't read my previous post.
  Anybody who cares and pays attention to the science of global warming knows that the science is NOT clear. Anyone who claims to be a scientist and says it IS clear is a fraud. I know. I have bothered to go through the exercise of reducing all the historical raw data collected before 1950. There's not much and it is readily available for anyone who CARES about global warming. Where a real scientist is needed is where you run into such questions as why the temperature increase came to a screeching halt during the 1940's and 50's when everyone was burning oil as fast as possible.
  'Gas from coal' and 'hydrogen from sunlight'? NO. Getting gas from coal is OK but it's dirty and expensive. Hydrogen from sunlight is science fiction.
  You're right, the young need some adult supervision. Lead by example and open a physics book. Otherwise you are part of the problem.On The global warming dilemma posted 3 years, 6 months ago 14 Responses

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  Motivation

  What do people want? The immediate drama of the global-warming debate (YEAH! Everyone's talking about it!) or an intelligently prepared future for their children (YUCK! That's too much work)?
  Human nature is a bitch. Altruism rarely impedes those who are supposed to know better from selling back their textbooks. Especially that yuckky (BLECH! BLECH!) physics (BLECH!) textbook. I remember helping out an engineering honors student who sold hers back because it was too heavy. If the best and brightest only care about what they can get next month, then what chance do we have?
  The real question is: do you care enough to revisit the fundamentals and open your old textbooks?
  Your right. It's more fun to just blame everyone else.On The global warming dilemma posted 3 years, 6 months ago 14 Responses

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  A challenge to B&S and Bond

  I saw this article in the NY Times this morning and the blood started boiling again, as I make my living solving heat transfer problems. The part that really got to me was this paragraph:
  'Briggs & Stratton has another idea: another study. It is helping pay for a $650,000 safety review by a Swedish government institute at the behest of the relatively new nonprofit group, the International Consortium for Fire Safety, Health and the Environment.'
  $650,000 to study small engine exhaust? I sure hope most of it is going toward emissions research and not fire risk because my company does that kind of study every week for around $5000 each! For less than that, we can design a 99.99% guaran#$%&*#&teed COMPACT heat shield using edge technology that will cost less than 50 cents to produce and install. And how much of our tax dollars is Bond wasting to support B&S's bad management?
  Challenge to B&S: Stop complaining and spending everyone's money trying to weasel out of the inevitable. Instead, just let your younger engineers solve the problem of how to install the CC's for less than $20 each. Remember, cost is an engineering parameter - good engineering costs less.
  Challenge to Bond: be a real statesman instead of yet another slimy enemy of our future generations and say goodby to B&S. Support small engine designers with good ol' American scrappy innovation and business savvy in actually COMPETING with B&S to produce much cleaner engines at lower prices without going to China (which any product designer knows is no longer profitable anyway, for the most part). I bet there's even 1 or 2 in Missoura.
  I know none of them read this BLOG, but it feels good to say it anyway.
  I don't know which is a bigger crime: tolerating bad air quality or supporting bad engineering which perpetuates a host of environmental problems.On Bond and Big Lawnmower posted 3 years, 6 months ago 1 Response

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  Combustion

  There's more to a combustion cycle than carbon balance. You have to look at how much heat a plant absorbs and how much is given off when it is burned. Ignoring the energy involved in harvesting and refining, burning plant-based fuel basically converts solar energy into mechanical energy and hot gases: primarily CO2, H2O (in more-or-less equal molar parts), with atmospheric N2 and O2 also being heated. Mechanical friction also heats the air around an engine which increases concentrations of ozone, NOx and other nasty local pollutants.
  Meander makes a great point: how would our bio-fuel production methods affect the atmospheric heat balance with everything from bare earth exposure to open irrigation to farm machinery operation taken into consideration?
  The real combustion question is: how much does HOT CO2 and water vapor affect local and global climate. Remember, hot gases in the atmosphere rise, react, and return after cooling. Most thermo and fluid dynamics scientists understand that global warming models are inadequate because they do not correctly take into account local concentrations of H2O vapor being introduced into the atmosphere.
  Human activity changes the atmosphere - the laws of thermodynamics say that it HAS to. There is no such thing as zero footprint.
  On Biodiesel: The slippery facts posted 3 years, 6 months ago 37 Responses