Soot warming 'maybe bigger than greenhouse gases' - NASA

The Register (UK) ^ | 15th December 2009 12:16 GMT | Lewis Page

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Forget Copenhagen CO2 cuts, tune your diesel properly

Researchers from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Centre, also the home of famous carbopocalypse doom-prophet James Hansen, have repeated earlier assertions that atmospheric soot may be as important as greenhouse gases in driving global warming.

This could be good news for humanity, as atmospheric soot levels would be much easier to reduce. Filtering soot out of exhausts from diesel engines and coal burners is simple compared to removing and sequestering CO₂, and as an added benefit the effects would be rapid: soot doesn't persist in the atmosphere for long periods the way greenhouse gases do, as it is washed out by rain or snow. However, many environmental campaigners would resist the idea of soot taking centre stage, fearing that this could lead to a reduced emphasis on greenhouse-gas emissions reductions.

Ice running off the gutters of the 'roof of the world'.

Earlier investigations including the effect of soot had focused on the Arctic, where Goddard scientists have previously suggested that "the impact of aerosols is just as strong as that of the greenhouse gases". Aerosols include soot, which tends to heat the atmosphere, plus sulphates and others which cool it. Unfortunately sulphates also cause acid rain, and clean-air regs in the US and Europe have seen them massively reduced - and the Arctic warm up.

[rfp1234]

Absolute horsehockeystick! Soot is an aerosol which BLOCKS sunlight and contributes to COOLING. The Climate Cretins are getting too hasty while circling the wagons.

[dead]

Plan B.

[eclecticEel]

Goodness, they’re dredging up non-existent acid rain once again? These people really do believe they’re the masters of the universe.

[The_Reader_David]

I’m old enough to remember the last computer-model-generated scare. In the 1970’s soot was supposed to trigger an ice-age.

[The_Reader_David]

Not that tuning your engine properly, whether diesel or gasoline, isn’t a good, frugal thing to do.

[steelyourfaith]

 

Beam me to Planet Gore !

[your local physicist]

If I recall correctly, I've read a few times that the eruption of Mt. Pinatubo cooled the earth by about half a degree celsius. Volcanic ash is a lot like industrial soot so one would think that industrial soot would also cool the earth by blocking sunlight. That's the explanation I've read for the cooling caused by Mt Pinatubo's eruption. NASA seems to be a bit obsessed with global warming theory. GW theory may be a big source of funding and jobs at NASA.

[seawolf101]

ANOTHER DISASTER DU JOUR, SKY IS FALLING YADA YADA YADA....

I’M SURE AL GORE WILL BE COMING OUT WITH A NEW MOVIE ABOUT HOW AWFUL THIS IS BUT IF WE SEND HIM A FEW BILLION DOLLARS HE WILL VACUUM UP ALL THE SOOT HIMSELF.

[KTM rider]

A recent scientific study by the Center for Study of the Obvious has concluded that Liberalism is the cause of Global Warming

[UCANSEE2]

"However, many environmental campaigners would resist the idea of soot taking centre stage, fearing that this could lead to a reduced emphasis on greenhouse-gas emissions reductions reduction in the loot they were planning on raking in.

[Myrddin]

Notice the recurring pattern of attacking carbon based energy sources. The socialists are determined to seize control of energy resources to control the population.

[DennisR]

Because it is impossible that only four (CO2) out of 10,000 atoms/molecules in the atmosphere could cause climate change to any significant, the Global Warming Cult will have to come up with another scapegoat.

[your local physicist]

Meanwhile the forces of nature apparently didn't get the memo about global warming. It's chilly in the American heartland tonight, with the temperatures in Omaha and Chicago down to single digit numbers.

[redhead]

Man, they are desperate. Next, it will be chewing gum. Then it will be pink flowers. Then it will be some other cock-and-bull yarn about the detrimental effects of sweeping your house. They’re pathetic.

[Vince Ferrer]

A nuclear war was supposed to throw up smoke and dust into the atmosphere which would cool the Earth, and this theoriy was called Nuclear Winter. What’s the difference?

[ProtectOurFreedom]

And don’t forget to inflate your tires properly, too!

[your local physicist]

Yes, the socialist bureaucrats are determined to find a reason to regulate the driving of motor vehicles by all citizens. If they can't convince the legislators that CO2 is evil then they'll try again with diesel soot, trace amounts of unburned hydrocarbons, or something else. Government regulators in the liberal Northwest are already experimenting with GPS transmitters in cars that transmit the current location and all mileage driven by individual cars. The socialist regulators are grimly determined to make sure "you will be assimilated."

(If they try to put a GPS device in my SUV I will find that device and break it with a spilled beer within 24 hours.)

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

That's the way I read it.

Maybe Hansen is behind this?

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

fyi