Questions tagged [climate-change]
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33 questions
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Would it be technically correct to call stratospheric aerosol injection "chemtrails"?
There is a BBC article about geo-engineering being the subject of conspiracy theories, referring to a study by Dr Ramit Debnath which I assume is this (graphical abstract below).
My very brief reading ...
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Are there any studies about scientific consensus about climate change solutions?
There are studies demonstrating the high level of scientific consensus around the existence of climate change among scientists, and how this is related to their publishing record.
Are there any such ...
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Is reindeer meat sustainable?
Beef is generally considered unsustainable, since cows are ruminants that fill the atmosphere with methane. The greenhouse gas effects are massive per a kilogram of produced beef.
However, something ...
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Why does climate change lead to more diarrhea?
Why does climate change lead to more diarrhea? Is it because people drink more E.Coli-contaminated water? Or does it multiply and contaminate a fixed volume of water more at warmer temperatures? Or ...
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Do carbon-offsetting apps work? Are there better ways for me to invest in reducing climate change?
For some time, I've been using an app called Klima to calculate my carbon footprint and pay a small monthly amount to offset it. They invest in:
tree planting schemes
solar panels
clean cookstoves
...
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The EU made its top priority to stop buying Russian fossil fuels, even if it involves less sustainable energy sources. Is net-zero under threat?
With Putin having invaded Ukraine, Europe made getting rid of Russian hydrocarbons a more urgent priority than phasing out fossil fuels and other unsustainable energy sources. They now intend to ...
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Does grass-fed beef have lower carbon footprint than feedlot-finished beef?
I have read this article of 2019 and still don't understand which one is better (climate-wise). Grass-fed beef involves more belches and produces less meat but seqesters carbon in grass. But what's ...
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What is the climate change impact of releasing one tonne of methane in the atmosphere vs. the impact of burning it?
I've always wondered if it was any better (in terms of emissions reduction) to burn methane that would otherwise be released in the atmosphere? I suspect it would be, given that methane is a more ...
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Does greener flights mean a lot less affordable flights?
They plan to decarbonize the aviation industry in two ways: electric planes and hydrogen-powered planes. But in any case it implies fewer passenger seats and, as a result, a dramatic increase in ...
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What's the effect of space launches on climate?
(I haven't received a proper answer on Earth Science SE so I decided to try my luck here since I can't yet start a bounty)
Do space launches warm or cool the surface temperature (admittedly, for a ...
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Is vermicomposting our food rubbish sustainable in term of climate change?
I'm a fan of indoor, cold, worm composting (vermicomposting) to reduce my rubbish. This uses a box with many worms that eat your vegetable remains in a very efficient way, without any odor, and ...
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Flying vs heating and cooling
In some regions, summer is cool and there's little use of air conditioning. In other regions, winter is mild and there's little use of heating.
Suppose a household adopted the practice of flying ...
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Can oil be used as a fuel source without contributing to global climate change?
I just posted this other question regarding oil, and as a follow-up, I would like to ask if oil can be used as a fuel source for energy without contributing to global climate change?
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How much methane is lost in extraction and transmision from different sources? [duplicate]
In recent years there has been a significant move towards electricity generation from natural gas. This has in large part been driven by the desire to reduce green house gas release. However methane ...
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Is environmentally-driven purchasing of coal mines a good idea?
Is environmentally-driven purchasing of coal mines a good idea? Certainly environmental non-profits won't have enough funds to do it on a large scale. Governments have, but they are corrupt. There's a ...
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What do we do with all the coal mines?
Coal is going to be the first victim of the green energy revolution as the least sustainable kind of fossil fuel. What do we do with all the mines, both surface and underground ones? You can do quite ...
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Should we recycle paper products?
Should we recycle paper products given what this paper pointed out?
In "Limited climate benefits of global recycling of pulp and paper" (pdf) they write:
We [...] show that additional ...
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When the topic of transport decarbonization comes up, all I hear is batteries and hydrogen. But what about renewable natural gas (RNG)?
When the topic of transport decarbonization comes up, all I hear is batteries and hydrogen. But what about renewable natural gas (RNG)? The milage is better, less energy loss, as I understand. You can ...
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Is burning wood for energy less bad than forest fires?
Forest fires are considered a contributor to global warming, but using firewood is considered carbon-neutral. I'm not sure I understand it. In both cases, only the carbon that had been captured ...
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Which CDR options, on balance, are the most feasible?
Reading the latest IPCC report, I came across an interesting overview of carbon dioxide removal (CDR) options (5SM-16 onwards). I've never heard of some of them: it includes biochar, ocean ...
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How is biochar production as a CDR method different from crop residue burning?
How is biochar production as a CDR method, which is good, different from crop residue burning, which is bad? Does it have something to do with oxygen availability?
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Is cutting down trees and building something from them good or bad for the climate?
I still don't fully grasp the climate impact of lumbering (unless its purpose is burning the wood for energy or making space for pastures which is obviously bad). Is cutting down trees and making or ...
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What climate benefits does a four-day working week have?
What climate benefits does a four-day working week have? I was a bit surprised to stumble across it among proposed ways to mitigate climate change listed in a recent BBC article (it didn't go into ...
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Is driving an electric car any better than driving a conventional car if electricity is generated with fossil fuel?
Is driving an electric car any better, GHG-wise, than driving a conventional car if 100% of its electricity is generated by fossil fuel combustion? Are there any peer-reviewed studies of that?
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Is crop production a net source or a net sink of carbon emissions?
While I was reading a recent BBC article on so-called "carbon farming", I started to wonder, is crop production a net source or a net sink of carbon emissions? Even with tillage and ...
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How is lumbering bad for the climate?
How is lumbering bad for the climate? Don't final products still store that carbon? What do those calculations mean (example [ch. 3], methodology [ch. 4])? The report says it doesn't include in-use ...
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What is the climate impact of discarding natural apparel in landfills?
What with fast fashion, loads of clothes are dumped in landfills, especially, I guess, in the US, given its humongous consumption of fiber goods. They are organic matter and therefore supposed to emit ...
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Is being a vegetarian really environmentally friendly?
Livestock and manure produce 5,8% of global GHG. But releases from agricultural soils (N2O), crop residue burning, and rice cultivation (all are associated with plant farming) generate 8,9%. So is ...
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What is the climate impact of shared electric kick scooter systems?
During the last few years, shared electric kick scooter systems such as Voi and Tier have become common where I live. The system consists of a number of shared electric kick scooters scattered around ...
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What is the most cost effective way for an individual to contribute to global climate action? (For an Australian resident)
Edited: I would like to spend money in the most effective ways (local tax considerations included)
I understand that in order to be effective at tackling climate change there needs to be action at a ...
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Is an incrementalist approach to decarbonisation feasible?
There seem to be two broad approaches to the climate crisis.
One centres around technological progress, where efficiencies, a gradual switch to renewables, and CCS enable a broadly similar model of ...
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My residential colony burns dry grass every year; how can I stop them?
Every year during June-October, it rains and a few months later after the rainy season there is a lot of grass growing in the empty sites in my residential colony. So all the grass is cut, piled up ...
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How much land would be covered by the plants that turned into the fossil fuels humanity has burned?
Many climate deniers suggest that humanity is too insignificant to impact the global climate. As a visualization to counter this claim, I thought of the following exercise.
How much coal, oil, and ...
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