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August 2025 Discussion-OBS - cooler than normal first week but a big comeback to warmer than normal for the last 2-3 weeks


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6 minutes ago, SACRUS said:

 

For the 1881 Michigan fires which appear the main / largest fires were in Sep 4 - 7th 

 

https://medium.com/life-fun-in-michigans-thumb/1881-michigan-fire-forever-changed-the-thumb-e60ae1e9d84e

“In September no penetrating rain had fallen for almost two months. Almost every stream was dry. Many wells had become empty. The swamps had been burned to hard clay by the sun, fiercer in its heat than it had been for years before. The vegetation of the fields and woods had become tinder. The earth was baked and cracked, the heat having penetrated to an unusual depth.

“The summer of 1881 was excessively dry, and the drought had done its work nowhere more effectively than in the wide, blunt, tongue of land which lies between Saginaw bay and Lake Huron. At the northern end of this tongue is Huron County. South of Huron is the counties of Tuscola and Sanilac, the latter bordering on the lake. Lapeer County lies south partly of Tuscola and partly of Sanilac. These are the counties that suffered from the great fires.”

 

When the fire finally burned itself out, there were 282 known dead, more than 3,400 buildings destroyed, and almost 15,000 residents homeless. Many were blinded — some temporarily and some permanently — by smoke, gusting dust, and flying ashes that traveled faster than a whirlwind and blotted out the sun for days. The disaster changes the landscape of Michigan’s Thumb region forever and jump-started the move from lumbering to agriculture.

 

 

“In Boston and along the eastern seaboard a mysterious “yellow sky” appeared. The skies darkened shortly after dawn on Tuesday, September 6, 1881 — throughout all six New England states. In the “forenoon,” as they called their mornings then, witnesses watched a “London fog” envelop their homes and roads. This London fog soon took on a yellowish hue. More than a few whispered that the “Saffron Curtain” was the sign of a divine judgement. The causes behind the odd skies of that September day were eventually traced to smoke that had traveled eastward from Michigan’s massive “Thumb Fire” that had burnt over a million acres of woodlands in Michigan’s Thumb Area all on one day, the day before.”

 

In 1881 Clara Barton founded the American Red Cross. The organization’s first meeting had taken place in Washington DC at the home of Sen. Omar D. Conger of Michigan. Their first official disaster relief operation was the response to the Thumb Fire, and the Red Cross provided money, clothes, and household items to victims of the fire.

 

How many people died in the 1881 Michigan Fire?

The stated death toll for the 1881 fire is stated as 282. However, the real total will never be known as there were many lumbermen and transient laborers in the region.

How many acres were destroyed in the 1881 Michigan Fire?

Over two days over a million acres were burned. It left 3,400 buildings destroyed, and almost 15,000 residents homeless.

What was the economic loss of the 1881 Michigan Fire?

The U.S. Army offered an estimate of $2,003,390. In today’s dollars that equates to over $50,000,000.

How Does the 1881 Michigan Fire Compare to Other Wildfires in History?

In terms of loss of life, the 1881 Great Michigan Fire is considered one of the top ten wildfires of all time. With 282 lives lost the 1881 wildfire is considered the 6th worst in history.

That's absolutely amazing for so long ago, Tony!

And wasn't the following winter, *The Long Winter*?

The Weather Channel had a climatologist on who analyzed the Little House on the Prairie books and said they were based on real weather events and one of them was The Long Winter, which is based on the winter of 1881-82?

 

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1 hour ago, donsutherland1 said:

A handful of U.S. representatives did so, but they are deflecting from their own policy responsibility. Tom Tiffany and Glenn Grothman of Wisconsin and Michelle Fischbach, Brad Finstad, Pete Stauber and Tom Emmer of Minnesota signed a letter to Canada's Ambassador to the U.S. complaining about Canada's wildfire smoke. All but Stauber reject the reality of climate change. Stauber claims to accept it but to want a technology-based solution rather than fossil fuel phaseout, but even that position isn't credible. He voted in favor of this year's reconciliation bill that guts the technology-based climate solutions from the Inflation Reduction Act. They are posturing. 

Finally, regarding geoengineering with its attendant risks (e.g., impact on India's monsoon season) and limitations (does nothing to stop ocean acidification), if the world's nations cannot agree on a binding straightforward solution to a basic physics problem behind the causes of climate change, it's highly unlikely that they would agree to a more complex agreement on geoengineering that would set food-sharing provisions e.g., if India's monsoon fails, other set binding approaches for addressing other major contingencies that could arise. Moreover, the caliber of the world's leaders doesn't compare to those of the 1980s or 1990s when the acid rain and ozone issues were addressed and the international processes e.g., COP conferences, are corrupted by allowing major polluters full standing to shape the outcomes.

 

Don, that's what I find most confusing-- who allowed the major polluters full standing to shape the outcome and why are their lobbyists allowed entry into COP at all? Was this a US position or is the UN itself corrupted as a whole and getting paid off by these companies?

 

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1 hour ago, jm1220 said:

The westerly flow blows the smoke back into Canada but brings back the swampy humidity. So we have a choice between waves of smoke during the drier conditions or 75+ dews. 

Shouldn't westerly flow be a drier flow though? I thought it was southerly flow that increases humidity, while a west wind is a downsloping wind that dries out the air?

 

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1 hour ago, SACRUS said:

 

As far as 1918 here is Newark

 

August 1918 Newark Weather
Day High (°F) Low (°F) Precip. (inches) Snow (inches)
83 60 0.00 0.0
87 63 0.00 0.0
80 68 0.00 0.0
n/a 61 0.02 0.0
96 65 0.00 0.0
95 78 0.00 0.0
105 79 0.00 0.0
98 79 0.00 0.0
90 77 0.00 0.0
n/a 67 0.22 0.0
70 64 0.64 0.0
85 69 0.50 0.0
94 70 0.00 0.0
97 75 0.09 0.0
86 67 0.00 0.0
87 65 0.00 0.0
79 64 0.00 0.0
73 57 0.00 0.0
76 59 0.00 0.0
82 60 0.00 0.0
84 58 0.00 0.0
89 62 0.03 0.0
91 67 0.00 0.0
89 66 0.00 0.0
80 73 0.00 0.0
87 73 0.00 0.0
83 69 0.00 0.0
75 58 0.00 0.0
85 69 0.99 0.0
87 63 0.00 0.0
79 63 0.45 0.0
September 1918 Newark Weather
Day High (°F) Low (°F) Precip. (inches) Snow (inches)
80 69 0.00 0.0
79 59 0.00 0.0
77 59 0.00 0.0
81 66 0.00 0.0
78 65 0.00 0.0
71 n/a 0.01 0.0
71 57 0.02 0.0
n/a 55 0.06 0.0
77 n/a 0.00 0.0
79 56 0.00 0.0
66 56 0.00 0.0
71 58 0.16 0.0
74 60 0.05 0.0
74 53 0.00 0.0
75 51 0.00 0.0
81 56 0.00 0.0
81 60 0.00 0.0
63 54 1.50 0.0
80 53 0.00 0.0
71 48 0.70 0.0
62 45 0.22 0.0
62 46 0.00 0.0
68 51 0.00 0.0
66 58 0.00 0.0
63 45 0.00 0.0
67 43 0.04 0.0
64 42 0.00 0.0
72 45 0.00 0.0
71 47 0.00 0.0
68 45 0.06 0.0

 

 

NYC

July 1918 New York City Weather
Day High (°F) Low (°F) Precip. (inches) Snow (inches)
78 65 0.50 0.0
70 60 0.00 0.0
81 57 0.00 0.0
80 63 0.00 0.0
85 64 0.00 0.0
77 65 0.33 0.0
79 63 0.00 0.0
72 60 0.00 0.0
73 60 0.00 0.0
81 63 0.13 0.0
81 62 0.05 0.0
83 62 0.00 0.0
76 65 0.00 0.0
81 64 0.09 0.0
88 63 0.00 0.0
90 68 0.00 0.0
76 68 0.06 0.0
85 64 0.00 0.0
84 71 0.20 0.0
90 69 0.00 0.0
95 71 0.00 0.0
98 75 0.00 0.0
95 77 0.00 0.0
88 74 0.00 0.0
77 70 0.00 0.0
81 68 0.00 0.0
87 72 0.00 0.0
89 71 0.00 0.0
87 74 0.00 0.0
86 68 2.00 0.0
70 64 1.00 0.0
August 1918 New York City Weather
Day High (°F) Low (°F) Precip. (inches) Snow (inches)
82 61 0.00 0.0
86 66 0.00 0.0
79 67 0.00 0.0
76 62 0.10 0.0
95 69 0.30 0.0
96 80 0.00 0.0
104 82 0.00 0.0
94 77 0.24 0.0
90 76 0.00 0.0
76 66 0.14 0.0
71 64 0.54 0.0
85 71 0.16 0.0
92 72 0.00 0.0
96 75 0.08 0.0
85 67 0.00 0.0
85 65 0.00 0.0
76 65 0.00 0.0
72 59 0.00 0.0
75 63 0.00 0.0
82 60 0.00 0.0
84 64 0.00 0.0
89 67 0.00 0.0
91 69 0.00 0.0
87 70 0.00 0.0
80 74 0.00 0.0
88 73 0.00 0.0
81 68 0.00 0.0
76 65 0.00 0.0
84 70 0.59 0.0
83 65 0.00 0.0
80 68 0.28 0.0

Wild, that must have been both NYC and EWR's highest temperature recorded at the time.

EWR's 105 was tied many times after this but was not exceeded until July 2011, almost 100 years later!!!

 

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1 minute ago, LibertyBell said:

Look at that August 7, 2018 Hi/Lo at NYC of 104/82, that's the stuff of legends.....

Over 100 years later and NYC has not been able to match that kind of heat in August (we came close with 103 in August 2001, almost to the same date.)

 

That's because the the site is crap now and the dewpoints are now consistently too high 

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Talk about a hot Euro run. Heat wave next week, but it's even hotter in the long range for the week of the 18th. We're getting a nice break here in early August, but mid August is probably going to be the worst part of this summer. We had those extremely intense heat waves in late June and late July, but they only lasted a few days. The heat in mid August is going to be much longer lasting. 

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2 minutes ago, winterwx21 said:

Talk about a hot Euro run. Heat wave next week, but it's even hotter in the long range for the week of the 11th. We're getting a nice break here in early August, but mid August is probably going to be the worst part of this summer. We had those extremely intense heat waves in late June and late July, but they only lasted a few days. The heat in mid August is going to be much longer lasting. 

Maybe it will be wrong

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18 minutes ago, SACRUS said:

 

For the 1881 Michigan fires which appear the main / largest fires were in Sep 4 - 7th 

 

https://medium.com/life-fun-in-michigans-thumb/1881-michigan-fire-forever-changed-the-thumb-e60ae1e9d84e

“In September no penetrating rain had fallen for almost two months. Almost every stream was dry. Many wells had become empty. The swamps had been burned to hard clay by the sun, fiercer in its heat than it had been for years before. The vegetation of the fields and woods had become tinder. The earth was baked and cracked, the heat having penetrated to an unusual depth.

“The summer of 1881 was excessively dry, and the drought had done its work nowhere more effectively than in the wide, blunt, tongue of land which lies between Saginaw bay and Lake Huron. At the northern end of this tongue is Huron County. South of Huron is the counties of Tuscola and Sanilac, the latter bordering on the lake. Lapeer County lies south partly of Tuscola and partly of Sanilac. These are the counties that suffered from the great fires.”

 

When the fire finally burned itself out, there were 282 known dead, more than 3,400 buildings destroyed, and almost 15,000 residents homeless. Many were blinded — some temporarily and some permanently — by smoke, gusting dust, and flying ashes that traveled faster than a whirlwind and blotted out the sun for days. The disaster changes the landscape of Michigan’s Thumb region forever and jump-started the move from lumbering to agriculture.

 

 

“In Boston and along the eastern seaboard a mysterious “yellow sky” appeared. The skies darkened shortly after dawn on Tuesday, September 6, 1881 — throughout all six New England states. In the “forenoon,” as they called their mornings then, witnesses watched a “London fog” envelop their homes and roads. This London fog soon took on a yellowish hue. More than a few whispered that the “Saffron Curtain” was the sign of a divine judgement. The causes behind the odd skies of that September day were eventually traced to smoke that had traveled eastward from Michigan’s massive “Thumb Fire” that had burnt over a million acres of woodlands in Michigan’s Thumb Area all on one day, the day before.”

 

In 1881 Clara Barton founded the American Red Cross. The organization’s first meeting had taken place in Washington DC at the home of Sen. Omar D. Conger of Michigan. Their first official disaster relief operation was the response to the Thumb Fire, and the Red Cross provided money, clothes, and household items to victims of the fire.

 

How many people died in the 1881 Michigan Fire?

The stated death toll for the 1881 fire is stated as 282. However, the real total will never be known as there were many lumbermen and transient laborers in the region.

How many acres were destroyed in the 1881 Michigan Fire?

Over two days over a million acres were burned. It left 3,400 buildings destroyed, and almost 15,000 residents homeless.

What was the economic loss of the 1881 Michigan Fire?

The U.S. Army offered an estimate of $2,003,390. In today’s dollars that equates to over $50,000,000.

How Does the 1881 Michigan Fire Compare to Other Wildfires in History?

In terms of loss of life, the 1881 Great Michigan Fire is considered one of the top ten wildfires of all time. With 282 lives lost the 1881 wildfire is considered the 6th worst in history.

There was also the Great Smog of London in December 1952. Lasted 5 days until the winds changed directions. Estimated over 12k  were killed, tens of thousands more sickened. This led to 

environmental legislation since 1952, such as the City of London (Various Powers) Act 1954 and the Clean Air Acts of 1956, 1968.

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15 minutes ago, LibertyBell said:

Shouldn't westerly flow be a drier flow though? I thought it was southerly flow that increases humidity, while a west wind is a downsloping wind that dries out the air?

 

Depends. If the flow is coming from the Midwest where there can be very high dews, that’s what we get. 

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24 minutes ago, Wannabehippie said:

There was also the Great Smog of London in December 1952. Lasted 5 days until the winds changed directions. Estimated over 12k  were killed, tens of thousands more sickened. This led to 

environmental legislation since 1952, such as the City of London (Various Powers) Act 1954 and the Clean Air Acts of 1956, 1968.

what caused this toxic chemical smog? factories?

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1 hour ago, Sundog said:

Don I'm interested only in solutions that have a possibility of working. 

The USA going carbon neutral TOMORROW won't solve this problem. 

The USA can geoengineer the solution on its own. Why do we need their permission?

Does China ask us for permission to pollute the atmosphere? Did they ask permission to build roughly 250 coal plants over the last 10 years?

Who's to say the aerosols caused the monsoon to fail? Why can't it be greenhouse gas induced climate change that did it?

Nothing will get solved as long as 90% of the problem lies outside the USA's borders.  

If they can pollute the atmosphere freely, then we can inject aerosols into it if we want to as well. 

 

I agree that it has to be a global effort. That's where leadership deficiency comes in. The ozone and acid rain issues were handled globally. That's also where corrupted processes via frameworks that include major polluters as equal stakeholders come in. 

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1 hour ago, LibertyBell said:

Don, that's what I find most confusing-- who allowed the major polluters full standing to shape the outcome and why are their lobbyists allowed entry into COP at all? Was this a US position or is the UN itself corrupted as a whole and getting paid off by these companies?

 

The UN created the Conference of Parties. However, each nation is allowed to include anyone it finds suitable in its delegation. That's where the problem arises. Nations include major polluters (likely because they seek to perpetuate the status quo), even as the polluters are the cause of the problem, have conflicts of interest, and have history of resisting change.

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36 minutes ago, donsutherland1 said:

I agree that it has to be a global effort. That's where leadership deficiency comes in. The ozone and acid rain issues were handled globally. That's also where corrupted processes via frameworks that include major polluters as equal stakeholders come in. 

I think acid rain and ozone were a lot easier to collaborate on and solve. 

Those also caused direct visible damage as well as a clear threat. 

They also weren't issues that if solved would severely damage countries' economies and standards of living. There are 300 million people in India that defecate outdoors. Their poor standard of living is one reason their carbon footprint is half the global average.

I also don't like excusing or allowing other countries to continue to pollute with impunity as if modern forms of energy production aren't available to them. 

Why couldn't China just build more solar farms or wind mills instead of installing 100 GW of coal powered energy over the last ten years? That's roughly 250 coal powered power plants. Meanwhile the West has built none in 25 years and more are being decommissioned every year 

We can't solve this problem when 90% of it has nothing to do with us. 

I feel like people aren't seriously interested in solving this issue when focusing only on the US and speaking in uniliteral terms as if we are the ones that, if we just went carbon neutral, we'd stop climate change. 

There's no carrot to get other countries to stop greenhouse gas emissions. We need a stick. 

And if the stick doesn't work, we need geoengineering. And the easiest and most cost effective way to do it is with aerosols. 

I fear that we'll all be right here, a bunch of old men saying the exact same thing 30 years from now, with nothing being done because people are holding out hope that by some miracle we will get everyone around the world to become carbon neutral. Meanwhile we lost 30 years of aerosol injections to at least get temps back down to reasonable levels while we try to solve this thing.  

Even if we did go carbon neutral in 30 years let's say, the greenhouse gases are all still in the air. Aerosols are a way to stop the warming and even reverse it while the world transitions over to clean energy and solves the problem of carbon sequestering at scale.

 

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2 hours ago, Sundog said:

Don I'm interested only in solutions that have a possibility of working. 

The USA going carbon neutral TOMORROW won't solve this problem. 

The USA can geoengineer the solution on its own. Why do we need their permission?

Does China ask us for permission to pollute the atmosphere? Did they ask permission to build roughly 250 coal plants over the last 10 years?

Who's to say the aerosols caused the monsoon to fail? Why can't it be greenhouse gas induced climate change that did it?

Nothing will get solved as long as 90% of the problem lies outside the USA's borders.  

If they can pollute the atmosphere freely, then we can inject aerosols into it if we want to as well. 

 

We do have plenty of options that WILL work. But the problem is the stakeholders that make massive amounts of money off fossil fuels don't want to change until the reserves they have purchased are fully depleted. 90% of the issues is NOT from outside the USA. The USA is still the second-biggest producer of greenhouse gasses with a relatively small population. Our per capita emission is around 14.2 tonnes per person, whereas China is 8.9, and India 1.9. Despite the fact that China is basically the manufacturer for the world (which does need to change). Yes, China has added more coal in the past decade, but it is also producing more and more renewables each year. (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jun/26/china-breaks-more-records-with-massive-build-up-of-wind-and-solar-power). China is likely at its peak gasoline consumption now as it has massively electrified its vehicle fleet (https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/chinas-fuel-demand-may-have-passed-its-peak-iea-says-2025-02-13/). 

Unfortunately for us, we have a president that does not want to build any wind power or any renewables. (https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c15l3knp4xyo) (https://ctmirror.org/2025/08/04/trump-administration-cancels-plans-to-develop-new-offshore-wind-projects/). And is also actively trying to destroy any research on greenhouse gasses (https://www.npr.org/2025/08/04/nx-s1-5453731/nasa-carbon-dioxide-satellite-mission-threatened). 

The technology exists for us to decarbonize rapidly, and it will not all be from one area. Many say to ban all oil-fired boilers in homes, but the fastest way to decarbonize heat in the Northeast is not getting rid of oil burners but switching them to primarily biofuels. We have the technology, but just like people were wary of electricity back when it was being brought into the house, we are facing a highly anti-science environment right now. Sadly, our present-day life is really reminding me of Idiocracy. People will put profits above all else. Only economists know that growth is infinite on a finite planet. 

Geoengineering is also highly risky. A miscalculation could be an extinction-level event, although the same can be said for the pathway we are on now. Once global CO2 levels hit 800 ppm, we are likely looking at a dead ocean. We could hit this by 2100 on our current track. 

The other thing I always tell my students is to look around... All this human development is in the last 200 years for the most part. Our lives have drastically improved, but now it is time to make sure we still have a future. Literally go back just two human generations, and most families in the USA did not have a car for every driving-age person. They may have had 1 for the whole family. We are incredibly lucky to be alive today when, all things being equal, life has never been easier to live (obviously, there are still struggles, but we aren't hunting every day, building fires, salting our meat to keep it longer, etc.). We have refrigerators, HVAC, cars, trains, etc. Now we just need to encourage engineers and scientists to help us build a better, more sustainable future. 

 

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11 minutes ago, Sundog said:

I think acid rain and ozone were a lot easier to collaborate on and solve. 

Those also caused direct visible damage as well as a clear threat. 

They also weren't issues that if solved would severely damage countries' economies and standards of living. There are 300 million people in India that defecate outdoors. Their poor standard of living is one reason their carbon footprint is half the global average.

I also don't like excusing or allowing other countries to continue to pollute with impunity as if modern forms of energy production aren't available to them. 

Why couldn't China just build more solar farms or wind mills instead of installing 100 GW of coal powered energy over the last ten years? That's roughly 250 coal powered power plants. Meanwhile the West has built none in 25 years and more are being decommissioned every year 

We can't solve this problem when 90% of it has nothing to do with us. 

I feel like people aren't seriously interested in solving this issue when focusing only on the US and speaking in uniliteral terms as if we are the ones that, if we just went carbon neutral, we'd stop climate change. 

There's no carrot to get other countries to stop greenhouse gas emissions. We need a stick. 

And if the stick doesn't work, we need geoengineering. And the easiest and most cost effective way to do it is with aerosols. 

I fear that we'll all be right here, a bunch of old men saying the exact same thing 30 years from now, with nothing being done because people are holding out hope that by some miracle we will get everyone around the world to become carbon neutral. Meanwhile we lost 30 years of aerosol injections to at least get temps back down to reasonable levels while we try to solve this thing.  

Even if we did go carbon neutral in 30 years let's say, the greenhouse gases are all still in the air. Aerosols are a way to stop the warming and even reverse it while the world transitions over to clean energy and solves the problem of carbon sequestering at scale.

 

India is horrible when it comes to air pollution too, all those people densely packed and too many people driving cars.

 

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2 minutes ago, JustinRP37 said:

We do have plenty of options that WILL work. But the problem is the stakeholders that make massive amounts of money off fossil fuels don't want to change until the reserves they have purchased are fully depleted. 90% of the issues is NOT from outside the USA. The USA is still the second-biggest producer of greenhouse gasses with a relatively small population. Our per capita emission is around 14.2 tonnes per person, whereas China is 8.9, and India 1.9. Despite the fact that China is basically the manufacturer for the world (which does need to change). Yes, China has added more coal in the past decade, but it is also producing more and more renewables each year. (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jun/26/china-breaks-more-records-with-massive-build-up-of-wind-and-solar-power). China is likely at its peak gasoline consumption now as it has massively electrified its vehicle fleet (https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/chinas-fuel-demand-may-have-passed-its-peak-iea-says-2025-02-13/). 

Unfortunately for us, we have a president that does not want to build any wind power or any renewables. (https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c15l3knp4xyo) (https://ctmirror.org/2025/08/04/trump-administration-cancels-plans-to-develop-new-offshore-wind-projects/). And is also actively trying to destroy any research on greenhouse gasses (https://www.npr.org/2025/08/04/nx-s1-5453731/nasa-carbon-dioxide-satellite-mission-threatened). 

The technology exists for us to decarbonize rapidly, and it will not all be from one area. Many say to ban all oil-fired boilers in homes, but the fastest way to decarbonize heat in the Northeast is not getting rid of oil burners but switching them to primarily biofuels. We have the technology, but just like people were wary of electricity back when it was being brought into the house, we are facing a highly anti-science environment right now. Sadly, our present-day life is really reminding me of Idiocracy. People will put profits above all else. Only economists know that growth is infinite on a finite planet. 

Geoengineering is also highly risky. A miscalculation could be an extinction-level event, although the same can be said for the pathway we are on now. Once global CO2 levels hit 800 ppm, we are likely looking at a dead ocean. We could hit this by 2100 on our current track. 

The other thing I always tell my students is to look around... All this human development is in the last 200 years for the most part. Our lives have drastically improved, but now it is time to make sure we still have a future. Literally go back just two human generations, and most families in the USA did not have a car for every driving-age person. They may have had 1 for the whole family. We are incredibly lucky to be alive today when, all things being equal, life has never been easier to live (obviously, there are still struggles, but we aren't hunting every day, building fires, salting our meat to keep it longer, etc.). We have refrigerators, HVAC, cars, trains, etc. Now we just need to encourage engineers and scientists to help us build a better, more sustainable future. 

 

 Only economists know that growth is infinite on a finite planet. 

This math really doesn't work, we are already consuming resources at twice the rate that the planet can replace them.  It's why this planet has a population ceiling of around 11 billion humans.

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Just now, LibertyBell said:

 Only economists know that growth is infinite on a finite planet. 

This math really doesn't work, we are already consuming resources at twice the rate that the planet can replace them.  It's why this planet has a population ceiling of around 11 billion humans.

And we really don't want to find out what first-hand what happens when populations overshoot their carrying capacity. Plenty of examples in the natural world shows it is pain and suffering and in some areas of the world, we are already seeing that. 

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1 minute ago, JustinRP37 said:

And we really don't want to find out what first-hand what happens when populations overshoot their carrying capacity. Plenty of examples in the natural world shows it is pain and suffering and in some areas of the world, we are already seeing that. 

Yes, it's ironic and in a sad way, people think they have free will (and we do to a certain extent), but everything we do is controlled by natural processes.  War, mass migration, etc, are all the result of what we do to the planet and on the planet.

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22 minutes ago, JustinRP37 said:

We do have plenty of options that WILL work. But the problem is the stakeholders that make massive amounts of money off fossil fuels don't want to change until the reserves they have purchased are fully depleted. 90% of the issues is NOT from outside the USA. The USA is still the second-biggest producer of greenhouse gasses with a relatively small population. Our per capita emission is around 14.2 tonnes per person, whereas China is 8.9, and India 1.9. Despite the fact that China is basically the manufacturer for the world (which does need to change). Yes, China has added more coal in the past decade, but it is also producing more and more renewables each year. (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jun/26/china-breaks-more-records-with-massive-build-up-of-wind-and-solar-power). China is likely at its peak gasoline consumption now as it has massively electrified its vehicle fleet (https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/chinas-fuel-demand-may-have-passed-its-peak-iea-says-2025-02-13/). 

Unfortunately for us, we have a president that does not want to build any wind power or any renewables. (https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c15l3knp4xyo) (https://ctmirror.org/2025/08/04/trump-administration-cancels-plans-to-develop-new-offshore-wind-projects/). And is also actively trying to destroy any research on greenhouse gasses (https://www.npr.org/2025/08/04/nx-s1-5453731/nasa-carbon-dioxide-satellite-mission-threatened). 

The technology exists for us to decarbonize rapidly, and it will not all be from one area. Many say to ban all oil-fired boilers in homes, but the fastest way to decarbonize heat in the Northeast is not getting rid of oil burners but switching them to primarily biofuels. We have the technology, but just like people were wary of electricity back when it was being brought into the house, we are facing a highly anti-science environment right now. Sadly, our present-day life is really reminding me of Idiocracy. People will put profits above all else. Only economists know that growth is infinite on a finite planet. 

Geoengineering is also highly risky. A miscalculation could be an extinction-level event, although the same can be said for the pathway we are on now. Once global CO2 levels hit 800 ppm, we are likely looking at a dead ocean. We could hit this by 2100 on our current track. 

The other thing I always tell my students is to look around... All this human development is in the last 200 years for the most part. Our lives have drastically improved, but now it is time to make sure we still have a future. Literally go back just two human generations, and most families in the USA did not have a car for every driving-age person. They may have had 1 for the whole family. We are incredibly lucky to be alive today when, all things being equal, life has never been easier to live (obviously, there are still struggles, but we aren't hunting every day, building fires, salting our meat to keep it longer, etc.). We have refrigerators, HVAC, cars, trains, etc. Now we just need to encourage engineers and scientists to help us build a better, more sustainable future. 

 

How many panels do you have and what is the size of your system?

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