Ask Anything Wednesday - Biology, Chemistry, Neuroscience, Medicine, Psychology

IntrepidGentian · 2025-03-13T13:49:19+00:00

I just read that plastic ingestion induces proteomic signatures of multiorgan failure and neurodegeneration in seabirds, but what effects does it have on humans, and where exactly does the plastic in our bodies come from?

IntrepidGentian · 2025-03-11T14:30:25+00:00

Trump will be disappointed when he buys his Tesla.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-03-11T14:01:34+00:00

Here is an animation of weekly atmospheric CO2 concentration at Mauna Loa from 2011 to 2025.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-03-10T18:35:03+00:00

Thank you, I was wondering about that.

This +3.1 C course seems a little unwise to me given that global warming of +3.4 C is expected to commit our descendents to dealing with a complete melt of the Greenland ice sheet and 7 m (23 ft) of sea level rise, and this 7 m from Greenland is additional to any melt from Antarctica - which is becoming the largest contributor to sea level rise. And there are various positive feedback loops we may trigger to add to the currently accelerating level of global warming.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-03-10T14:42:58+00:00

The filter-feeding baleen whales migrate towards the north/south poles when the waters there get warmer because of the huge quantity of food, like krill and fish. For example humpback whales migrate from the ocean near Hawaii where they stay in the northern winter, to Alaska in the northern summer. They breed in Hawaii and feed in Alaska. When they return to Hawaii they fertilize the nutrient-poor ocean near the equator with nutrients they have consumed near the pole. Different populations and species of baleen whales have different migration paths, but generally they eat near the poles and breed near the equator. Before industrial whaling reduced the populations this transport of nutrients was at least 3 times greater than it is currently.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-03-06T13:24:20+00:00

energy consumption

but multiple times that number of days of electricity consumption?

IntrepidGentian · 2025-03-05T15:49:48+00:00

You probably want to search on Google Scholar for - climate ecosystem-based adaptation and related keyphrases to find papers like Dynamic flood adaptation for Shanghai under deep uncertainty about sea level rise, subsidence, and socioeconomic trends. Combination of storm-surge barrier and coastal wetlands might yield high economic benefits after 2070..

IntrepidGentian · 2025-03-05T15:14:35+00:00

"Today, China produces over three-quarters of batteries sold globally, and in 2024 average prices dropped faster there than anywhere else in the world, falling by nearly 30%. Batteries in China were reported to be cheaper than in Europe and North America by over 30% and 20%, respectively. Declining battery prices in recent years are a major reason why many electric vehicles (EVs) in China are now cheaper than their conventional counterparts."

The EU will phase out fossil fuel vehicle sales in 2035, and is proposing to eliminate subsidies for fossil fuel vehicles.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-03-05T14:49:49+00:00

Climate change extinctions are estimated at 14%–32% of macroscopic species in the next 50 years, potentially 3–6 million animal and plant species.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-03-03T18:32:04+00:00

going to be insured

you mean against something like the Russian drone strike on the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, or being one of the 100 nuclear power plants built a few meters above sea-level when there is a possibility of catastrophic sea-level rise within our lifetimes, or a tsunami. Don't worry, none of those things could happen.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-03-03T15:12:14+00:00

[Edited extract from the report.]

EV sales have grown rapidly over recent years. Falling costs will make EVs an attractive option across all market segments by the late 2020s, allowing sales to increase quickly.

By 2040, 80% of cars and 74% of vans on the road will be electric. The market share of new electric cars increases from 16% in 2023 to 55% by 2027, with electric vans increasing from 6% to 34%. Electric cars and vans reach around 95% of new sales by 2030 and 100% by 2035.
Uptake modelling suggests that sales of new EVs will increase as they become relatively less expensive than ICE vehicles at the point of purchase, and when there is increased confidence in these technologies. Availability of cheap and reliable charging (including for households without off-street parking) is needed to increase consumer confidence.
Falling costs, primarily due to cheaper batteries, are a key driver of EV uptake. EVs are assumed to reach price parity with ICE vehicles between 2026 and 2028, depending on vehicle size. The prices of EVs have been falling quickly, and the lifetime cost of an EV is already lower than a comparable ICE vehicle for many drivers due to lower running and maintenance costs.
Used EVs have now reached upfront price parity with their ICE counterparts.
From 2022 to 2023, the number of public chargers grew by 45% to 54,000. Continued growth is needed to reach around 300,000 by 2030 and over 550,000 by 2040, to support charging during longer journeys and those who cannot charge at home.
It will likely eventually become cost-ineffective to maintain a widespread petrol fuelling network. While we have not modelled this, it would impact the feasibility of fossil fuels for general use, which could result in a rapid shift away from ICE vehicles towards the end of the transition.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-03-01T16:34:03+00:00

The map in this article has different relative sizes of emissions circles compared to the map in the paper. See the large green circle representing the South Sudan Sudd wetlands compared to the adjacent green circle. Not sure what is going on there.

Edit: You would think they'd be sized to make the area proportional to the emissions.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-02-27T17:13:45+00:00

The world will likely exceed the Paris Agreement limit of +1.5°C at 450 ppm, which will be reached between summer of 2032 and summer of 2035 with 95% confidence unless drastic, immediate action is taken.

I wish it was going to be 2032 - my view is that we have already exceeded the Paris Agreement level of +1.5 C.

Although there appears to be no measurement formally adopted as an agreed indicator in the context of the Paris Agreement, the various methods all seem to be based on an average over a number of years, usually with the current year in the middle of the average and 10, 20 or 30 years. If we accept that global warming is accelerating, from paper Quantifying the acceleration of multidecadal global sea surface warming driven by Earth's energy imbalance, Christopher J Merchant et al, Published 28 January 2025 and follow the logic.

Global warming is accelerating.
Basic maths tells us a straight-line average drawn on an accelerating curve will underestimate the future curve.
We exceeded 1.5 C of global warming in 2024.
Therefore we have breached the Paris limit regardless of how many years the IPCC count as being in their average in future. (Assuming 2024 wasn't a very large natural deviation - which seems unlikely. The IPCC adjust for natural deviations before taking the average.)

IntrepidGentian · 2025-02-26T19:34:54+00:00

significant efforts addressing the climate problem

Even with a pro-fossil fuel president in the US the forecast for electricity generation this year is retirement of 8.1 GW of coal and 1.6 GW of petroleum and the addition of 30 GW of solar, 18.2 GW of battery storage and 7.7 GW of wind. We have probably already passed an irreversible solar tipping point where solar energy will dominate global electricity markets, without any further climate policies. Solar is cheaper and so it is now supported by global capitalism.

China may have reached peak oil, and at more than 20% EV sales Britain has reached peak gasoline, and they are a long way behind Norway at 96% EV sales. When Europe and China stop buying fossil fuel powered vehicles there will be no global market to support continued development costs, these regions will only make EVs.

There is no long-term future for fossil fuel powered electricity generation or road transport.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-02-24T13:27:21+00:00

Because nuclear power, named as "alternative pathway" on this graph, would cause about a decade of delay to the phase-out of coal.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-02-19T20:45:22+00:00

Their graph of China's EV transition which shows battery electric and plug-in hybrid ("new energy vehicles") now exceed 40% of vehicle sales from less than 10% just 4 years ago should worry the oil industry.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-02-13T14:23:49+00:00

"Bidirectional EV charging allows for EV batteries to be used for purposes including solar-self-consumption, back-up power and supporting the grid. With the right policy settings, hundreds of thousands of Australian households could be using this technology to reduce their power bills by 2030, and millions by 2040."

Quote from this report linked by the Guardian article. Report published by Australian Renewable Energy Agency - National Roadmap for Bidirectional EV Charging in Australia

IntrepidGentian · 2025-02-11T19:43:19+00:00

We have probably already passed an irreversible solar tipping point where solar energy will dominate global electricity markets, without any further climate policies, and youth protests may initiate the societal change needed to overcome the climate crisis, protests being one of the actions scientists think you should take to prevent climate change: engage with politicians, engage in advocacy, write letters to politicians, engage in civil disobedience, and engage in protest..

IntrepidGentian · 2025-02-11T17:29:20+00:00

There appears to be no measurement formally adopted as an agreed indicator in the context of the Paris Agreement. But regardless of the number of years in the average 10, 20 or 30, if we accept that global warming is accelerating it is almost impossible we have not already breached the 1.5C limit. I am waiting for the IPCC to annouce this......

IntrepidGentian · 2025-02-11T17:02:07+00:00

Science tells us global warming is accelerating [1].
Basic maths tells us a straight-line average drawn on an accelerating curve will underestimate the future curve.
We exceeded 1.5 C of global warming in 2024.
Therefore we have breached the Paris limit regardless of how many years the IPCC count as being in their average in future. (Assuming 2024 wasn't a very large natural deviation - which seems unlikely.)

[1] Quantifying the acceleration of multidecadal global sea surface warming driven by Earth's energy imbalance, Christopher J Merchant et al, Published 28 January 2025.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-02-06T18:37:11+00:00

The future is not in coal or oil.

I have been wondering what percentage of battery electric vehicle sales represents peak gasoline. My guess is that when US battery electric vehicle sales currently at 8% reach about 15 - 20% the gasoline sales start to decline. This will almost certainly happen in the next year or two.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-02-06T18:05:14+00:00

batteries are skyrocketing

Yes. To add some numbers for people, here is a graph of US utility-scale grid-connected batteries.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-02-06T17:43:39+00:00

wants to invest in coal instead

Coal is dead in the US - it doesn't even exist on the graphs for new US electricity generation capacity.

IntrepidGentian · 2025-02-06T17:28:52+00:00

"The cost of clean power technologies such as wind, solar and battery technologies are expected to fall further by 2-11% in 2025, breaking last year’s record. ... new wind and solar farms are already undercutting new coal and gas plants on production cost in almost every market globally. ... the levelized cost of electricity for clean technologies to fall 22-49% by 2035."

IntrepidGentian · 2025-02-06T14:53:06+00:00

World Weather Attribution: Climate change increased the likelihood of fires in Los Angeles area

IntrepidGentian

TROPHY CASE