Oil and NASA's mission statement change

The enormous hydrocarbon reserves of the outer planets, planetisimals are important resources that may well be exploited by humans. Even if there' s a great breakthroughs in energy physics, technology freeing us from our present dependence on fossil fuel, hydrocarbons will always be important for our chemical industries. Indeed petro-chemists have long been lamenting our wasting the terrestrial resource by burning it up.

But, in the absence of great breakthroughs in spacecraft propulsion systems, that resource is likely to be used beyond the Earth. Earth's running out of oil might thus be expected to be an important factor greatly boosting space colonisation. Nuclear war, accumulating radio-active contamination following nuclear wars, nuclear terrorism/accident episodes and so on, might be other important factors.

Burning hydrocarbons does add CO2 to the atmosphere and extra CO2 should make plants grow faster. The plants return to the ground as hydrocarbons-right? Its part of a cycle that stores solar energy in the hydrocarbon reserves and it goes on with or without human help. The biosphere depends on the cycle with or without mankind.

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"><i>Originally posted by Jim</i>
[The biosphere depends on the cycle with or without mankind.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

Jim

You have hit the nail on the head. CO2 has a cycle within our biosphere. Influences outside of our biosphere cause changes in climate - such as massive volcanic eruptions, asteroid impacts, changes in the Sun.

Gregg Wilson

What difference does it make what causes climate change? The real issue with this hypothesis has nothing to do how the biosphere uses carbon. The spin doctors claim man is causing climate change. So, is what you want to establish the opposite of that spin? You want spin but not that spin? Why not investigate nature rather than be a spin expert?

Where is the spin? The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere is about 360 ppm. The amount of water vapor (not as clouds or rain) is about 24,700 ppm. Both are "greenhouse gases". Which one should we be worried about?

Real problems come from emissions of SO2, and to a much lesser extent NOx and HF.

Gregg Wilson

I find that the most compelling evidence for the consequences of global warming (which I hold as natural and cyclic) come from <u></u>The Coming Global Superstorm<u></u>. The movie The Day after Tomorrow is loosely based on the ficticious section of this novel and some of the scientific evidence is presented in the movie. Since Ben Franklin discovered the Gulf Stream in roughly 1769 or so, we have tracked its velocity. Introduction of freshwater from polar melting shouldn't raise the sealevel (observe a glass of water full of ice and let it melt - it won't overflow since ice contracts as it melts into water). The consequence of the freshwater does affect the halo-thermal drive system in the north Atlantic which does seem to regulate the flow of energy from the Equator to the poles. The evidence in Coming Global Superstorm points to the gulf stream changes which have slowed since the 1970's by half as well as the fact that the upper level atmosphere above the north pole (not sure about the south pole honestly) has cooled by 70 degrees from -70 to -140ish. This does seem to support the hypothesis for the ice age mechanism on earth. Additionally, ice ages play and incredibly important part in the Carbon cycle whereby allowing for the reuptake of carbon into the deep ocean (gotta make new coal) due to the higher rate of CO2 reuptake by an ice age cooled ocean (like making soda pop in other words.) Now, this is bad for humans who cannot adapt to the abrupt changes. However, the glacier activity carves mountains and in the past produced the fertile soils that we reap here in the USA for our agricultural success. Earth upheaves from time to time. BTW, according to the cycle of ice ages...we are overdue by 100,000 years. Get your parkas fellas, its gonna get real cold.......

Mark Vitrone