Global Warming and Cooling Cave Records

[Gina]

Anyone got any results on global temperature records from cave reasearch. I'm not a cave reseacher myself but is there anything from cave sediments, fossils etc that would indicate global temperatures in the short term say 0-100,000 years and longer term.

In response to the original question, caves and more specifically speleothems are an excellent resource for climate records through analysis of oxygen, carbon and trace elements (magnesium, strontium, barium, sodium, phosphorous).  Temperature, rainfall, hurricanes, el nino events, monsoon strength, soil nutrient supply can all be obtained. 

If you want specific papers, there are 100s out there showing you such records.  Do a search in web of science or sciencedirect and you'll get loads.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleListURL&_method=list&_ArticleListID=600247967&_sort=d&_st=0&_acct=C000010018&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=121739&md5=90c4b552338cb9842997832f97190170

 

[Bob Smith]

If the cost of carrying the cans to Bridgend negates any benefit, then simple economics should dictate that they wouldn't bother.
The normal quote is "recycling aluminium drink cans saves up to 90% of the energy needed to make aluminium from its raw materials"
Its hard to accept that moving 1000Kg of cans across the country is more energetically expensive than shipping 4000 - 8000 Kg of Bauxite from Australia.
Then the Cans require melting while the Bauxite needs processing to AlOxide then Aluminium

Your understanding of extractive metallurgy is slightly lacking, honestly the saving of 90% is very over stated, it's nowhere near that. Just remember the amount of driving needed to get the cans to bridgend; lots of cars to local collection centres, local council recycling scheme waggons, transport to centralized collection, then transport to bridgend, lots of clean up before/during smelting and then off to mill to be turned into useful ingots. Bulk carrying is often a much more efficient method of transportation (even from Oz! When shipping casiterite to brazil from cornwall our largest cost in fuel per ton of ore was from Wheal Jane to the docks! ). And remember you can't just use recycled material in the smelter, it is added to a quite high percentage of 'new' ally.

 

[graham]

And remember you can't just use recycled material in the smelter, it is added to a quite high percentage of 'new' ally.

I don't doubt you are right, but why can you not do this?

 

[Bob Smith]

I can't quite remember why, it's a lame answer but "cos or chemists/metallurgists to us so". Sorry Graham, but i expect the answer is out there. I'll go back through my papers at some point and find a decent reason.

 

[Peter Burgess]

At the risk of appearing to be an ignorant fool, might it be because it is cheaper to adapt an EXISTING process, than to develop a completely new on to recycle purely old metal?

 

[Cave_Troll]

as far as I know you blast the cans with hot air to burn off the coatings and then melt it.
Once thats done you're left with a block of Al which gets sent to the rolling mill. so no you don't need to mix it with "new" Al. Al is Al , there is no difference between recycled and "fresh out of the bauxite" Al.

All the quick research i have done (including the "International Aluminium Institute") do keep coming up with figures like
1Kg of recycled Al saves 6-8Kg Bauxite.
Recycling only takes about a small fraction of the energy required to Redox AlOx in Bauxite and then melt the Al
Al recycling is one of the few recyling to be commercialy viable and cover its own costs.

Anyway getting back to the origional question as to wether you can tell anything about historic climate from fossils, sediments etc. the answer is probably yes, but you get much better results including sequence etc from drilled core samples than just wandering around caves.

 

[dunc]

another global warming thread, oh joy..

 

[Cave_Troll]

another global warming thread, oh joy..

Actually i beleive the orginator intended it to be a different topic of "can caves be used as a historical record of climate temerature", the answer to which is "yes" but most of the time there are better ways of doing itt.
we somehow seem to have seem to have got on to a "recycling aluminium" discussion

 

[ttxela]

It's certainly worth a bit, I regularly take relatively modest amounts of ally down to the scrappy and it pays for fish and chips for the whole company. 

 

[rich]

Global warming from man made CO2 is crap.............in my opinion.

I agree it demonstrates a clear and unmistakeable sign that things have warmed up - but says nothing about the cause - man-made or natural background cycle.
I'm inclined to think it's a bit of both.

I Don't believe anyone knows what is going on. And therefore we are being subject to a huge con.

I find it incredible that people can make confident decisions on major topics on the basis of intuition or how they feel about them. Here's some news for you: the scientific laws remain the same regardless of your opinion of them.

The scientific consensus on climate change is now very strong indeed: climate change is definitely occurring, and human activity is responsible for a very large proportion of it. Thousands of experts in the field have spent many years collecting data, producing models, writing papers, and arguing about it. If you're going to argue against this consensus, be aware of what you are doing.

If you still want to insist that climate change is not due to human influence, I suggest you first spend several months (at a minimum) getting up to speed on the years of scientific literature that have been produced on the subject. Now, having done that, you have to find either some evidence that has so far been overlooked or some logical errors that have been missed by the thousands of very smart people who have been working in the field. After that, you have to write up and submit your new research to a relevant journal or conference to have it peer-reviewed by experts. If it gets published, then feel free to present your views to the rest of us.

 

[graham]

Good post, Rich. Gina and I have given links to places where they can start looking for the relevant publications.

They won't though, 'cos they simply don't understand the extent of the work that has been done.

It's rather like the fact that Michael Behe will refer you to 4 peer-reviewed papers that, he claims, disprove aspects of Darwinian evolution* but refuses to mention the thousands upon thousands of publications that demonstrate the accuracy of that theory on virtually a daily basis.





*In fact they don't so let's not go there.

 

[Cave Monkey]

The scientific consensus on climate change is now very strong indeed: climate change is definitely occurring, and human activity is responsible for a very large proportion of it. Thousands of experts in the field have spent many years collecting data, producing models, writing papers, and arguing about it. If you're going to argue against this consensus, be aware of what you are doing.

Oh come on, the scientific community had its names pasted on a paper used to sell the idea of man causing global warming.
It has been well published that the vast majority of the people whos names were included, have asked for their names to be removed, some have gone as far as seeking legal advice regarding the matter.

Not enough is known about this rock we live on to understand what is going on.

 

[Prince of Darkness]

I find it incredible that people can make confident decisions on major topics on the basis of intuition or how they feel about them. Here's some news for you: the scientific laws remain the same regardless of your opinion of them.

The scientific consensus on climate change is now very strong indeed:
[/quote]

But it isn't.

I find it incredible that people can make confident decisions about improvershing populations even more based on a few dodgy statistics.

 

[Robert Scott]

Just to clarify some terminology in case some people find its use slightly confusing

Scientific law = a statement of a relation or sequence of phenomena invariable under the same conditions.

Scientific consensus = majority of opinion amongst the scientific community.

 

[andymorgan]

I find it incredible that people can make confident decisions on major topics on the basis of intuition or how they feel about them. Here's some news for you: the scientific laws remain the same regardless of your opinion of them.

The scientific consensus on climate change is now very strong indeed:

But it isn't.

I find it incredible that people can make confident decisions about improvershing populations even more based on a few dodgy statistics.
[/quote]

Oh yes it is The overwhelming majority of published articles support the view that global warming is occurring, and it is man-made...

 

[rich]

Oh come on, the scientific community had its names pasted on a paper used to sell the idea of man causing global warming.
It has been well published that the vast majority of the people whos names were included, have asked for their names to be removed, some have gone as far as seeking legal advice regarding the matter.

Not enough is known about this rock we live on to understand what is going on.

Look, no offence here but you clearly haven't got even the beginning of an understanding of how the scientific process works. People's names do not get added to scientific papers without their agreement -- it just doesn't work like that.

More importantly, there is no one single paper that sells the idea of human-influenced climate change. If there was, you would be right to be skeptical. However, there is a huge mountain of scientific literature, consisting of thousands of papers, that supports the conclusion.

I strongly suspect that there is no such paper as you describe, but feel free to provide evidence for its existence.

 

[rich]

But it isn't.

I find it incredible that people can make confident decisions about improvershing populations even more based on a few dodgy statistics.

I would respond but I don't know what improvershing means, nor what populations have to do with the subject.

 

[Cave Monkey]

Look, no offence here but you clearly haven't got even the beginning of an understanding of how the scientific process works. People's names do not get added to scientific papers without their agreement -- it just doesn't work like that.

More importantly, there is no one single paper that sells the idea of human-influenced climate change. If there was, you would be right to be skeptical. However, there is a huge mountain of scientific literature, consisting of thousands of papers, that supports the conclusion.

I strongly suspect that there is no such paper as you describe, but feel free to provide evidence for its existence.

None taken, but i do work in the scientific field, and i have a strong understanding of how the whole process works. I also get to see on an almost daily basis how information is used and in most cases manipulated for one groups advantage over anothers.

Regarding the paper i mentioned, it was compiled from every bit of information made available by all the people regarded as leaders in global warming to be the definative guide on global warming, and it was inconclusive. However, thats not what we (the public) were told, and therefore most of the contributers wished to have their names disassociated with it.

I am in no doubt that the planet is changing and we are going to experience climate issues, but the reasons are not as black and white as you wish to argue. If they were there would not be so many blanks. I know its human nature to ask for/need a reason why, but unfortunately at this moment in time there is no answer.

There was a TV skit called 'The great global warming swindle' that attempted to argue the points, but unfortunately it kinda got bastardised.
http://www.channel4.com/science/microsites/G/great_global_warming_swindle/programme.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Global_Warming_Swindle

 

[nickwilliams]

Having direct experience of metalliferous mining I strongly disagree with current aluminium recycling policies, the amount of energy to transport all the cans to the few smelting plants in the UK negates ANY benefit from recycling.

Clearly a knowledge of metalliferous mining does not necessarily qualify you as an expert in what happens to the ore once it has been mined.

These guys ought to know what they are talking about:

http://www.world-aluminium.org/production/smelting/index.html

Nick.

 

[andymorgan]

Regarding the paper i mentioned, it was compiled from every bit of information made available by all the people regarded as leaders in global warming to be the definative guide on global warming, and it was inconclusive. However, thats not what we (the public) were told, and therefore most of the contributers wished to have their names disassociated with it.

So, it sounds like this paper was a review. I have never heard of a review claiming a be a 'definitive' guide. Secondly, if the review was inconclusive, why did the cited authors want to have their names dissociated from it?