Letter to the Editor: Attend today’s climate rally

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I’d like to draw attention to the climate rally planned for Friday, Sept. 20 at noon in Meetinghouse Park.

Organized by students, the rally joins others around the world seeking to focus attention on the climate crisis and the dire outlook for the future livability of the world they are inheriting.

This is an opportunity to express your support for their efforts and offer some assurance that the older generation is willing to fight for the future along with them!

Cynthia Stancioff
Chesterville

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77 Comments

  1. Ok Ozerki I have the rare night off so I will give you a basic science lesson. Natural CO2 is largely caused by the decaying of organic matter, you’re familiar with how photosynthesis works, yes? Well, as long as green things like plants for example are alive they keep absorbing CO2, they don’t release it, they with the help of water actually break the CO2 down in to Carbon and Oxygen, they release the O and retain the carbon, when they start to run out of storage room, the plant grows(yes putting your marijuana plants in a CO2 enriched environment will make them grow faster.) in order to hold more carbon. Carbon by itself is harmless, here some chemistry fir you, Carbon has 6 electrons and oxygen has 6, oxygen atoms are the lovers and the bullies of the atomic world, they hate being by themselves. that whole opposites attract thing, yup it’s true. Oxygen is a neutral having 3 positive electrons and 3 negative ones, but it is extremely extrovert and just want to be part of stuff, carbon on the other hand, carbon is a neutral but is somewhat introverted, it doesn’t mind being alone, but those pesky oxygen atoms, they will join together and form O2, they will join a hydrogen atom and become H1O1 and will become negatively charged and since hydrogen is a positive, a hydrogen atom will join the group and form H2O. Now when an oxygen atom finds a carbon atom, carbon by itself just sits in the soil and waits, then when something quite literally stirs up the dust the carbon atoms get bombarded by oxygen atoms and form CO2, another way carbon is released is by burning, 2 pounds of burning wood releases 4lbs of carbon which then mixes with the oxygen and forms CO2, forest fires release huge amounts of carbon and since the air is 21% oxygen, the carbon almost instantly becomes CO2 the carbon that isn’t released into the air becomes charcoal, coal, oil and other fossil fuels.

    Now for some oceanography and fluid dynamics, The Oceans cover 71% of the planet and hold 90% of the world’s water, and can be divided into two groups, dense(cold water) and less dense(warm water), I will get to freshwater in a moment. there is one band of warm water(the middle) and 2 bands of cold water(Arctic and Antarctic), the dense cold water actually keeps the warm water from entering it, but should outside forces heat the cold water the warm water will “invade” the cold water. But here is a quick explanation of why the melting ice(not really melting) won’t have much of an effect on the oceans, similar to what happens in an estuary, saltwater and freshwater don’t instantly mix, they probably will but it may take 10s of thousands of years for them to do so, saltwater is denser than freshwater due to all the salt and other minerals in it so the freshwater will float on top of the saltwater as it is less dense than the saltwater is. And since the water cycle evaporates the the top layer of the ocean, most of the freshwater will be redeposited back onto the land as that is where the tide tends to push things that float on it,

    The clouds trapping the heat, yup that they do, but they also produce rain, ever gone outside after a good rain and thought “Wow the air is cooler and crisper, that’s not the temp that does that, it’s the rain that washed the carbon out of the air as CO2 dissolves in the water and carried it into the soil or washed it into the water where green aquatic plants suck it up and hold on to it, estimates, only 35-40% of the total carbon produced actually makes it into the atmosphere. As for the methane, burn it, blow the fumes through a carbon scrubber, take the carbon and bury it somewhere out of the way.

  2. Hey Watched…did you watch the predictions made over the last 40 years? NOT A SINGLE ONE has come to pass. NADA.

    Real science has predictive value. “Climate change” (nee global warming, nee global cooling) is not a real theory, as it cannot satisfy that requirement. It is pseudo-science which changes its mind constantly and makes excuses for why its predictions fail, and is more like a cult than anything else. We need to SUSPEND the rules of science to ‘make it work! The religion of the Left – gives you an excuse to turn everything over to a small group of elites and not have to do squat yourself, like clean up trash by the road. Too bad you’re so against the USA, since the USA is such a CLEAN, basically NON POLLUTING nation, compared to everyone else…you’re doing it for nothing! Look to China, India…nothing you could do will improve ONE thing. But you WILL harm your neighbors; bet that doesn’t bother you much, though.

    I hope the individual rights you surrender don’t end up being taken over by something like the Trump cabinet :) Could happen VERY, VERY easily, you know….oh, you gonna be sorry once it really happens. They always are.

  3. Over regulated: Yes, I have been reading, watching listening and learning for more than 50 years, have you?

    Watched the moon missions progress, and make it, watched the winter snow reduce in the Northeast, participated in a business that recycled CO2 from industrial systems, been fascinated with the reductions in summer ice in the arctic, and the discoveries concerning glaciers around the world. Went to Glacier National Park, to see what’s left of the Glaciers……

    I have lived in the blossoming of the energy consumption age, from way back when a family of five might have one car for five people, until now when that family of five may have four cars…..

    How much coal do we still consume? oil and natural gas do we burn? Now that we have been joined by many other nations, is it not reasonable to expect the atmospheric concentration of CO2 to increase? And measurable, too.

    And CO2 is a greenhouse gas? Hmm…. Is it contributing to climate change? I believe so….

    Your point seems to be…its all a lie….Have you checked with the island nations that are disappearing? How about the Aleutian Islands? Maybe sampled the permafrost area of the arctic that are melting?

    Is it climate change you do not believe in, or mankind induced climate change?

    PS: I was vaccinated for polio, and guess what? I did not get polio! And small pox? Vaccinated, and I did not get smallpox.

  4. Watched and listened, Since you mentioned snowfall, I thought I’d share some things that the good folks at NOAA were nice enough to share with me, in 1954 Maine saw 181 inches of snow, that’s a lot of snow. In 2007 Maine saw 197 inches of snow, that’s even more snow. In 1971 Maine got 137 inches, last year Maine got 135 inches, in 1968 Maine got 152 inches, in 2013 Maine got 151 inches. Our average snowfall is 115 inches, in the 1900s it was 80 inches. Between 1900 and 1904 we had 4 days every year over 90 degrees, between 1920 and 1924 we had 2 days that were over 90 degrees every year, between 1940 and 1950 Maine had 6 to 6.5 days every year that were over 90 degrees, but from 2010 to 2014 we had less than 4 days every year that were over 90 degrees, from 2014 to 2019 we had 3 days that were over 90 degrees, hummmm, less days now than in 1900. But from 1900 to 2019 we have had only 40 years with more than 4 days that were above 90 and 80 years with 3 or less days over 90, with 50 of those low years being between 1951 and 2019, so if the Earth is getting warmer, you couldn’t tell that by looking at Maine’s weather and temperatures.

  5. HB – nice try, but you again fall short. Of course I can benefit from a lesson, but your detailed explanation does nothing to address the points to which I responded in one of your other posts. You simply divert a conversation to something that appears to address my questions/statements but doesn’t really. Your comment about estuaries is a complete red herring and does not come close to demonstrating the understanding of how the global weather system works. I do have to thank you for making a case against the NECEC with your dissertation about the Carbon cycle and photosynthesis. I will send that along to doug herling and Sandi Howard. Your ice core example will show that there have been pretty consistent concentrations of CO2 over a long period of time until the 1960’s when they began to rise significantly and the only explanation is man’s insatiable appetite to pollute. I also want to ask again if you have read the IPCC report, you seem to dodge that question with your usual panache. At any rate, I have made my point from several different directions. It would be interesting to continue to discuss things with you, but you would need to promise to directly refer to my questions and comments rather than take a discussion in an oblique direction.

  6. Heartless, thanks for trying to educate the liberals. Your efforts are honorable but I suspect the audience has little use for science or history that contradicts the liberal talking points that they have been indoctrinated with.

  7. Peter – think you were reading upside down. And please enlighten me on those ‘liberal talking points’. Would love to find out what those are. Maybe I could even use one or two. It would be advisable for you to re-read many of the posts ….. you might learn something about science yourself. However, I wonder why these type of discussions always seem to attract someone who wants to make this a liberal v conservative controversy rather than sticking to facts and science. You do know that monarch butterflies are now gathering to migrate to Mexico, right?

  8. Melting permafrost in the Arctic is unlocking diseases and warping the landscape
    In Bethel, Alaska, roadways are literally rippling and warping as the ground beneath them becomes less solid. In other places, the melting permafrost is creating craters and sinkholes. “You see buildings that are kind of slumping into the ground; you see that a lot in the Russian Arctic,” Holmes says. Civil engineers are experimenting with new types of pilings and foundations to help keep Arctic buildings on strong footing.There is one crater in Siberia so large it’s gotten the nickname “doorway to the underworld.” It’s a kilometer long and up to 100 meters deep. And it’s growing larger every year.”

    https://www.vox.com/2017/9/6/16062174/permafrost-melting?fbclid=IwAR2lEbbz-R-bk-FRCLqV8MXpXaRlNJ2Lc5Y_SHu7lEdE9ciL2mOemZBywQs

  9. Marie E so the diseases resurfacing in Cali is from glacier melt ? I thought it was unvaccinated immigrants bringing it back and unvaccinated kids were catching them. Maybe it’s from the trash and human excrement or the dirty needles. Also I heard little Greta talking about eco systems which eco systems are dying because of “climate crisis” ?

  10. “Quick! Burn the Constitution, pass your freedoms to the politicians – THEY’LL save you!! Only THEY have the means!!!!!!”

  11. Hate to tell you, Marie…if things are as bad as the hysteria makes them out to be….there is no reversing ‘climate change’, even if we returned to 1500’s levels of emissions. That would mean that AOC is correct, and life on earth is probably over. The US ending ALL production would do NOTHING. Party on!

  12. Bee humble. Bee kind. Bee self-sufficient. I applaude people like Greta Thunberg for standing up for what she believes in. Who wants to praise me for having a smaller carbon footprint in an entire year than Greta’s just in the flight to make her speech?

  13. Mine too, Amanda. I burn <30 gallons of heating oil per year…my heat come from all renewable firewood burned in an EPA-approved stove. Until, of course, the EPA doesn't approve of it any longer, and uses force to make me change my ways. But hey, I can signal my virtue ALL OVER the place! I barely even use electricity, and I don't buy new things very often. I will fight back on these alarmists all day, and I WALK THE WALK that THEY won't. Funny, huh? Oh, but it sounds so lovely and dramatic to make these huge pronouncements (when you won't even pick up the trash on the sidewalk on High Street. They just want to force OTHERS to do it).

    It's interesting that all of the climate talking heads live in mansions and eat up the electricity that 25 homes would take, and fly around in private jets, rubbing elbows with the big wigs at huge galas….why, that's an awful lot like the privileged class in socialist nations, isn't it??

  14. Marie – she had a crew FLY OVER to sail her back!! Her PLASTIC boat (which cost a fortune…) is so bad for the environment, it’s a joke, and took massive amounts of energy to build (just like a wind turbine)! Why didn’t she (and Mills) use SKYPE to ‘address the UN’ instead of GOING THERE?? They talk the talk, but don”t WALK THE WALK, as always. Virtue signalling – “look at ME, I’m GREEN!”

    You folks are SO, SO, SO gullible. Me, a conservative, is FAR more “carbon neutral” and nature-friendly than someone like she is, bwahahahaha! They probably don’t even go outdoors like many conservatives, working. You guys are addicted to the DRAMA, not the daily drudge of living in a rural place that requires labor, doing environmental work like going around collecting used motor oil, picking up disgusting trash at highway rest areas, pulling dead animals out of water supply intakes, doing soil borings at gas stations and compiling data….what you are showing IS NOT ENVIRONMENTALISM. It’s just political maneuvering for control. You won’t do the work for real environmentalism! That is why conservatives are SO against you!

    You seem to have no idea what you’re talking about – you just link to things and spread talking points, as if they were your ammunition. “See! See! Take that!”. Marie: go outside. Pick up 1 black bag full of trash in downtown Farmington. Not on ‘a nature walk’, right along Front St or Rt. 2, or High St where the college kids toss things after protesting for the environment.

    Talk talk talk talk talk – vote, hope to get power for your elites – talk talk talk talk…just a political movement.

  15. Marie E, I am currently working for CSX in Hyde Park MA and have been for the past few weeks and I have never seen any icebergs off the Cape, that must be proof of global warming or climate change as it is now known after global warming got debunked, oh wait….yes there was in 2015 when a bunch of sea ice washed ashore, but if the Earth is getting warmer, where did the sea ice come from? Every time somebody says the Earth is getting warmer we get a record cold snap, why is that do you suppose?

    Ozerki, I addressed your questions in a comment the Mods decided not to post, so maybe they held on to the post, so if you wish my answers to your questions, pressure the Mods to post the comment.

  16. The long diatribes that pass for “insight” must take a lot of time away from actually doing anything good for the planet, in spite of assertions to the contrary.

  17. Greta doesn’t know how she will eventually return to Sweden. She has plans to travel overland across the Americas to arrive in Chile in December.

  18. Marie E, You would be surprised how I help the environment and the economy for example, did you know that a single CSX locomotive can haul 1 ton of freight 471 miles on a single gallon fuel, without people like me to keep them running and maintained, it would require more trucks on the road that can haul 1 ton of freight 10 miles on a single gallon of fuel. Which is why most of the trucks have a 300 gallon fuel capacity.

  19. So have any of you fellows that seem so against the climate change message stopped long enough to realize the following. Even if the whole message is a load of malarkey, the end result would be making the planet a better place for all of us and future generations to live.

    How anyone could say that it’s a bad idea to clean up not only the planet, but the things we do everyday, is beyond my comprehension and I for one would be embarrassed to be so short sighted.

  20. To the Score Keeper……Did you back out HB’s commute to MA? From all the comments on the local DB all this time,….seems he is from around here. Hopefully not commuting clear to MA in a pick up truck at less than 20 mgp.

    Environmentalist have long advocated the use of trains for transport of goods (and people.) Unfortunately, the convenience of trucks (and cars) wins out. Glad to hear that HB’s current work supports trains.

  21. “How anyone could say that it’s a bad idea to clean up not only the planet, but the things we do everyday, is beyond my comprehension and I for one would be embarrassed to be so short sighted.”

    But we are, and we have! The US is VERY clean, relatively speaking, and is ALWAYS moving forward! Now the message is extreme….to become a socialist nation, lose our individual freedom. LISTEN to these people, Jon! Mass hysteria….beware of authoritarian mass movements…the more we progress, the more control they DEMAND.

    We have an EPA, DEP, a process around building (env. impact etc). We have governments that can affect state transportation (change the fleet to nat gas, etc). They CANNOT dictate what we do on our property, generally speaking (such as using a wood stove). They WANT to do this, though. At what point will it end? When you go to sell your home, and they make you buy a new $10,000 furnace before you can? People should pay more attention to the hammers and sickles present at these rallies….this is simply another way to tax the crap out of you (most of which will be wasted) and take your freedom. Yet MORE ‘redistribution’….and the poor will pay the heaviest price. And I thought home ownership was the Left’s keystone…not anymore!

    This is politics, NOT ‘environmentalism’. Why does that seem to be hard for ppl to see? The message is a fine one – but the politics is horrid, authoritarian, and has been seen before, much to citizens of other nations detriment. The more we do, or agree to, the more freedom we’ll lose, and new demands will ALWAYS be made. We’ve seen this happening for decades now. The ‘slow creep’ is now a grab.

  22. Rather than continuing to talk in roundabout dramatic terms….how about:

    “WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM US THAT WE’RE NOT DOING NOW?”

    Please be extremely specific.

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