Re: Off Topic: NMD/Environment was: (Re: Ada and the NMD)

["chris.danx" <chris.danx@ntlworld.com>]

"Marin David Condic" <dont.bother.mcondic.auntie.spam@[acm.org> wrote in
message news:9n882d$rsh$1@nh.pace.co.uk...
> This is all drifting way off topic and into the realm of political
opinions.
>
> Let me ask this though (now that I have marked the subject line as off
> topic):
>
> If the Kyoto treaty is such a wonderful thing, why don't the Europeans
just
> go ahead and sign it themselves? Why do they need us to sign it for them?
> Why shouldn't the US make its own decisions about what is in the best
> interest of the US and all the rest of the world can do the same? If
France,
> Germany, England, et alia, all *love* this treaty so much and think it is
in
> their best interest, well, let them put their John Handcock on the bottom
> line.

Perhaps it's because Northern America is one of the biggest polluters.
Something like 25% of all CO2 emissions are produced by Northern America.
If the US doesn't support it and Japan doesn't either then Kyoto is a dead
duck.  IMO Kyoto is pants and there are better ways of dealing with lowering
emissions like the emission credits system but no one in power really gives
a crap and arguing about it is pointless (emission reduction a vote winner,
and that's all).  The main idea is the same but the consequences of not
finding a way to implement the idea (emission reduction) could be dire...


The recent train of thought is that we have 40 to 100 years before the
Amazon sink begins releasing it's C02.  When that happens the biggest sink
of them all, the oceans, will release it's store (of something who's name
eludes me, but it decomposes to methane when the pressure drops i.e. as it
rises from the ocean floor, and oil rigs sometimes disturb a deposit) and
all hell breaks loose.  A rapid jump in temperature will occur (around 2 to
5 degrees in a few years), and the oceans will burn due to the methane
igniting which isn't good news for anyone.  This is thought to have happened
before so many million years ago and took 200,000 years to get into balance
again and sparked an extinction event.

Maybe this will happen, maybe not but recent evidence and experiments seem
to support it.  Like all science though it's not a certainty.