back to article Massive global cooling process discovered as Paris climate deal looms

As world leaders get ready to head to Paris for the latest pact on cutting CO2 emissions, it has emerged that there isn't as much urgency about the matter as had been thought. A team of top-level atmospheric chemistry boffins from France and Germany say they have identified a new process by which vast amounts of volatile …

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  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    VOCs

    Does that mean I can buy some decent paint again?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: VOCs

      +1

      White Gloss that doesn't turn yellow after a week.

      1. Richard Wharram

        Re: VOCs

        All gloss does that doesn't it? If not, where do I buy such wonder-gloss?

        1. jeffdyer

          Re: VOCs

          All new gloss does yes, gloss bought 20 years ago didn't.

        2. Vendicar Decarian1

          Re: VOCs

          No, not all gloss paints yellow. Yellowing in gloss paints is often due to the oxidation of oils that carry the resins that give the high sheen.

          "Higher quality" paints won't yellow.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: VOCs

        White Gloss that doesn't turn yellow after a week.

        IME it's the high VOC stuff that turns yellow, the water based low VOC stuff is much whiter and stays that way. Against which the low VOC paint is only more marginally glossy than a "silk", and apparently for the best finish you need a good alkyd primer, even over old oil based gloss.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: VOCs

          apparently for the best finish you need a good alkyd primer, even over old oil based gloss.

          Nowhere near as good a finish as pre 2007 gloss and nowhere near as durable. Yes all oil based gloss does yellow eventually but pre 2007 stayed white for years as long at it wasn't in the dark, UV stops the yellowing process.

          Welcome to the bib and braces forum.

          1. Vendicar Decarian1

            Re: VOCs

            "Nowhere near as good a finish as pre 2007 gloss"

            Well, if you are buying your paint from Walmart, you should know that you are purchasing low quality paint.

            Capitalism has after all produced a race to the bottom in terms of product quality.

        2. Chemist

          Re: VOCs

          "it's the high VOC stuff that turns yellow, the water based low VOC stuff is much whiter and stays that way. "

          In my experience it's the low VOC but non-water based gloss that gives a good finish but yellows rapidly. I'd guess that to make it easy to apply the amount of VOC removed has been replaced with even more of the (necessary) binder which is what yellows.

          UV probably works by getting the TiO2 pigment to oxidize the yellowing binder. Water-based, having no need for a large amount of binder stay whiter longer at the expense of poor finish

          1. Andrew Newstead

            Re: VOCs - white paint yellowing

            Just a thought folks. I'm a model maker and one of the tricks we use to stop white paint (gloss or matt) yellowing over time is to add a drop of a royal blue paint to the white paint. Don't know the science but it does work quite well for both enamels and acrylics.

            1. Youngone Silver badge

              Re: VOCs - white paint yellowing

              @ Andrew Newstead:

              See, that's why I come here. A useless (to me) piece of really interesting information that seems totally counter-intuitive but obviously works.

              Made my day.

              1. x 7

                Re: VOCs - white paint yellowing

                for heavens sake all of you........if you want white gloss that stays white you need a paint that uses white lead as a pigment. Modern titanium oxide paint doesn't cut it

                1. Baskitcaise
                  Pint

                  Re: VOCs - white paint yellowing

                  Oh! yes to this :-)

                  Well it made me smile before 09:00 on a Friday.

                  Here have a beer on me.

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: VOCs

            Water based is incredibly stable with no yellowing. I use it exclusively for this reason regardless of the low VOCs. The satin/silk finish can rival any oil based finish and while the gloss can't match the finish of the oil based stuff it has the massive benefit of being much easier to repair / touch up so over time it can be kept looking good through small repairs without having to cover large areas with slow drying paint. I regularly refurbish water based gloss and satins in a couple of hours (including drying time) where it would be an 'occupants in a hotel' two day job using traditional oil paints.

      3. Vendicar Decarian1

        Re: VOCs

        Typically yellowing is a result of the oxidization of Organic Compounds (VOC), and a low content of Titanium Dioxide - which is what makes the paint white.

        If you don't want yellowing, avoid paints with low Titanium dioxide levels, and vegetable oils.

    2. Aristotles slow and dimwitted horse

      @ Keef : VOCs

      No, but you can buy a nice 1 litre tin of plankton. It comes in one colour only though, but does glow faintly in the dark.

    3. Zog_but_not_the_first
      Thumb Up

      Re: VOCs

      Count me in as a founding member of the Campaign for Real Paint

    4. John Smith 19 Gold badge
      Joke

      "Does that mean I can buy some decent paint again?"

      No, obviously.

      Those are the bad VOC's, not the good VOC's

    5. Vendicar Decarian1

      Re: VOCs

      Some of the best paints are classified as zero VOC.

      What are you jabbering about?

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    A very complex system after all.

    Good to see all but the most faithful and profit driven have accepted the idea that climate is a complex system we do not know well enough to forecast. Maybe now we can start to look at air pollution and require all trading countries to meet the same standards? Guess not, more carbon taxes it is then.

    1. GrumpyOldBloke

      Re: A very complex system after all.

      We missed a once in a lifetime opportunity to tackle air pollution because the *elites* wanted an Enron designed CO2 based eugenics/poll tax. 100's of $B's wasted harassing polar bears, modelling the harassment of polar bears and pretending that diesel is a clean fuel. Yet there are still people out there campaigning for their own doom, demanding a market based solution to a problem they can't even observe. First they came for the power stations and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a power station, then they came for the cars and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a car, then they came in the dark for me and I couldn't get away.

  3. dogged
    Mushroom

    Incoming Hippy Bombardment in 5.. 4... 3...

    *takes cover*

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I'd agree that the current climatic model are far too simplistic, do not account for every single possible variable and are on the over pessimistic side.

    Go Lewis.

    1. TheOtherHobbes

      The current climate models certainly are wrong - they've been significantly underestimating warming and the effects of warming.

      At this point the only the delusional, ignorant, and the bought-and-paid-for are still deniers.

      Just because there are fools who keep repeating that scientists have invented the whole thing for the money - because the carbon industry would never lie to you, or pay people to lie to you, dear me no - doesn't mean their opinion is as scientifically valid as that of someone who's been studying climate change professionally for their entire working life.

      Who are you going to believe when you see steam coming out of you car - someone who says your car isn't really overheating at all because overheating cars are a conspiracy invented by the amalgamated motor trades and besides, the roof isn't on fire yet, or an experienced mechanic who's actually fixed things for you in the past?

      1. dogged

        > deniers

        sorry, but use of that term gets you instantly dismissed as a religious lunatic.

        1. Vendicar Decarian1

          "religious lunatic"

          Awwwwwww... Do the denialists get upset when they are called deniers?

          Poor babies.

          1. enoughAlready911

            Who is upset? We just think you are an idiot.

          2. dogged

            > Awwwwwww... Do the denialists get upset when they are called deniers?

            For the record, anyone using the term "warmist" is similarly dismissed as a religious lunatic.

            Why? Because they have become about sides, about conflict, about some imaginary great battle between Good and Evil (regardless of which side they think is which) instead of the pursuit of knowledge.

            I tried to post this yesterday but I think I've been relegated to the Moderation Sin Bin again and I have absolutely no idea why, which is worrying.

        2. This post has been deleted by its author

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        You might try reading this series.

        Finally someone with a brain and the education has dismantled and demolished the climate models as bogus and provably wrong by design.

        http://joannenova.com.au/2015/09/new-science-1-pushing-the-edge-of-climate-research-back-to-the-new-old-way-of-doing-science/ There are 9 articles so far I think.

      3. StudeJeff

        Actually scientists came up with the theory, it's the big government types that are pushing it and paying scientists to come up with more "evidence" to support global warming which has, for all practical purposes, become the official religion of the United States government. The UK and EU don't seem to be any better off.

        You'd think we would have learned something from Galileo's experience with "settled science", but alas that does not seem to be, especially with so much money and power at stake.

    2. Vendicar Decarian1

      "I'd agree that the current climatic model are far too simplistic"

      But since your knowledge of climate models is zero, your opinion has zero worth, doesn't it?

  5. hplasm
    Boffin

    So-

    A model is just a model. It's not actually the real thing, in a little box (other containers are available), and if you look closely, you can see the differences.

    Well blow me down...

    Will anyone listen to this, or is the carreering gravy train too loud?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: So-

      I find this quasi-religious attitude that "something is complicated so there is no need for us to do science about it" really weird.

      Surely things which are complicated are the things where we have the greatest need for scientific understanding?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: So-

        Um...I think they were, in fact, 'doing science.'

        Just because their results mean that, probably, the IPCC will have to, again, massage their data, doesn't mean this team wasn't performing science. Are they correct? That's up to other scientists to determine.

        1. Vendicar Decarian1

          Re: So-

          "IPCC will have to, again, massage their data"

          My goodness. Such ignorance on display.

          The IPCC doesn't produce "data", and doesen't even do data analysis.

          The IPCC produces a meta analysis of climate research, as well as reports that are dumbed down so that non-scientists can read them.

          I always find it laughable that the people who whine about the IPCC never actually know what the body does.

          Kinda like Sarah Palen begging to be the head of the U.S. department of energy so that she can change environmental regulations when in fact the energy department doesn't do that king of thing.

          Dumber than dumb.

          RepubliDumb.

      2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

        Re: So-

        The process science is intended to follow is to form a hypothesis, test its predictions against reality and, if it fails to match up, recognise that and then either discard it for a new one or modify it.

        A model is a complex hypothesis, nothing more, nothing less.

        With "climatic" models we have three problems. One is that the timescales that get discussed are really too short to be called climate but we don't have anything in our vocabulary to deal with the gap between weather and climate. The second is that over those short timescales meaningful measurement is difficult at best and arguably impossible. The third is that both sides are so dug into there positions that they would be reluctant to recognise any detectable* failure of prediction.

        *Personally I'm not convinced we're seeing anything but noise.

        1. Vendicar Decarian1

          Re: So-

          "Personally I'm not convinced we're seeing anything but noise."

          Fortunately scientists know better than nobodies.

      3. Naughtyhorse

        Re: So-

        depends, when the system is fundamentally chaotic, in it's actual sense, then there is little or no point in trying to model it.

        that said all deniers are morons. or have an agenda

        1. nijam Silver badge

          Re: So-

          > that said all deniers are morons. or have an agenda

          They have that in common with proponents, at least.

        2. Grikath

          Re: So- @ Naughtyhorse

          "depends, when the system is fundamentally chaotic, in it's actual sense, then there is little or no point in trying to model it."

          Amazingly , Life, the Universe, and well... Everything.. is fundamentally chaotic.. Has never stopped science from accurately modelling it. It's simply a matter of knowing all the relevant variables.

          Which our current climate models lack, as the article shows (again), and as such cannot be used to predict anything to a satisfactory degree, especially when you're staking whole economies on the results.

          Seriously... If someone at my old alma mater dared to make definitive statements on such a dataset, (s)he would have been ridiculed for the cardinal Sin of "Speculation", and rightly so. Politicians and Hippies™ get to do that stuff, scientists don't.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: So- @ Naughtyhorse

            No, things that are predictable are not chaotic, almost by definition. And if they are chaotic then knowing more initial data helps only a tiny smount. Weather, for instance, is chaotic, and is therefore essentially unpredictable beyond a fairly short time, no matter how much computational rssource you have. Climate is not chaotic, although I am not sure if it is known why,

            1. Grikath

              Re: So- @tfb

              Climate is very much based on chaos, I'm afraid. It merely seems ordered in the timescales it's defined as.

              "Climate", you see, isn't a "thing". It's merely a long-term average (method of calculation depending on how you want to rig the numbers) of local-ish weather. Weather itself, as you noted, is a bit more ...variable..., although the variations are limited by the physical constraints of the local environment ( ocean currents, jetstreams, mountain ranges, etc.) which have a period of change far larger than the average of "climate" , and as such limit the possible outcomes. This has the effect of making weather, and as a result : "climate" , more or less "predictable".

              It does help that weather as a random phenomenon is an emergent system ( sir PTerry's Science of Discworld has a thing or two to say about the concept. (Warning: Thought; It May Require Some. Whether or not you ask your parents to engage in it is up to you.)). As such, when a "choice" is made, it cannot be unmade, which means that all the variables in weather are constantly rubbing up against each other, getting in each others' way, without a way to dodge or reset.

              The effect is that in the short term ( days) you can reasonably predict "weather" locally, but you're going to be hard-put to be accurate 5 days ahead. Because mr. Soak may be out on his rounds, but he's still in the band.

              In the same vein, "climate" tends to be rather constant, if you realise it's measured as "the average of the weather in roughly a human generation". If you look at it over a century, you may notice a couple of wiggles, wobbles over centuries most likely, over a millennium certainly, and a couple of millennia, definitely. And then we're still staying within the range of "Human Civilisation" from the Gizeh pyramids onwards.. So there's not only plenty of archeological evidence, but also quite a number of written sources. Funny how we failed to Perish during all that unsettling Climate Change, and all it entailed, Innit?

              1. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: So- @tfb

                I understand what climate is. The point is that the various means over weather &c which are climate do not seem to exhibit chaotic behaviour. They do exhibit various instabilities (ice ages) but I don't think there is evidence of chaos. In particular there is no sensitive dependence on initial conditions as far as I know (and indeed you can check this in models by running ensembles, and people do this).

                (And note: by 'chaos' I mean 'deterministic chaos' in the formal sense, not just 'variability'.)

              2. Anonymous Coward
                Anonymous Coward

                Re: So- @tfb

                Survivor bias!

                It may well be that our descendants will look down from their nuclear fusion based flying cities and say, 'wasn't climate change good to us, because if we hadn't had it we wouldn't have all this cool stuff' - but that doesn't mean that the process of getting there won't be painful and worth avoiding.

                Your grandparent^20 survived long enough to birth your grandparent^19, but lots didn't make it through the drought/flood/famine. If you live in California a drought is at the moment inconvenient, if you live in Chad it can be, and often is, fatal.

        3. Anonymous Coward
          Boffin

          Re: So-

          The interesting thing is that climate isn't chaotic. Weather, of course, is, but climate isn't. It's clear that it's not chaotic mostly because we're here to measure it: if it was chaotic then it would lash around all the time because of SDIC, and it's pretty unlikely that a planet with a climate like that would support the evolution of intelligent life. Life, I think, could arise, but a planet with a chaotic climate isn't going to support farming, for example.

          That tells us that it's not chaotic (as, of course do climate records of various kinds ans the great success of models at predicting climate, buffoons like Lewis Page notwithstanding), but not why: it's a complicated nonlinear system so there almost certainly will be chaotic regions in the phase space, but we're not in one. Something people worry about is that we could be pushing things into one but this seems unduly alarmist to me.

          1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

            Re: So-

            "The interesting thing is that climate isn't chaotic. Weather, of course, is, but climate isn't."

            Hmmm. On the right scale weather isn't chaotic in that a weather system will follow a predicted track, more or less, at a predicted speed, more or less but such predictions fail if you try to extend them out more than a few days on the one hand and you can't tell who will get hit by a shower at one time on the other.

            When we look at palaeoclimates we have very few variables we can measure and measurements tend to represent quite long periods of time so the long term changes look fairly steady yet do bounce around quite a bit on time scales of millennia. Do we really have sufficient data to say that they aren't to some extent chaotic apart from some forcing due to orbital factors?

            The thing about paleoclimatology is that because the measurements cover extended periods of time they smooth out variations on the scale that warmists/non-warmists are arguing about. Even taking the longest data sets directly observed measurements only cover a tiny fraction of the current interglacial.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: So-

              Just to be clear that I was talking about deterministic chaos, as you are I think.

              And I will revise what I said slightly: climate may indeed be chaotic, but there are bounds to the behaviour (you get ice ages, but you don't get Venus), and the chaos, if it is there, is there only on very long timescales. So my point is that it turns out that climate is indeed usefully predictable over timescales wecare about.

          2. jimbo60

            Re: So-

            Chaotic doesn't mean unbounded. Chaotic system can operate within a bounded range, it's just very difficult to predict where it will be within that range at any given point in time.

            1. Chemist

              Re: So-

              "Chaotic system can operate within a bounded range"

              Indeed a dripping tap is chaotic

              http://www.nature.com/news/2000/001222/full/news001228-2.html

              We should really use the phrase 'deterministic chaos' in these cases where, usually, the equations describing the phenomenon can be written but where the extreme sensitivity to initial conditions means that predictions are difficult/impossible.

              Best not to use chaos when random is meant.

              https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaos_theory

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