[Stoves] Biomass and climate-neutrality (Re: Ron on Kirk Smith)

[Traveller]

Paul:

So now you are getting fussy about time periods and such. Ruddiman and
Unger are relevant still, but they are not incorporated in the currently
fashionable climate models as far as I know.

Your "eventually" is what - 300 years, about the time duration over which
climate policy models are run (to 2100, 2200, 2300; might be longer now)?

If it is 86 years - the threshold for computing premature mortality of
people, how do you know that your assertion of "A living plant takes in
CO2... " holds true?

Now let me ask you - do you mean all living plants, including in oceans? Or
just those plants owned and affected by humans -- say, leaves in front of
my home right now, the trees and plants around, or timber in my home,
paper, animal feed and excretions?

But that is not relevant to IPCC inventorying. They ASSUME biomass to be
CO2-neutral except when there are LULUCF considerations (Land Use, Land Use
Changes, and Forestry). What is the basis for this assumption, and what
data do we have to accept or reject the assumption that it is only the
LULUCF that has affected biomass balances?

The more one delves in the inventorying methods of the climate
establishment, the hoakier things get.

For carbon stocks, soil carbon is computed, and for carbon flows, plant
respiration is also computed. How do you know that in the aggregate, carbon
balances out for any given time period?

We know for a fact that vast land use changes have happened not just in
Ruddiman time periods but our own lifetimes and those of our
great-grandparents. Their messing up of biomass carbon balances has brought
a great deal of luxury and security -- from food to timber, for example.

LULUCF also changes water balances. In fact, we change water balances
across regions -- irrigation canals -- and between surface and ground --
irrigation pumping -- precisely for the reasons of disturbing biomass
balances.

Where, pray tell, can you find a verification of your assumption - that
biomass carbon is in balance for the last 200 years or the next 200 years?
Inasmuch as water vapor is the most significant GHG, where do you think our
disturbances with the water balances show up in greenhouse effect?

Now let's talk about non-CO2 emissions from biomass -- either by rotting or
by combustion. Some have short atmospheric lifetimes before converting into
CO2 or depositing on to the ground or surface waters. Their radiative
forcing can be much stronger than that of CO2, and is reflected in the
Global Warming Potentials (GWP). When the total GHG-load from a poorly
combusted ton of solid wood is counted (my preference is 20-year GWP for
all warming gases, with credit for cooling gases as appropriate), there is
no way "GHG neutrality" is assured in, say, a 70-year period.

Except by assumption. Agreement among experts to scratch and pat each
other's backs. A good part of science is simply accepting other people's
instructions and assumptions.

***

There is more -- such changes in land and water use affect the LOCAL and
regional climates. After all, the global climate is both a sum of local
climates as well as a determinant of local climates (a dirty little secret
you don't read much of in the pop media on climate).

So, if we are going to look not just as some "project boundaries" and
assumptions for CDM projects or IPCC inventories, we would need to assess
climatic impacts of biomass changes within our lifetimes, or 200 years
before and after us.

For all we know, UNFCCC circus of assumptions and entertainment might not
survive 200 years after us. Climate will change, nobody would be able to
tell why. People will still die prematurely and from floods and droughts.

****

In sum, dear sir, your assertion about GHG-neutrality - or climate
neutrality of biomass - is a matter of faith, not science.

I have no problem talking about "sustainability" and all that jazz - so
long as all biomass and all uses are covered. But I would like CDM masters
of methodologies to recognize that non-CO2 GHG emissions from traditional
solid fuel consumption can be much higher, so that efficiency improvements
in biomass or coal use - like your TLUD stoves or Crispin's heating stoves
in Central Asia - are properly given the credit for gross emissions
reductions they achieve in practice (i.e., without netting out "renewable"
biomass from biomass stoves).

The relevance to this list is not the global balance of biomass carbon - as
I argue there is no reason to assume the balance - but the pernicious
anti-poor effect of treating biomass as "GHG neutral". It is a conspiracy
of the accountants.

Let's wait till Ron gets back after reading Kirk Smith. He shook my faith
in "renewable biomass" being good for the poor.

Nikhil


---------
(US +1) 202-568-5831


On Fri, Jan 6, 2017 at 3:52 PM, Paul Anderson <psanders at ilstu.edu> wrote:

> Nikhil,
>
> You wrote:
>
>
> “*To begin with, biomass is not GHG-neutral. Period. "*
>
> This time I will give you some suggestions to read - Ruddiman
> <http://stephenschneider.stanford.edu/Publications/PDF_Papers/Ruddiman2003.pdf> and
> Unger <http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2013/2013_Unger_un02100s.pdf>. Also
> this
> <http://www.humansandnature.org/william-ruddiman-and-the-ruddiman-hypothesis>.
> Prove me wrong.
>
> I looked at the abstracts of those three documents and did not see support
> for your statement.  Certainly there have been changes in the atmospheric
> CO2 in past thousands of years.  But that is not the essence of what is
> being stated, which is:
>
> A living plant takes in CO2, grows, dies and CO2 eventually goes back into
> the atmosphere (allowing for delays while the root rot, or for geologic
> time for formation of fossil fuels, etc., which is not what is being
> discussed).
>
> For me, this specific topic is concluded.
>
> Paul
>
> Doc  /  Dr TLUD  /  Prof. Paul S. Anderson, PhD
> Email:  psanders at ilstu.edu
> Skype:   paultlud    Phone: +1-309-452-7072 <(309)%20452-7072>
> Website:  www.drtlud.com
>
>
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.bioenergylists.org/pipermail/stoves_lists.bioenergylists.org/attachments/20170106/db099460/attachment.html>