Stream of Stuff

[neufer]

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Thanks for your post Art! There is a lot of debate as to whether or not the pipeline would be safe for the aquafier! https://www.google.com/search?sourceid= ... H6hxBFIw9E

Like we really need dirty tar sand oil from Canada any more.

[rstevenson]

We quibble over whose CO₂ to buy and whose to shun, while using more and more of it, and the world slides ever downward into chaos.

Rob

PS
Canada is #6 this year, with Iran in at #4. Iran would have displaced Canada from the top 5 throughout the charted period if it wasn't for a couple of Bush fires that cut back their production.

[neufer]

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We quibble over whose CO₂ to buy and whose to shun, while using more and more of it, and the world slides ever downward into chaos.

Soon we'll be able to mine dry ice on comets, asteroids & Mars.

(At least the U.S. is doing a lot better than China.)

[Chris Peterson]

(At least the U.S. is doing a lot better than China.)

That is arguable. Our growth rate in emissions is less, which is very good. But our per capita usage is twice as high as China's... which just goes to show that ultimately, population is the real problem, not carbon emissions themselves.

[neufer]

(At least the U.S. is doing a lot better than China.)

That is arguable. Our growth rate in emissions is less, which is very good. But our per capita usage is twice as high as China's... which just goes to show that ultimately, population is the real problem, not carbon emissions themselves.

Urban population growth perhaps.

[Nitpicker]

I was surprised to learn recently that China produces/mines about half of the world's coal:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_co ... production

[neufer]

I was surprised to learn recently that China produces/mines about half of the world's coal:
. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_co ... production

But we have more coal: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal#World_coal_reserves
(China will run out of coal in 35 years.)

[Nitpicker]

I was surprised to learn recently that China produces/mines about half of the world's coal:
. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_co ... production

But we have more coal: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coal#World_coal_reserves
(China will run out of coal in 35 years.)

It is worth remembering that estimates of geological reserves and schedules can be somewhat rubbery. Not unlike counting one's chickens before they're hatched.

[Beyond]

But with chickens, you know eggzackly how many eggs you have.

[neufer]

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

It is worth remembering that estimates of geological reserves and schedules can be somewhat rubbery. Not unlike counting one's chickens before they're hatched.

<<A Discordian pseudo-secret society, The International Rubber Chicken Society, formed in New Fairfield, Connecticut, uses the emblem of the rubber chicken as a sight-gag with the initials "R.C." to suggest a link with the Rose Cross (also "R.C.") of Rosicrucianism. Andrés Bustamante also featured rubber chickens during his shows in the 1990s.>>

[Beyond]

Aluminum: The metal that just keeps on giving. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25020651

[Beyond]

For those of you who like a few lights in your holidays...

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

[neufer]

India’s First Mars Mission Set to Blast off Seeking Methane Signature
by Ken Kremer, Universe Today, October 17, 2013

<<India is gearing up for its first ever space undertaking to the Red Planet – dubbed the Mars Orbiter Mission, or MOM – which is the brainchild of the Indian Space Research Organization, or ISRO. Among other objectives, MOM will conduct a highly valuable search for potential signatures of Martian methane – which could stem from either living or non living sources. The historic Mars bound probe also serves as a forerunner to bolder robotic exploration goals.>>

"India's First Mars Mission to Seek Martian Farts" - Layman's translation.

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

Cow farts a greater problem than previously thought, EPA says
Associated Press, November 26, 2013

WASHINGTON – <<The United States is spewing 50 percent more methane — a potent heat-trapping gas — than the federal government estimates, a new comprehensive scientific study says. Much of it is coming from just three states: Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas. That means methane may be a bigger global warming issue than thought, scientists say. Methane is 21 times more potent at trapping heat than carbon dioxide, the most abundant global warming gas, although it doesn't stay in the air as long.

Much of that extra methane, also called natural gas, seems to be coming from livestock, including manure, belches, and flatulence, as well as leaks from refining and drilling for oil and gas, the study says. It was published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science. The study estimates that in 2008, the U.S. poured 49 million tons of methane into the air. That means U.S. methane emissions trapped about as much heat as all the carbon dioxide pollution coming from cars, trucks, and planes in the country in six months. That's more than the 32 million tons estimated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Administration or the nearly 29 million tons reckoned by the European Commission. "Something is very much off in the inventories," said study co-author Anna Michalak, an Earth scientist at the Carnegie Institution for Science in Stanford, Calif. "The total U.S. impact on the world's energy budget is different than we thought, and it's worse." EPA spokeswoman Alisha Johnson said her agency hasn't had time to go through the study yet, but hopes it will help "refine our estimates going forward."

While the world has a good handle on how much carbon dioxide is pumped into the air, scientists have been more baffled by methane emissions. They have had to use computer models to estimate how much methane is going into that air. This study, however, was based on nearly 13,000 measurements from airplane flights and tall towers, the most used in any such research. The information was collected in 2008, right at the beginning of the natural gas boom from hydraulic fracturing. So these measurements, which will be repeated for 2012, don't include much impact from fracking, Michalak said. Studies recently have shown conflicting results about how much methane escapes during fracking and other forms of fossil fuel drilling.

Outside experts praised the study. Robert Howarth at Cornell University called "it very compelling and quite important. This is the most comprehensive study yet." Michalak said because of the way they measured methane — just looking for it in the air as opposed to tracking it from a source — it is hard to say what is putting more methane into the air. But she said by looking at concentrations — especially within Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas — the scientists have a good idea: Cows, oil and gas. Nearly one-quarter of the U.S. methane emissions came from those three states. Texas is by far and away the No. 1 state for refineries that turn oil into gasoline. Texas and Oklahoma have been big oil and gas drilling states and Kansas is a big cow state. Cows seem to be spewing twice the methane that scientists previously thought, Michalak said.

While burps and flatulence are part of the methane emission from cattle, University of California Santa Barbara professor Ira Leifer said a bigger factor is manure. "If you shovel it into an artificial lagoon you are creating the perfect production for methane, but it cuts down on the smell and your neighbors complain less," he said.>>

[Beyond]

Gee, neuf, that post is a real gas.

[Beyond]

Why is all sand the same

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

[geckzilla]

I'm pretty disappointed that parrotfish poop was never mentioned in that video.

[Beyond]

Maybe because the subject was sand and Parrot fish poop isn't True Grit, but coral grit

[neufer]

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

[Beyond]

I never realized that "sea level" could vary so much.

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

[Ann]

Geckzilla wrote, in another thread:
A turducken universe of dark energy turkey, dark matter duck, and visible matter chicken.

Wow. Turducken. I can see what it means, a chicken inside a duck inside a turkey. But to me, who can't help "trying on" new words in Swedish to see how they would fit my native language, "turducken" looks so exceedingly strange.

Let's begin with "tur". In Swedish, that means "luck" or sometimes "lucky". If one of you here won the lottery, I might call you (in Swedish) "tur-Beyond" or "tur-geckzilla". How lucky you were to win!

(Just in case you would like to pronounce "tur" in Swedish, I can at least help you with the vowel sound. Listen to how number seven is pronounced in Swedish in this video. You might also, perhaps, rejoice in the pronunciation and spelling of number six.)

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

Okay. Someone or something is lucky here, obviously. But what is it that is lucky? Let's look at the last two letters, "en". If a Swedish noun ends in "en" it usually functions as a definite article at the end of the word. The word "dog" for example, is "hund" in Swedish, but "the dog" is "hunden". So "ducken" to me sounds like "the duck". Except that "duck" absolutely doesn't mean a feathered fowl in Swedish. In Swedish, Disney's Donald is an "anka, Kalle Anka, so obviously I think of whenever I see the proper name of Alpha Phoenicis. (Well, Alpha Phoenicis is called Ankaa, you see.)

So what does "duck" mean in Swedish? It means nothing at all, because the word doesn't exist here. That's quite strange, because it would be a very good word. Perhaps we can't use it because we know that it means that special kind of bird in English, and we already have our own word for the Disneyesque avians.

But "ducken" to me sounds like a person, someone you would take for granted, someone who is known by his or her function rather than for his or her personality. It sounds to me that you might talk about "ducken" in the same way that you may talk about "the cook" - where's the cook? - or in the same way that you may talk about the nurse, the driver or the gardener. I think "ducken" sounds like a servant to me, an old, rather stiff female servant. Where is "ducken"?

I couldn't find any really good picture of the kind of servant I was looking for, but this one will do. Admittedly she looks quite unhappy, so she is obviously just "ducken" right now, and not "turducken". But cheer up, ducken! You're bound to win the lottery soon!

Ann

Oh, P.S, just possibly "ducken" might refer to the local member of the lesser nobility. You know, him, ducken? Like, perhaps, this guy.

[Beyond]

I noll sprechen Swedish, Ja.

[Chris Peterson]

Wow. Turducken. I can see what it means, a chicken inside a duck inside a turkey. But to me, who can't help "trying on" new words in Swedish to see how they would fit my native language, "turducken" looks so exceedingly strange.

Hönkalkand?

[Beyond]

Wow. Turducken. I can see what it means, a chicken inside a duck inside a turkey. But to me, who can't help "trying on" new words in Swedish to see how they would fit my native language, "turducken" looks so exceedingly strange.

Hönkalkand?

Dagnabit Bing Translator gives me the same word for English and Swedish, so it must have a definition for it, but it won't tell me, no matter how i put it in.

EDIT: Google Translator does the same thing, but also asks if i mean-->: Höns Kalkand

[Chris Peterson]

Wow. Turducken. I can see what it means, a chicken inside a duck inside a turkey. But to me, who can't help "trying on" new words in Swedish to see how they would fit my native language, "turducken" looks so exceedingly strange.

Hönkalkand?

Dagnabit :!: Bing Translator gives me the same word for English and Swedish, so it must have a definition for it, but it won't tell me, no matter how i put it in.

EDIT: Google Translator does the same thing, but also asks if i mean-->: Höns Kalkand

I imagine that would give automatic translators a bit of a headache.

höna - chicken (might be kyckling applied to food, like I'd use kylling in Danish)
kalkon - turkey
and - duck

[Beyond]

I set Bing to translate from English to Swedish and typed in -duck-. It gave me -anka-, not and, like you have.

I think I'm just going to anka this part of the thread.