The fight is over, if there ever was one. Our species is toast. New ones, that are better adapted to extreme heat, will evolve. Maybe even bio-electronic. There will be an interim period when Antarctica is green and many species will migrate there. That's the way of the world. The only real question is will humans blow each other up or try to get along.
Burning all remaining fossil fuels would cause the Earth to absorb about 1% more solar energy, leading to surface temperature increase in a plausible range of 0.84 – 1.41 °C (depending on climate sensitivity assumptions) according to an AI after I asked the following:-
Q: At current rates of consumption how many more years of fossil fuels are left in global reserves? And what level of CO2 ppm in atmosphere will this create?
A: Combining all proven reserves, analyses typically find proven fossil-fuel reserves would last decades to a century+ at current consumption rates. Coal ~130 years, Oil ~47–70 years (depending on what’s counted), and Natural gas ~100 years.
If all current proven reserves were combusted, estimated cumulative CO2 would be roughly 4,700–4,800 Gt CO2 (after adjusting for non-fuel uses). Given that only about 45% of emissions remain in atmosphere long term, a ppm conversion is about 699 ppm (423 ppm current CO2 level + 276 ppm additional CO2 after burning all reserves).
Q: Burning current fossil fuel reserves yields ~ 699 ppm atmospheric CO2, so it's not possible to double CO2 from 423ppm, so how many W/m2 would 699 ppm yield and what proportion would that be of the total solar radiance hitting the earth in W/m2?
A: Radiative forcing from 430 → 699 ppm ≈ 2.60 W/m². That is ≈1.1% of the solar energy absorbed by Earth (≈238 W/m²), or ≈0.76% of the solar constant S0/4 value. The solar constant S0 is the average solar irradiance at the top of Earth’s atmosphere for a surface perpendicular to the Sun’s rays (~1361 W/m²). Dividing by 4 (S0/4) accounts for geometry: Earth is a sphere but intercepts sunlight over a circular cross-section (area = πR²) while it radiates over its whole surface (area = 4πR²), so the sunlight per unit area averaged over the whole planetary surface is S0 × (πR²)/(4πR²) = S0/4. This gives the global-mean incoming solar power before accounting for reflection by clouds and surface (albedo).
In our atmosphere Carbon Dioxide (CO₂) only contributes about 25% of the Greenhouse Gas effect, Water Vapour is between 50% - 67% depending on weather, with Methane (CH₄) 6%, and Nitrous Oxide (N₂O) 6%.
Electricity is only ~20–22% of final global energy consumption. In 2024, solar and wind (combined) accounted for only about 3–4% of global final energy consumption (13.6% of global electricity generation), while hydropower contributed ~6–7% of global primary/final energy (14.4% of global electricity generation).
Whole supply chain analysis, geology & mining dynamics, and engineering, manufacturing and heavy transport requirements, confronts us with the reality that without high energy density hydrocarbons it's in practice impossible to build and maintain low energy density solar energy flow harvesting infrastructure (solar panels, windmills, battery storage, & distribution grids) and replace these so-called renewables at end of life ~20 years or so, let alone scale them up from 3–4% of global final energy consumption to replace hydrocarbons' 80% contribution. Giant oil fields are declining at an average rate of 6 % a year and oil is the master resource that makes all others possible, including coal and natural gas.
In other words, as fossil fuel depletion accelerates, it's hard to see why CO2 is portrayed as the climate devil when in about a century or so anyway our global civilization will be well on the way towards completing its collapse back to pre industrial populations and technology use. I've written about more about this here:-
But we’ll run out of fossil fuels in less than 100 years, rendering the temperature predictions in this post irrelevant. In other words CO2 doubling to 800ppm would require more fossil fuels than we have access to.
The Medium scenario this essay is built on doesn't require 800 ppm — it peaks closer to 600-700 ppm under current policy continued forward. And on fossil fuel availability, IPCC AR6 estimates global resources at over 13,000 GtCO₂, several times what would be needed to reach higher concentrations. The constraint is policy, not geology.
My rule of thumb is this: I would not want to live in a city where, if I trip and fall on the pavement, I could get third-degree burns.
https://www.cnn.com/2023/07/24/health/arizona-heat-burns-er
Adaptation is a defensive strategy and that is ultimately self-defeating. The fight must be taken to the enemy.
Adaptation is a smart policy. It is the defense against the enemy of Earth 🔥. It isn't self defeating.
Self defeat is ignoring Earth 🔥 and not mitigating.
I 🤔 you want to say adaptation ALONE is inherently stupid. 😀
I thought that would be inherently obvious
The fight is over, if there ever was one. Our species is toast. New ones, that are better adapted to extreme heat, will evolve. Maybe even bio-electronic. There will be an interim period when Antarctica is green and many species will migrate there. That's the way of the world. The only real question is will humans blow each other up or try to get along.
Burning all remaining fossil fuels would cause the Earth to absorb about 1% more solar energy, leading to surface temperature increase in a plausible range of 0.84 – 1.41 °C (depending on climate sensitivity assumptions) according to an AI after I asked the following:-
Q: At current rates of consumption how many more years of fossil fuels are left in global reserves? And what level of CO2 ppm in atmosphere will this create?
A: Combining all proven reserves, analyses typically find proven fossil-fuel reserves would last decades to a century+ at current consumption rates. Coal ~130 years, Oil ~47–70 years (depending on what’s counted), and Natural gas ~100 years.
If all current proven reserves were combusted, estimated cumulative CO2 would be roughly 4,700–4,800 Gt CO2 (after adjusting for non-fuel uses). Given that only about 45% of emissions remain in atmosphere long term, a ppm conversion is about 699 ppm (423 ppm current CO2 level + 276 ppm additional CO2 after burning all reserves).
Q: Burning current fossil fuel reserves yields ~ 699 ppm atmospheric CO2, so it's not possible to double CO2 from 423ppm, so how many W/m2 would 699 ppm yield and what proportion would that be of the total solar radiance hitting the earth in W/m2?
A: Radiative forcing from 430 → 699 ppm ≈ 2.60 W/m². That is ≈1.1% of the solar energy absorbed by Earth (≈238 W/m²), or ≈0.76% of the solar constant S0/4 value. The solar constant S0 is the average solar irradiance at the top of Earth’s atmosphere for a surface perpendicular to the Sun’s rays (~1361 W/m²). Dividing by 4 (S0/4) accounts for geometry: Earth is a sphere but intercepts sunlight over a circular cross-section (area = πR²) while it radiates over its whole surface (area = 4πR²), so the sunlight per unit area averaged over the whole planetary surface is S0 × (πR²)/(4πR²) = S0/4. This gives the global-mean incoming solar power before accounting for reflection by clouds and surface (albedo).
In our atmosphere Carbon Dioxide (CO₂) only contributes about 25% of the Greenhouse Gas effect, Water Vapour is between 50% - 67% depending on weather, with Methane (CH₄) 6%, and Nitrous Oxide (N₂O) 6%.
Electricity is only ~20–22% of final global energy consumption. In 2024, solar and wind (combined) accounted for only about 3–4% of global final energy consumption (13.6% of global electricity generation), while hydropower contributed ~6–7% of global primary/final energy (14.4% of global electricity generation).
Whole supply chain analysis, geology & mining dynamics, and engineering, manufacturing and heavy transport requirements, confronts us with the reality that without high energy density hydrocarbons it's in practice impossible to build and maintain low energy density solar energy flow harvesting infrastructure (solar panels, windmills, battery storage, & distribution grids) and replace these so-called renewables at end of life ~20 years or so, let alone scale them up from 3–4% of global final energy consumption to replace hydrocarbons' 80% contribution. Giant oil fields are declining at an average rate of 6 % a year and oil is the master resource that makes all others possible, including coal and natural gas.
https://energyskeptic.com/2024/giant-oil-field-decline-rates-and-their-influence-on-world-oil-production/
In other words, as fossil fuel depletion accelerates, it's hard to see why CO2 is portrayed as the climate devil when in about a century or so anyway our global civilization will be well on the way towards completing its collapse back to pre industrial populations and technology use. I've written about more about this here:-
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1BKrLgym4fzQPgNF4Ps7vHhiVn4FnN_zX/view
https://hend1n1.substack.com/p/is-the-co2-greenhouse-effect-saturated
https://hend1n1.substack.com/p/putting-the-con-in-consensus
But we’ll run out of fossil fuels in less than 100 years, rendering the temperature predictions in this post irrelevant. In other words CO2 doubling to 800ppm would require more fossil fuels than we have access to.
The Medium scenario this essay is built on doesn't require 800 ppm — it peaks closer to 600-700 ppm under current policy continued forward. And on fossil fuel availability, IPCC AR6 estimates global resources at over 13,000 GtCO₂, several times what would be needed to reach higher concentrations. The constraint is policy, not geology.
Adaptation embraces mitigation when we brighten urban areas. Albedovgoes up cooling energy expended goes down.
Well, am a firm believer in using water for all the good things including evaporative cooling in urban areas. We need alot more water.
So, desal baby! Desal!
And,
Reflect baby! Reflect!
We can save it all... if we Think baby 🤔