How Climate Change Could Take the Stars Away From Us

CNET ^ | January 22, 2023 | By Monisha Ravisetti

[sauropod]

/eyeroll

[dennisw]

OMG climate change might make an asteroid hit us and destroy all life on earth. We are all going to die, because we insisted on driving our polluting cars and heating our houses, and cooking on our gas stoves.

[Paal Gulli]

According to NASA, earth's atmosphere weighs 5.1e+18 kg (comes to ~5,600 trillion US tons).

According to The Engineering Toolbox, it takes 1006 Joules (of energy) to change the temperature of one kilogram of air by one degree Celsius (or Kelvin).*

1006 Joules/kg/°C per 5.1e+18 kg comes to 5.712e+21 Joules to raise the temperature of earth's atmosphere by a single °C (or °K).

The Little Boy atom bomb (the one dropped on Hiroshima) exploded with a force of about 15 kt.

A thousand tons of TNT will release about 4.184e+9 Joules so 15 of them comes to 62.76e+9J.

Divide that into the 5.712e+21 Joules and you get 91,013,384,321 -- 91 billion -- Little Boy atom bombs. That's what you'd need to heat earth's atmosphere by 1 °C.

We couldn't cause it if we wanted, which also means there's nothing we can do to un-cause it.

* Yes, I am aware this specific heat value only applies to air @sea level pressure but the scale of final answer is so absurd that I couldn't be bothered to find a mean value.

[brookwood]

“Climate change has many positive effects. Scientists believe it will lead to increasing supplies of delicious filet mignon and Beluga caviar and large low-cost mansions with spectacular sunset views across vast expanses filled with tropical birds, orchids, wildebeest, and lions with the gentle personality of a golden retriever puppy. Climate change will bring an endless fantasy of health and peace which will allow billions to live long carefree lives in perfect comfort and bliss.”
- all this is as true as a typical green fraud claim about dangers of climate change.

[markman46]

CNET needs to stay in their lane of computer tech

[clearcarbon]

"But what if such a time-sensitive asteroid warning had been sent out in November of 2020, when Santana-Ros' telescopes were shut down because of bushfires ravaging the region and covering lenses with inky layers of ash? Or in February of 2021, when bushfire debris made its way into some telescopes, forcing astronomers to dismount instruments and pull blobs of soot from them after the wind settled?"

Had that problem simultaneously affected telescopes worldwide, sunlight would also be blocked and the world would be cooling. Of course there are orbiting telescopes and radio telescopes would unlikely be affected.