International conflicts and emissions

[Jethro_uk]

I wonder how much emissions are being pumped into the worlds atmosphere by conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza ? And more interestingly the fact that no one cares.

Another reason to swerve this greeny bollocks.

[Colin Bignell]

Probably a lot less than you think. Ukraine is estimated to have around

14,000 armoured vehicles. Even including army support vehicles, the numbers will be quite well short of more than 400,000 heavy goods vehicles on the roads of the UK alone.

There are possibly more important things to worry about in an armed conflict.

The US Army has the aim of converting its military vehicles to all-electric and the British Army are trialling 'eco-friendly' vehicles.

[Jethro_uk]

I wasn't talking about vehicle emissions. I was thinking more of all the explosives and propellants and pollutants from buildings being blown up.

[alan_m]

Probably less than the British public will fire off on Nov 5th (and the weeks leading up to it).

[Colin Bignell]

The contaminants from those appear to be localised, rather than affecting the world's atmosphere. The studies I have found concentrate on the effects of explosives on soil and water, rather than air.

[John Rumm]

The emissions from all the energy use to rebuild all the stuff will probably dwarf that...

(although at least Ukraine has a decent amount of nuclear power - so long as the orcs don't blow that up).

[John Rumm]

The latest version of the Abrams tank has a hybrid power system which is supposed to cut its fuel use in half... (i.e. it will now do two miles to the gallon!)

[Colin Bignell]

I suspect the USA will be sending the ones those are intended to replace.

[Brian Gaff]

And what has this to do with anything other than you pushing your climate change denial rhetoric? Brian

[Paul]

Of more concern, is wildfires.

"Europe's Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS) found that accumulated carbon emissions from Canadian wildfires had soared to 290 megatons in just the first seven months of 2023. That is already more than double Canada's previous whole-year record and accounts for over 25% of the global total year-to-date."

The figure for the year, might be closer to 500, and it is in the same ballpark, as all of our other (civilized) emissions here.

If you look at the curve, we haven't moved the needle. You can be proud we've achieve nothing on CO2.

So whether we pretend to do something, or don't pretend as hard, it matters not. There's no sign of progress in any case.

We may already be past the tipping point, but we're too proud to admit it. The tipping point being, a point past which, our usual level of effort will achieve nothing.

The tundra here is slowly warming up, there are peat fires emitting CO2. The tundra represents a HUGE source of CO2, when it is eventually let loose. It will also be a potential source of disease, and ancient pests.

*******

Modern warfare does not involve carpet bombing and application of napalm. At least, not the style we have become accustomed to (door to door guerilla warfare). Relatively speaking, a volcano could have more of an impact on the conditions, than the small amount of warfare going on right now.

One of the reasons modern warfare doesn't emit as much as it used to, is the use of precision weapons, which are expensive, and we easily run out of them. If a weapon costs a million, you don't fire them very often, or, you pick especially high value targets. Some of the jet fighters cost $270 million each. It would be pretty difficult to make a thousand of those, or five thousand of those. And some of the flying machines, no longer have large bomb racks. Only the B52 holds a lot of ordinance, and those are held together with bailing wire and binder twine.

Only one kind of warfare makes a difference, and you know what that is... And the seeds are now sewn.

Paul

[The Natural Philosopher]

*yawn*. There is no 'tipping point' CO2 in the context of the earths atmosphere has little or no effect on temperature.

[Fredxx]

Many art students agree with you. Most engineers and scientists (with offspring they still talk to) believe it's not a risk worth taking.