Preparing for Climate Change
karlb_zone6a
| Posted in General Questions on
It seems to me that there’s remarkably little discussion here of how to prepare for climate change. What should we be doing (and code REQUIRING) to ensure that our buildings are prepared to exist in the world of tomorrow?
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The world of tomorrow..... LOL
Which one?
The one with dire famine by 1975
another ice age by 2000
flooding to wipe entire nations off the face of the earth by 2000
NYC under water by 2010
No ice caps left by 2013
The British will live in a Siberian climate by 2020
I've left a bunch out, but assume you get the point
Karl, you can see one reason ^^^ we may not discuss climate change here as much as we could, and tend to stick to specific assembly and material questions. It's exhausting dealing with people who cherry-pick data in an attempt to discredit something the vast majority of researchers say is clear, and the most important issue humankind has faced.
That said, I'll turn the question around: what do YOU think we should be doing, in addition to discussing it more on GBA?
Trevor: point taken. The climate change I'm referring to is (anthropogenic) global warming, but it almost doesn't make a difference.. if "weather" is the day to day variation in outdoor conditions, and "climate" is what you expect for a given season, then my question remains "How do we prepare for change, from the [expected/current/"normal"] climate?"
Michael: I'm not a builder, but in the "low-hanging fruit" category, I have a hard time believing that we're not yet installing termite shields and inspection strips in northern climates. Yes, they're a thermal bridge. So we cover them up for another 50 years. A lot easier than trying to retrofit them beneath our entire housing stock when the termites arrive.
Wildfire and flood risk (and associated mitigation strategies) are regularly discussed here. In both cases, we might expect that the affected areas will shift, and probably expand. So let's try to get out in front of this, identify [future] at-risk areas, and at least RECOMMEND best practices for new construction.
Those are the obvious hazards that jump out at me, but I'm sure there are others.
Karl B, not just climate change but more and more demand for natural resources worldwide and an ever more rapidly changing science and technology.
I am thinking small, comfortable, and durable for my retirement home.
Flood risk is little concern for inland and elevated locations. An example: I don't see any need for flood resistant structures in Denver. If water levels get that high, we're in biblical flood times and will have bigger things to worry about. Termite stuff is different, but there are other issues with those guys than just climate. It is entirely possible to overengineer a structure to the point that it's completely unaffordable, and that helps no one. Adding excessive requirements that may or may not ever be needed isn't beneficial.
What you can do is try to increase efficiency. Weather things get warmer or colder, better air sealing and insulation is a positive, and reduces energy use. Being smart about sizing HVAC equipment will improve comfort AND save energy, so that's another thing that really has no downside. Design details can be helpful too, such as not going overboard with complex roof details that make proper insulation (and attic venting) difficult. I would put all of these things into the "low hanging fruit" category, since they're relatively easy to do using common existing materials.
We're not all going to be in tropical climates in 50 years, no realistic projections are trying to show that. It doesn't make sense to go overboard. If stuff is significantly different in 200 years, or similarly very long timescales, chances are your current home will have been demolished and rebuilt several times by then, so it makes no sense to incorporate things today that won't be needed for a century or two.
It is imporant to keep costs in mind. One of the big issues that can come up with a structure is spending so much on one area that you end up wasting money -- money that could have gained you a bigger net benefit if it was spent on some other area of the home. An example would be insulating your walls with spray foam, since that cost would likely have provided a bigger overall energy efficiency improvement if it went into continuos insulation (exterior rigid foam) instead. You have to be intelligent about how you allocate your resources, which is probably what you were hinting at with the "low hanging fruit" comment. Many people lose sight of that, and then they end up with less performance than they otherwise could have had if they thought more about the entire system as a whole instead of focusing on any one part.
Bill
I think the systems approach is very wise, but I don't understand why we as a society, or certain groups of people at least, advocate for it on the one level, but not the next level up. Why take a systems approach for a house but not for a community, a city, state, or country.
For many, the former is 'good engineering' while the latter is an affront to the free world. It's a paradox, though I understand some of the reasons for it's existence.
We do do it at the "next level up" -- there is a lot of stuff in the building codes, commonly know as "energy code" in the trades these days. There are requirements for occupancy sensors on many commerical lights for example (so they don't stay on all the time), and minimum efficiency requirements for things like chillers (basically really big air conditioners for commercial buildings).
A good reason against trying to mandate more things is that even what we have now is sometimes counterproductive. I'll give three examples, all of which I've seen on some of my own projects:
1- Minimum efficiency requirements sometimes mean you can't use repurposed or used ("reclaimed") equipment. You end up having to buy new. If you had some ancient boiler this would probably make sense, but what about a large chiller that is only maybe 5 or 10 percent more efficient? It would probably be better from an overall energy use standpoint (including manufacturing, etc, for the new unit) to use the used unit instead of scrapping it.
2- Requirements for insulation sometimes result in no insulation. This comes up sometimes in upgrades and building retrofits. Code will require something like R15 minimum, but the building currently has nothing. The building department won't allow the installation of new R10 insulation because it doesn't meet current code. The result is the owners choose to install NO insulation, and they can because the building is grandfathered. Obviously R10 insulation is a lot better than R0, so requiring "R15 or nothing" is counterproductive in terms of the ultimate goal of reducing energy use.
3- Another chiller example (I work in telecom, we have lots of heat to remove so we run a lot of cooling systems :-): R123 is the most efficient refrigerant in large chillers in continuous operation (all day, every day, all year long, a common datacenter operating condition), but it's being phased out because of ozone depletion potential -- but it's minimal compared to things like R12 or R22. R123 is usually replaced by R410A in chillers (this requires a different chiller, but I'm only talking about energy use here). R123 uses less energy to produce the same amount of cooling, so the argument is that the tradeoff is better with R123 since it isn't very bad in terms of ozone depletion potential, and it's better in terms of energy efficiency. Which is the better tradeoff?
I don't like the attitude of requiring things by regulation and government action, because this often ends up being counterproductive, or being applied stupidly. I prefer to have systems engineered correctly for their application without a lot of unnecassary and often counterproductive or "one size fits all" regulations resulting in systems that aren't as optimally designed as they otherwise could be. I see this kind of thing all the time too, don't even get me started on the fill station requirements for large fuel tanks...
Bill
Bill,
I hear what you're saying. To be clear though, I wasn't really comparing well-engineered systems approaches to broadcast regulatory approaches. My statement was more about how we spend money as a society.
I agree that broad regulations that are applied blindly can be frustrating and, at times, counter productive. I also think (and I'm as guilty as anyone of doing this) that doing a systems optimization for a given parcel, while ignoring the larger system in which that parcel exists, is all too common.
Drawing boxes to define smaller systems are useful; otherwise it's information overload and optimization would be an exercise in futility. But on occasion it's necessary to consider the larger system that smaller parcels exists in, and perhaps consider upper level optimizations. Again this is in reference to monetary spending.
I understand people's aversion to 'government spending' and their lust for some form of 'individual freedom'. As such I'm not necessarily saying this is simply a matter of tax and spend (especially if it's not done wisely and in good-faith), but I am saying that our cultural framework is naïve. If we think we're going to build an overall healthier society with the 'individual' (and their pocketbook) at both the center and boundary of the system, we will continue to struggle in optimizing society's health. In my opinion.
>"but I am saying that our cultural framework is naïve. If we think we're going to build an overall healthier society with the 'individual' "
That's dangerous thinking though. I understand what you're saying, but starting down that road risks the usual outcome of draconian results. You end up trading what are relatively minor problems now for future misery. I know people, including in my family, who have lived under such systems in the past who will tell you you don't want to go there. The tendency for good intentions to become heavy handed oppressive mandates is too great.
Thinking about the "entire system" also requires you to consider some of the darker sides of human nature, unfortunately, when considering how to steer things in the desired direction.
Bill
"That's dangerous thinking though."
Haha, Bill I have no doubt you, and others of your mindset, think that.
"You end up trading what are relatively minor problems now for future misery."
Things that may be minor to you are not minor to millions of other people, and may not be minor in the future.
As much as we can occasionally agree on things here Bill (that science is cool and a key to a better future), clearly we have very different world views. I will continue to challenge yours when I see it necessary (to offer other views) because frankly I see signs of 'dangerous thinking' in what you present. I don't say that to be contrary or rude, but to express what I see as truth, as you have.
And of course you can/will do the same. So it goes.
People around here live in dilapidated structures with toxic building materials (lead and occasionally asbestos) and cannot afford to make better their situation. We can argue about 'how' to make that possible, but I feel its inhuman to ignore those struggling the most while others build highly optimized 'green' McMansions (I know, I know, personal freedom!). It's never simple to hash this stuff out, but my fundamental point is that we are in this together and the weakest link of the system affects us all. I am making no proposals for 'draconian' measures, despite that being the fear tactic that is so often spun around the subject of helping fellow human beings.
I think you may have misunderstood. I did not mean to ignore problems, only that it's important to make sure that when mandating things it not get out of hand. A free for all is not a good idea, but some flexibility is good too. I have even advocated here on occassion to ADD some additional code language. I don't remember everything I've mentioned, but I know I've said that the backwire type electrical devices (the kind that you "wire" by poking wires into holes in the back that hold the wire with a spring clip) should be disallowed. I think these should be banned for exactly the reason I think you're hinting at: people who don't know anything about this stuff get stuck with a crummy product because someone else saved a buck on labor. They're dangerous devices, and they are almost guaranteed to fail over time. I don't think someone should get stuck with those because it saved a builder a little money.
All I meant is that human nature applies equally, everywhere, so those intending to "fix" things can often get just as bad or even worse as those who don't want the "fix". Industry and government can both be good or bad, basically, neither is clearly better than the other in that regard.
You might be surprised as to my world view in some ways. I donate a lot of my time to youth STEM projects and also on places like this forum, trying to help and educate others to build better or otherwise improve their lives in some way. I particularly like helping high school kids thinking about going into STEM fields. I know of several of those kids who went into electrical engineering (my field) because of some of the work I'd done with them. Who knows how that might help improve the future? We all contribute in our own way I suppose.
Bill
"You might be surprised as to my world view in some ways. I donate a lot of my time to youth STEM projects"
Bill, no doubt I know very little about your worldview. That ^ (above) is awesome, and I don't have any reason to think you are anything besides a decent and kind human who has a lot to offer.
I think the intertwining of politics and economy can be a dark cloud and one that people tend to latch onto as part of their identity. I also happen to think there is a faction of the political-economic divide that treats individual freedom as the end-all be-all at the expense of logic, ingenuity, and frankly the well-being of humanity in a larger sense. I don't think it speaks to anyone's individual malice, but to a systemic and cultural phenomenon; one that in some ways came to a head and got insanely nasty over the last 4+ years. But it may only get worse. The population is still growing. It feels like we're teetering on the brink of 'every man woman and child for his/her self, the rest of ye lot be damned.'
That is a sad cultural mentality to exist within.
If you look specifically at the statement you took issue with, you may understand why I in turn would find your mentality 'dangerous' (but don't confuse dangerous with 'intentionally malicious' because I don't believe that is the case.)
As a reminder the statement was: 'If we think we're going to build an overall healthier society with the individual (and their pocketbook) at both the center and boundary of the system, we will continue to struggle in optimizing society's health.'
This brought up in you a fear of 'draconian results.' Perhaps there is some projection going on, but I am in no way advocating for some authoritarian state. I'm advocating for people to consider that perhaps it would actually be mutually beneficial to come together and consider the overall health of society as a unit. And I'm suggesting that we do this using good engineering principles (systems analysis) and creative thinking. Obviously this complex beyond words, and not something that happens over night. I'm talking about a cultural shift. And I honestly believe that in the way of such a shift is the toxic rugged-individualism that seems to have gotten a soapbox in recent years, and that continues to pervade in more subtle ways in the way we view economic optimizations.
karl, I read a good quote that pretty much summarizes the reason why one can't address this subject here:
"The paradox of the anti-stupidity vaccine is that the fools don't want to take it..."
Karl,
It's a very interesting topic. To forestall a lot of pointless arguments about climate change, I'd re-word the question: Why don't we do a better job of designing for the known risks in any region? Both those that have occurred and those likely to in the future.
It's really odd we allow housing to be built (and re-built) on flood-planes, or in hurricane zones, etc. without basic precautions in how the structures are constructed. I suspect the answer as to why probably owes more to sociology and market forces that building science.
I agree with Bill though. The temptation to believe you are building a 200 year house comes up quite often among GBA posters. I understand the impulse, but the odds against any house we build enduring even a century are pretty high, and the factors that determine longevity don't have much to do with how a house is built.
Malcolm, around here the housing stock is very old, 100 years being not uncommon. (200, yes that'd be unusual).
Do you think there is something fundamentally different in the world today that will make 100 year old houses (100 years from now) non existent, by and large?
To be clear, if your answer is yes, I wouldn't be disagreeing necessarily, but I'm interested in what you think has shifted.
I think we'll see more structural decay in another 100 years. I have some friends who restore old properties in the Baltimore area, many of which are over 100 years old. Aside from some really crazy construction (some of it is downright scary), the brick foundations deteriorate with time, as do the walls. There have even been shared party walls collapse when one side was being renovated which results in legal action (not my friends places, but there have been others that have had this happen).
Natural materials decay with time. Eventually the repair work becomes so costly that it's cheaper/easier and sometimes also safer to just demolish the old structure and build new.
Another difference, but this is due to improved materials and people's concerns, is the far, far better insulating that goes into structures now. 100 years ago it wasn't common to have any insulation at all, no we have pretty high code minimum insulation levels.
Remember that 100 years ago Rural Electrification was a big deal, with many homes being retrofitter with electrical wiring. Who knows what the next 100 years might bring. I tell my customers it's hard to predict 5 to 10 years into the future. I don't even want to try predicting things 100 years out.
Bill
This is an interesting thing to think about. It isn't uncommon for people to site longevity of a building material (especially those exposed to the weather) as a trait, in and of itself, of greenness. I don't disagree, but I also wonder if we should be thinking equally about end-of-life. That cradle to grave mentality.
I feel the earlier green building movements were more about the life cycle of materials (use wood, BECAUSE it rots, ese straw BECAUSE it rots. etc.). This is a simplification of course, and not actually how people advocate for the use of those materials.
Now the movement seems to be much more about reduced energy use/efficiency. Though we are seeing more air-time for carbon budget, which often times brings back the materials of old (ones that grow).
Maybe we're seeking that balance. There are certainly divergent opinions on where we're heading / should be heading in these regards.
Perhaps things like wiring chases that can be easily accessed are more valuable than often realized by virtue of living in a world that is fast evolving technologically and otherwise.
Perhaps future building techniques will be specifically designed and implemented to 'come down' in 50 years knowing full-well that in 50 years it will be obsolete.
Legos?
Is adaptability the best form of resilience?
Tyler,
Irrespective of how it is built or where, what determines a house's longevity is that it is maintained over time. House are maintained because people want to live in them. What determines whether people want to live in them are largely demographic and economic factors that have very little to do with the houses efficiency or structure. Whole districts or regions thrive or decay together. Look at Detroit.
I don't see any evidence that a Passive House built in a rural area or on a city street will last longer than its neighbours, or that the housing stock that has lasted for over a century has done so because of the quality of the initial build.
I agree that the quality of a build is not the sole, or even greatest, determining factor in a building's longevity (though I do think it can be 'a' factor at times).
My point is really a different one entirely, which is that when people build today, the decisions they make may indeed have influence 100 years into the future (or at least that seems to be true looking back 100 years, perhaps it will be less true looking forward, and if so, the reasons why are interesting).
The decisions that were made when the house I live in was built 100+ years ago affect my current reality; it imposes restrictions and parameters to my choices. Those decisions may not be what dictated whether or not this structure still exists today or whether it will exist into the next 50 years, but they form the baseline form on which changes are made.
Bill's comment said that "if stuff is significantly different in 200 years, or similarly very long timescales chances are your current home will have been demolished and rebuilt several times by then. It makes no sense to incorporate things today that won't be needed for a century or two."
I agree in many ways with that statement (how would we truly know what is needed in a century or two anyways), but my contention is that houses don't necessarily disappear in 100 years. Admittedly a 200 year timescale is probably more correct, though I think it's disingenuous to imply that climate change impacts are not likely to be significant within 2 centuries. Additionally, I would contend that the reason 200 year-old structures are not standing today DOES have to do with the physical build (in other words, these structures sagged and decayed out of existence, in many cases). [edit: maybe... I do see your point about maintenance, and perhaps even these structures could have been kept going with proper maintenance. It would be interesting to further study what caused the demise of such old structures. Maybe one could truly point to shifting social and economic factors.]
What's my point in terms of practical decisions we make today? I do not know. I do wonder if there is more to crack on the adaptability front. Or perhaps that if buildings are going to be younger lived moving forward, perhaps we pay more attention to certain life-cycle assessments. Or maybe nothing.
There are tradeoffs with some building materials though. Stone has been shown to last a long time, but it's also horrible in terms of thermal performance (insulation value, not thermal mass). I agree about trying to balance things -- sometimes you want stuff to last (a foundation), other times you want it to degrade quickly (packaging materials). It takes a lot of thinking and planning to optimize things, and no matter what you do, you're almost always going to wish you did something differently at some point.
Aside from obvious stuff ("let's build in the middle of that stream over there!" or "we'll NEVER have winds like that again!"), I don't think it's really possible to plan for 100 years out. Too much will change in terms of building materials, and probably construction methods, in that time frame. Wet plaster is almost completely replaced by drywall now, but it was the dominant wall material 100 years ago. You'll probably be using fiber optic communications cables in 100 years, but I doubt we'll be using the same types of connectors then that we are today.
I think if we spend too much time trying to plan for 100 years out, stuff that would help us in the next decade or two may be missed, and that's not particularly helpful. About the best you can do is do a good job today, try to plan for the reasonable future (maybe 10-20 years for a building, if that), and try to do things efficiently now since being efficient will help you now and over the life of the structure.
Bill
Tyler,
I agree with a lot of what you say, and have few useful ideas about what to do about it.
I do think the the focus on longevity you sometimes see among posters here is misplaced. Sometimes it seems to stem from an understandable urge to lead some lasting physical legacy, and I'm not sure that's a useful aim. While I'm almost comically poor at predicting the future, one thing that seems obvious is that the world where people end up living in the house their grandparents built is almost completely gone and unlikely to return.
Rather than aim at longevity I think more fruitful would be to design houses to be more easily adapted, and anticipate the replacement of those things that will not last (windows, roofs, etc).
Another thing that might help increase the lifespan of house would be a return to urban planning, as opposed to just using zoning, as a tool to form our communities. Many of the houses that endure are part of districts people want to live in or visit. They get maintained and renewed because of being part of a larger whole. A house designed to last 200 years built in a suburban subdivision in say Vegas, has a vanishingly slim chance of making it past the demise of its neighbours.
Malcolm/Tyler/Bill,
I'll acknowledge that we can't foresee 100 or 200 years down the road, but we *can* make educated guesses, and some of these might be pretty good. Especially in the middle-term.
To my termite concern: I live in a 200 year old farmhouse in Vermont. The sills are original, and in some cases needs replacement, but holy smokes - they've lasted 200 years! When they get replaced, we'll take the opportunity to install a proper sill gasket and termite shield. We don't have termites here. But I fully expect that they'll be here within 50 years. Maybe 20. Without shields, none of the houses around here will stand a chance.
I'm not worried about foreseeing developments that gives us Jetson-style flying cars and floating cities. But as Malcolm points out, it's not hard to foresee flooding or hurricane damage if you live in a flood-plain or hurricane zone, and not particularly difficult or expensive to take basic precautions. Why shouldn't we be doing the same in zones that are likely to be (become?) affected in 20/50/100 years' time? The marginal cost to install proper hurricane ties in new construction can't be more than a percent or two, can it?
If we good and truly expect that our buildings aren't going to last more than 50 years ("disposable"?), and that it doesn't make sense to plan for anything beyond that, then yes, maybe we should all be living in strawbale houses, after all.
I think it's pretty common for people who previously did not worry about wanting AC to question that. Heat pumps also change the game in what's common and available (dual purpose), as does standards for comfort.
With that in mind, I wonder if interior vapor barriers (which are still common in colder climates) may be considered increasingly risky at increasingly higher latitudes.
Here's a fact. It's a fact that the "World of Tomorrow" is difficult to define let alone to predict within a reasonable level of confidence. Predicting climate change is worse than predicting the weather. The climate in 50, 100, 200, 300 years from now will differ compared to each other as well as compared to today. The issue is at what point in time you want to measure and the probability of various predictions occurring within that time frame. There are special interests who are vested in either prognosticating either the worst outcome or perhaps a positive* outcomes.
*Yes some models point to a positive outcome in the near-mid term but out of fear of "mixed messaging" it doesn't get publicly mentioned.
So here's my suggestion. If one is truly concerned and serious then you should
No 1 - Opt to reside in the most energy efficient all-electric multi-family (i.e. condo, 2-4 unit) you can find. A unit of approx 750-1000 sqft in size should suffice.
No 2 - Do not have children. Population growth is going to hinder biodiversity as more land is converted into monoculture combined with the additional strains place on the ecosystem by pollution generated by animal husbandry.
No 3 - Become a vegetarian. Animal based proteins are comparatively more polluting and energy intensive.
Anyone taking the time to read through this thread should also read this Fine Homebuilding article: Climate Change for Builders: The Biggest Opportunity. Former FHB editor Justin Fink described it as the year’s most important story.
Kiley, I think that article by Michael is a really excellent overview of what we're facing in the very near future. People often can't get their arms around the fact one has to operate on a statistical basis about global warming. Because one can't tell the future with certainty does not mean that there isn't evidence for probabilities for a particular outcome in the future. It's called Bayesian analysis.
I see many people try to refute the consequences of global warming as an existential threat. They do this by ignoring the Bayesian analysis because they say the probability of something occurring isn't the same as the fact of something happening. But what they are really doing, including an expert individual here, is cherry picking what they are going to use Bayesian analysis for. When we stop for a stop light we are not just doing it because it's the law that we stop. We are also doing it because we trust that even though we know it's not a FACT that we will have a collision if we ignore it we know that someone, the city planners, have already done the Bayesian analysis that there is a high probability that we will be in a collision if we ignore the sign and just proceed.
What is happening now is that the combined research and brainpower of a multitude very smart individuals has come together to create a statistical probability of severe climate change being probable in the very near future. Unfortunately there are individuals, people who should know better on this thread, who are saying because it's based on probabilities, i.e. Bayesian analysis, that it isn't valid. Like Michael said in the very first comment, that is just cherry picking to decide that in this one case statistical analysis is not valid. As a society we do it all the time and it is particularly dangerous to not do it about climate change.
If one is truly concerned about climate change the detached single-family home is no longer an option.
Yes, I agree. We should ignore climate change because it will infringe our freedoms and make many of us, including myself, look hypocritical. One must always preserve one's ego over everything else. The view from 10,000 feet is just too much trouble for the majority of people and will hurt our self images too much. Best to just ignore it and keep on keep'in on. (sarcasm)
I never said that. Climate change is real but thinking one is somehow mitigating it by living on an acre lot in the woods and only consuming products made in the US is just ignoring the reality that not everyone can live on an acre lot and afford to buy products made anywhere else but China.
Since most people want to live in single-family homes, those of us who are truly concerned about climate change have to do the best we can with them while also promoting more sustainable options such as multi-family and multi-generational housing. We spend plenty of time lamenting the fact that very little of what we do has a net positive outcome. That doesn't mean we should throw up our hands and give up--it means we should continue trying to do better.
Eric, can you cite a scientific consensus that severe climate change is probable in the very near future? That's not something I've ever heard of from the scientific community. The consensus studies I'm familiar with are about mild climate change over century timescales being probably caused by human CO2 emissions. The consensus is evolving, but has typically been a 2 or 3 degree increase in mean global surface temperatures by 2100. What are you referring to?
"Eric, can you cite a scientific consensus that severe climate change is probable in the very near future?"
I guess you don't get around much. In my region of northern California there were no local fires that threatened us from around 2002, when I moved here, until about 2014. After that there were successive fires every year that did huge damage, They destroyed homes, and killed many people. It seems like a another life when I think about the first 12 years I lived here. Before 2014 I never experienced a certain time of year as "fire season". Now I always worry about it after July. I hope that answers your question. Every one needs to wake up to how a few degrees difference can make a huge difference in the severity and frequency of horrible weather caused events.
Eric, the fires in CA are not out of the historical norm.
Politicians and "environmentalists" with no forestry management knowledge at all are restricting and eliminating practices that in the past reduced the number of fires and damage those fires caused.
“The idea that fire is somehow new,” said geographer Paul Robbins of the University of Wisconsin, “a product solely of climate change, and part of a moral crusade for the soul of the nation, borders on the insane.”
Scientists calculate that, before Europeans arrived, 4.4 million acres of California burned annually, which is 16 times larger than the amount that burned in 2019.
“Of the hundreds of persons who visit the Pacific slope of California every summer to see the mountains,” reported a U.S. government scientist in 1898, who had surveyed the region, “few see more than the immediate foreground and a haze of smoke.”
@ trevor, It's good to know you're a such an expert on California and its forestry management. What I'm seeing from you is a determined negative stance on environmentalism and specifically California environmentalism. You appear to me to be using that stance, "California is a shithole state" as you've said in another memorable exchange, to manipulate facts to match your opinion. Next you'll be advising us to rake our forests.
Despite your didactic statements about our stupidity here we have a pretty good idea where we stand in the scheme of things. You are doing the thing many people do. You are taking things out of context to create a straw man which you can attack easily. I've lived here 68 years, my entire life, and I can tell you that it's not my imagination that things have changed here very recently. Like so many arrogant people who are haters I'm sure you have no doubts in saying to me "who are you going to believe, me, or your own lying eyes?"
What's really neat is that it's actually possible the wildfire issue is not due to one single issue. Funny how life is like that huh?
Forest management undoubtedly plays a role and some of the recently lobbed criticisms are not unfounded in regards to management policies (some of these criticisms of course missed the mark and were poorly articulated political jerk-jobs rather than actual scientific criticism, but...). The practice of total fire suppression has been criticized and warned about for some time, people even going so far as to hate on ol' SMokey and his campaign.
In a statistical sense however, climate change is of presence as well. One doesn't really preclude the other.
There are other issues too when it comes to the cost of fires; like the expansion of people living in the wildland-urban interface. None of these things need exist in isolation.
@Tyler,
I'd say that's fair. I wish more people were like you and treated people like they would like to be treated. That may include myself. Having said that, there is a contingent of people who just like to hate on California. When individuals such as Trevor have gone on record for doing that I have no inclination to later give them the benefit of the doubt. He should think about the golden rule. I'm not like Jesus and turn the other cheek. As you said, it's funny how that works and I'm glad your own actions are in accord with that principle. People could learn from that.
Eric,
You're giving me too much credit (I'm not sure I'd say my actions have been in arrordance). I try, but have as much devil as saint on the inside, and it doesn't always stay there. Fear gets the better of me as much as anyone. (fear is the mind-killer. name that book).
I live and grew up in Maine but have relatives in Cali by the way. Nice country. I've experienced the dodging of fires and days of smoke (red suns at noon) while hiking out there.
@eric, don't shoot the messenger because you don't like the truth.
The facts are that recent fires are not out of the historical norms. This is really easy data to find.
CA's politicians and "environmentalist" have made the situation worse by restricting/ending logging, grazing, controlled burns, clearing out of underbrush on and on..
All of which used to be common practice during first half of your 68 years in CA...
Not sure how or why you can't/don't/refuse to remember that....
Trevor,
The accumulation of fuels due to fire suppression pre-dates your implied date (halfway through Eric's life), and certainly any modern 'environmentalism' that people are wishing to blame. Not that the fuel-scape has improved recently, but the problem wasn't born as recently as suggested.
My understanding is that a lot of the pushback against prescribed burns simply came from complaints of smoke; not really 'environmentalists' at all.
@tyler, there was/is massive pushback by "environmentalists" that caused the buildup of fuel, going back to the 80's when the Sierra Club started their crusades.
Even fienstien blamed them in 02 for blocking a wildfire bill.
In 07 Sierra Club v. Bosworth stopped the U.S. Forest Service program of cutting brush and thinning dead and dying trees to protect communities from catastrophic wildfires
From 89 to 08 there were over 1100 lawsuits filed against the forrest service to prevent cutting. clearing, burning etc.
Trevor, I'm not going to argue there haven't been misguided forest management practices (or lack thereof) masquerading as environmentalism, or perhaps trying but failing to be good stewards. But it's simply not at all that simple and the original practices that began creating problems were born more than a generation ago, arguably longer. And before you praise loggers and slam 'environmentalists' blanketedy, you'd do well to consider how poorly some logging practices are done and actually contribute to young thick growth ready to burn.
None of this really matters; everyone wants to blame who they want to blame. My suggestion would be to step back a bit and try to see the whole picture (people on 'both sides' of the blame game). I see your points though.
There is a consensus that CO2 emissions are having an impact on climate. The argument is over the cost of mitigation.
John, it's actually reassuring to read your comment about consensus on the impact of CO2 emissions, as it does not always seem that way to me--some commenters on this thread, for example. I know you're intentionally leaving out "anthropogenic emissions" but I'll take it.
The argument over the cost of mitigation--what is the cost of NOT mitigating?
Kiley, thank you for the reminder about Michael's excellent article. It also appeared here on GBA, and had some good discussion in the comments:
https://www.greenbuildingadvisor.com/article/climate-change-for-builders-the-biggest-opportunity
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There doesn't seem to be much room for relevant action. The projected climate change is just 2 or 3 degrees of warming by 2100. That's warming defined as an increase in mean global surface temperatures. That's an extremely mild thing to worry about. It would potentially impact coastal communities, depending on their particular geography, but they've got many decades of advance notice, so I don't worry about them.
Actual climate as experienced by a house or a human is the local climate, not global mean surface temperatures. Local changes will be lumpy, with some regions seeing more than 2-3 degrees of change and others less. I'm not sure what you'd want to do with a house to "prepare". Humans wouldn't even notice this kind of climate change unless you told them about it statistically. A human lifespan is 75+ years, and humans won't typically compare the average temps when they're 70 years old to the average temps back when they were 8 years old or something, because we don't save a statistical record of average temps in our brains. And our bodies don't hold a sense of temps to compare over a 60 year slice. Our houses won't care about climate change of this small magnitude. Though maybe if wildfires become a concern in some areas people will finally stop building ridiculous wood houses. This website promotes wood and plastic home construction far too much. If I was worried about resilience, wood and plastic "vapor retarders" would not be options at all.
BlueSolar - There's so much wrong with your statements that it's difficult to respond . Your "just 2-3" degree (that's deg C, or 3.6-5.4 deg F) increase is _already_ responsible for increased extreme rainfall - an almost doubling in the NE US, increased flooding, sea level rises that are inundating communities, record-setting wildfires, and numerous other impacts. And that TODAY, not 20 or 40 years in the future. I suggest you review e.g. the more recent National Climate Assessment, any of the many state climate vulnerability assessments, the IPCC reports, or the numerous scientific studies that clearly document these effects and the attribution of them to human-caused climate change. Just expressing our opinion does not make it so. If you think climate change has not occurred or is not already having major effects, you're just wrong. I.e., it's not an opinion or belief, there's a huge body of evidence that is readily available to anyone that bothers to look.
Many of us ARE noticing impacts of human-caused climate change NOW. Where I live, the number of summer days over 90F has more than doubled, to more than 40 days/yr, with most of that increase since 2000. There's been a similar decrease in very cold days. I can assure that many people I know have very much noticed these changes, along with the increase in our gardening season, when we charge and blow out sprinklers, etc. Maybe you're just younger or moved more often, but in many areas anthropogenic climate change is extremely apparent.
The impacts of a 2-3 C average global temperature increase _will_ cause tremendous human grief and suffering. We're already experiencing water shortages, population displacements, increased flooding from extreme rainfall-caused flooding and in coastal areas, and heat-caused increases in morbidity, among many other impacts. 2-3 C doesn't sound like much, but the impacts are huge. The "good" news is that with a concerted, global effort to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, it's still possible to restrict warming to the lower range, and this will dramatically reduce the impacts.
johng
And this years keynote speaker at the 2021 climate change symposium is: BlueSolar.
Hi folks thank you for being here today,
"The projected climate change is just 2 or 3 degrees of warming by 2100. That's warming defined as an increase in mean global surface temperatures. That's an extremely mild thing to worry about.
...
Humans wouldn't even notice this kind of climate change unless you told them about it statistically.
...our bodies don't hold a sense of temps to compare over a 60 year slice."
That is all folks. Thank you for coming and have a nice day.
(Was it safe for me to assume that the utter absurdity and total lack of basic knowledge is self-evident there? I'm beginning to fear that wasn't a safe assumption here. Yikes.)
"This website promotes wood and plastic home construction far too much. If I was worried about resilience, wood and plastic "vapor retarders" would not be options at all"
Then propose your own options. Make sure to consider carbon impact, resource use, energy efficiency and price point in your quest for moisture resilience. There are few ways of building an enclosure that omit plastic and wood in their entirety.
Jason,
Be careful what you wish for. Bluesolar has spend a lot of time thinking up odd, novel building methods and arguing for them on threads here.
Malcolm,
I'm hoping he proposes an igloo. ;)
The climate has always changed and species survive by adapting to the climate. Learn to adapt. Don’t build on flood plains and design structures that trap moisture. Design a house that has good ventilation and good filtration. Remember ventilation is different than heating. Don’t rely too much on synthetics as you may not be able to fix things in the future. All electric houses make sense as solar PV panels become lower in price. Remember to replant trees when you build a house, shade does wonders for tempering the climate.
Above, put on the BS filter to distinguish between marketing, and other questionable sources. Remember all mathematical models have built in assumptions.
Has someone corrected the observed warming level yet? I haven't seen all the comments yet, but the first reply falsely stated that we had already had 2-3 degrees C of warming. That's wildly false. We've had 0.8 degrees C of observed warming.
2 degrees is one of the common targets by 2100. 3 is another target and a projected amount with certain realistic scenarios. But there are lots of different models and they're always changing.
The response you are referring to does not say what you think it does. And if you think 2-3°C won't have significant impacts, you are wrong again. While it's true that those are targets, they are far from ideal scenarios, and it is likely that we will reach them before 2100.
BlueSolar - I didn't mean to imply that global mean temperature has increased 2-3C. However, some regions of the US and Canada have warmed by 2C since 1970, with serious consequences. Many (I think most) well-informed scientists and citizens think a 2-3 deg global temperature increase will have dire - some say catastrophic - consequences to humans and nature. But there are more appropriate forums to engage in serious evaluations of the evidence for and impacts of climate change (e.g. RealClimate).