http://www.usatoday.com/story/weather/2014/03/18/keeling-curve-mauna-loa-carbon-dioxide-scripps/6576803/
In the article, University of California San Diego Geochemistry Professor Dr. Ralph Keeling was bemoaning the fact that he had a $1 million shortfall in his project of measuring atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations at Mauna Loa in Hawaii, because of the expiration of several of his government grants. Dr. Keeling did not actually say that his measurement program cost $1 million, he merely said he had a shortfall of the million dollars, which implied the total expense is larger.
However I took the million dollars and asked how he possibly could spend that much money on a carbon dioxide measurement program. Since such an expense was inconceivable to me, I called him a charlatan.
On receiving my comment, one of our Political Advisors made a comment of his own. He said he found Dr. Keeling;s annual budget for the Mauna Loa measurement project and presented it to me. After looking at it, I went back to the Political Advisor suggesting that it was a joke or spoof. He subsequently admitted that it is a spoof, but also included a number of personal opinions, such as:
"Just like I think the whole global warming story is. I can’t believe we have come to this, these people made wild predictions as early as the 90’s that have not come true. All the fish are supposed to be dead by now, most of Florida underwater, Orange trees in Kansas… and on and on. But the more their own words prove them wrong the more our government buys into it. We are a people who have lost their way. We have been given this great country as a heritage, the greatest opportunity in human history. Instead of taking us to a great place, we follow pseudo scientists who not only make wild claims about the future, but deny the very existence of God in our world. They are standing on sinking sand, and the rest of us are getting dragged in with them. At the end of it is a small group of people who plan on making out like a bandit on a world paying Carbon tax. Many well intentioned folks are buying into the lies, planting trees in the rain forest and preparing to live life to a lower and lower degree. They desire to create a world of 3rd rate lives and trade the advance of the human race on its head."
While the alleged research budget for Dr. Keating has been admittedly declared a spoof, I believe it has some substantive value. It fictionalizes how one could spend $1 million on a research project and also presents a challenge to Dr. Keelling to come up with his real budget.
For laughs, I present the spoof version of Dr. Keelling's budget as follows:
Expense Report on the 2012 Mona Loa CO2 Measuring Program:
4 CO2 detectors @ 250.00/each. $1,000
36 Rechargeable D cell Batteries @ 12.00/each 432.00
2 Solar recharger for D cell batteries @ 4,000/each 8,000
2 Tesla Electric Cars (one a charging and one a going) @ $205K 410,000
1 Shipping Cars to Hawaii 25,000
1 Solar Recharger for Cars @ $78,000 78,000
27 Electric Car Tows back to Headquarters after breakdown @1,500/ea 40,500
1 Misc Shop work on Tesla Electric Car Fleet in Hawaii 25,000
2 Shipping Tesla cars back to mainland for repair 25,000
2 Shipping Tesla cars back to Hawaii 25,000
15 1st Class Flights roundtrip San Diego to Hawaii @ $996 14,940
45 Nights in Hotel @ 360/night 16,200
45 Meals in Hawaii @ 120/per diem 5,400
1 Shop/Warehouse for operations @ 24,000/year 24,000
40 Car Rental due to Electric Car malfunctions @ 200/day 8,000
1 Dr Keelling 'Research Fees' @ 240,000/year 240,000
30 Hot Research Assistants round trip flights San D-Hawaii @650 19,500
2 Hot Research Grad Assistants @ 24,000 each 48,000
1 Hot Research Assistant Bikini Clothing Allowance 2,000
1 Suntan lotion 28
2 Electric Cars sold for Salvage @ $4,000/each (8,000)
Total $1,000,000.00
Challenges on the 2012 Mona Loa CO2 Measuring Program:
This research endeavors to accomplish the measuring of the CO2 levels at Mona Loa one time per month, whilst making the lowest 'CO2 Footprint' with our team. To this end reliable electric solar power was utilized to power all measuring, metering, and transportation needs for this project. 2 vehicles were purchased to transport our team up the mountain, one would be charging while the other was going. This was required because we needed full batteries to get up the hill and a full charge takes at least a full day. Unfortunately, we had many transportation 'issues' mainly due to the batteries not getting us up and down, on 27 separate occasions we had to be towed back to our headquarters, which greatly affected not only our budget but also our time at work. Also we learned through our research that the steep inclines caused overheating in several components of the electric cars and much damage was caused to the battery and electronic systems of the vehicles. Since most of these repairs could not be accomplished in Hawaii, we had the cars eventually shipped back to the US for repairs before being returned to duty. Once repaired, we left the cars parked and rented a conventional gas powered vehicle to go up and down the mountain. Eventually we sold the electric vehicles locally, the only buyer was a salvage operation. This valuable research was accomplished by caring human beings that intentionally wanted to minimize and mitigate their personal and team CO2 footprint. To wit, many conversations were engaged about humans learning to live on fewer breaths per day to further diminish our personal emission of this dangerous gas.
Measuring Results on the 2012 Mona Loa CO2 Measuring Program:
Because of the transportation issues, we experienced a reduction in total actual readings we were able to record. The measuring equipment may have been damaged in one of the car fires, the readings seemed to be lower than we initially expected, but then who can really trust partially melted equipment. Then one time we lost our book that had the readings recorded. So we can't definitively say what the actual readings of CO2 are, but we are sure that CO2 is a dangerous substance and the world should be panicked about its existence. Further study is needed and our experienced team is available for this important work. Additionally, we have discovered vast amounts of water vapor in our atmosphere. This is disturbing and alarming and additional research should be funded to measure the growth of this gas.
No comments:
Post a Comment