If all of mankind’s energy was supplied through solar panels would the effect be big enough to decrease the temperature (since light is converted in part to electricity)?

  • @givesomefucks
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    81 day ago

    This?

    if you use a watt of sunlight to power your phone instead of a watt of energy you got from burning coal, this watt of energy instead stays below earth and therefore doesn’t heat up the planet.

    The “watt of energy” is a watt from the coal… And they’re saying to leave the coal buried and sequestered.

    I assumed that was understood, so I explained how burning coal heats up the planet…

    You may have not realized what you highlighted had to do with fossil fuels, but that’s just because you didn’t understand.

    Which is fine, you did the right thing and asked questions.

    • @[email protected]
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      22 hours ago

      Burning coal doesn’t significantly heat the planet directly. The CO2 released by this causes solar heating to be more effective by trapping the escaping infrared radiation. It’s the greenhouse gases that are the issue, not the energy released by combustion. “Watts staying underground” is a poor explanation. Burning coal makes watts from the sun more effective at heating the earth.

      • @givesomefucks
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        -222 hours ago

        Participate pollution melts glaciers which increases the temperature long after it fucks shit up by trapping heat in the atmosphere and blocking photosynthesis.

        • @[email protected]
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          222 hours ago

          Just saying “watts staying underground” is a poor explanation. That’s an insignificant amount of energy compared to what the sun is delivering and what’s being trapped by CO2. “Carbon staying underground” is much more the priority.

          • @givesomefucks
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            221 hours ago

            Just saying “watts staying underground” is a poor explanation

            Which is why I clarified for someone what someone else likely meant…

            I’m not sure what you’re doing here, do you want me to go complain to the person who first used that phrasing on your behalf?

        • @[email protected]
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          121 hours ago

          That’s not really relevant. Fine particulate emissions from coal power plants, which are already mostly gone in the US but are still used around the world, don’t travel a really long distance.

          • @givesomefucks
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            121 hours ago

            No, they do.

            Precipitate pollution from coal use in India and China is making it to the northern glaciars.

            It doesn’t need to be a lot, a small speck on a glacier can “snowball” into a substantial melt because black soot gets hotter than white snow.

            When soot settles on snow in large enough quantities, it creates a dark, heat-absorbent film on the otherwise reflective white surface of the snow. This causes the surface to absorb significantly more heat than it otherwise would, which eventually thins the snow down to the glacial ice that sits below the surface layer, causing further retreat.

            https://www.nbcnews.com/sciencemain/coal-soot-darkened-melted-glaciers-during-industrial-revolution-8C11069699

            It’s not like the soot has to blanket it, especially when they’re already melting.

    • @credo
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      -51 day ago

      If you swim in an Olympic sized pool instead of a kiddie pool, this will give you a better experience

      Grammatically, coal was not the subject of that sentence. But that’s fine, I see what OP was going for.

      • @givesomefucks
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        41 day ago

        But that’s fine, I see what OP was going for.

        Weird choice to downvote the person who helped you understand, but you do you I guess.

        It’s definitely convinced me not to spend anytime helping you in the future though. So maybe don’t be like this to the next person, Lemmy is small and there’s only so many people to help you, eventually you’ll run out.

        • @credo
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          -51 day ago

          I downvote those who downvote me. No worries, I didn’t really need your “help”.