Ken Fabian

I got pulled up before on another forum by suggesting this - because of axial tilt (1.5 degrees I think?) and the moon wobbling in it's orbit (nutation) the poles are not constantly sunlit. I have heard claims that some polar mountain peaks may be constantly lit (named Peaks of Eternal Light) but I don't believe any have been identified. But having several solar arrays at different longitudes, close to the poles, could be linked by much shorter power transmission cables than doing that near the equator. My scepticism that lunar bases or colonies can pass any kind of benefit vs cost analysis remains strong, but as thought experiments I still find these questions interesting.

Studiot, it's not that I think reducing the packaging isn't a better option, just that I think it's a less achievable option. Just as making things that last is less achievable. It seems to me the degree of change within manufacturing, food distribution and retailing to achieve those better outcomes involves a greater degree of regulatory intervention; the potential for retailers to raise the PR profile of their businesses by adopting different packaging is greater than the potential for getting the major retail chains, that like the way pre-packaging streamlines things, to greatly reduce packaging. I still think you are missing a lot of what I have been saying. I did mention methane utilisation, more than once. But that it's far from universal - as a source of atmospheric methane it is not from the landfill that utilises it but the landfill that doesn't; it probaly will increase in use but I think it is better that the food waste not be incorporated into the landfill to make landfill a methane source. Which I think is greatly impacted by ease of separation; if the past-it's-use stuff can just be thrown into a bin for biorecyclables, without needing to be unpacked, less of it will go by default into the bin for landfill. Deplore the waste all we like; it's a fact to be dealt with. Also think that civil engineering projects, like flood mitigation, as a secondary use for landfill can be done even better if that biological material - and toxic material content - were reduced. If such projects have a sound basis they ought not be reliant upon landfill to get done.

studiot - We may be more in agreement than not. I understand dismay and frustration with those in positions of public trust and responsibility letting us down, engaging in gesture politics rather than well considered and well implemented policies; here in Australia for example, the national climate and energy debate is currently heading towards farce - only, given the seriousness, I don't find it funny. Why food packaging? Leaving aside the GHG contributions - which many people are surprised to learn far exceeds in weight and volume that of 'solid' waste - the largest component of our own household's waste is food packaging. Chickens, worms and garden deal with our food waste but we are not typical. A lot more is, supposedly, recyclable, but I still say 'downcyclable'; a couple of re-uses at lesser quality at best and it ends up in landfill. Very little aluminium for us (and less glass as plastics replace it for many food items) but, like I say, we are not typical. I spent time with my mother in Sydney in her infirmity and food waste separation was not even an available option within the "retirement village"; the amount of food waste going unseparated surprised and shocked me. Yes, it often is commonly an option, with separate bins for recyclable plastics and metals as well as those for food and garden waste but my understanding is that a lot of that plastic packaging makes it's way into food waste, food in the recyclables and both in the 'general waste' that goes to landfill. Good intentions and even good implementation are hindered by that. It's all very well to say much of that packaging is not necessary - absolutely I agree; I just suspect that choice of packaging at the supplier level is simply more achievable than eliminating it and would lead to ease of and higher rates of separation at the household level. Like I said, what comes out of composting - and liquid waste processing - can and does have economic value. And costs for processing it of course - but reducing costs of processing at the waste end is worth some attention. I don't know about globally but a quick search showed the US landfill is it's third largest source of atmospheric methane, because of food waste - which is on top of better managed sites where methane is a spin off that is utilised. I don't see reducing it as insignificant. John - Where the materials have sufficient monetary value there is motivation - and better rates of recycling. Where they don't is where it isn't done so well. Not so sure that heat is or should be the primary means of dealing with residuals in metal or glass containers - rinsing and incorporation into liquid waste streams would be more usual, with heat for final residues - air pollution issues? It may be that no viable and cost effective replacements for metal, glass or, increasingly, plastics will emerge - and recycling methods for those will continue to improve, even to seeing less of it being 'downcycling' with more reuse at the original quality. I still think it's worth some efforts to explore new possibilities.

John, I'm interested in whether that line can be redrawn, for ease of separation. Aluminium is, yes, amongst the most recyclable of materials and drink cans get recycled more than most other recyclable materials around here because scrap metal businesses will pay money for them. People and charitable organisations collect and cash them in so the sorting is better done. But a lot of food packaging is widespread, not well sorted and is commonly mixed with food remnants. Some is already compostable but a lot of it isn't.

Reading back over this thread I think I pointed out more of the benefits of landfill than you have - flood mitigation through, I thought by land reclamation, although I'm ready to be corrected, as a spin off benefit is about it. Nor have I suggested it does not serve a valuable function or that we not use it. Have I been a loudmouth, know it all environmentalist by asking if we can improve the management of waste by suggesting we may be able to improve recycling of food packaging by preferentially using biological materials that can be recycled biologically into economically and environmentally useful products? I would suggest that, whilst use of methane from landfill - a product of large amounts of those materials in it - is being utilised more, it is not a good reason to fail to consider methods for making better use of those materials. I have no problem with people campaigning about environmental concerns. I think that an absence of people who do would, given the capacity for political systems to neglect important issues in the absence of political activism, be a net step backwards. The capacity for policy makers to put populist gestures ahead of well thought and effective policy remains significant but that is not the fault of political activism.

studiot - precision in language has it's place but did my more colloquial use of "organics" actually result in misunderstanding or is it pedantry? Biological? Bio-recyclable? "Biodegradable" has been stretched to plastics - err, particular kinds of polymers? - that break down into smaller bits but not necessarily into foodstuffs for organisms. Are you just playing devil's advocate or do you really believe criticisms of landfill waste disposal - as commonly practised - are not rationally based but are principally grounded in political ideology? Doing things "better" can depend on how you define "better" but I don't see this issue as inconsequential or those urging improvements as engaging in a witch hunt. There are, of course, genuine benefits to landfill disposal compared to absence of landfill disposal but for a lot of waste it is not the only available let alone best option. Concentrating and containing waste has public health benefits - better that broken glass, waste food and other biological or hazardous materials is there than scattered across the landscape. Spin off benefits such as land reclamation or methane production have to be balanced against the downsides but look rather dubious as grounds for using it rather than other options. Methane from landfill is primarily from the inclusion of unseparated food waste. I don't think elimination of landfill disposal is possible but it can be reduced significantly, perhaps improving it's suitability for land reclamation as a side benefit. Is it really the best we are capable of? Energy costs do matter but the downsides are not intrinsic to energy use but to the way that energy is produced; processes like chipping and grinding hard biological materials to speed the breakdown process as well as that of remaking glass or metals or making food packaging from biological materials do take energy but there are better and worse options for making energy. Endy, the agar materials look interesting, thanks. Cellulose and cornstarch looks good for film type wrapping. Paper/cardboards with wax coatings have been around a long time and bee, soy and other waxes look better for bio-cycling than mineral based paraffin waxes. Agar seems to be good for liquids at least for shorter storage times. Long term storage of liquids is probably going to remain difficult.

Two issues - a) Ease and simplification of keeping different kinds of waste separated. That flows through to making other kinds of recycling simpler, by reducing the organics content within metals and plastics waste streams. b) Biologically based materials are potentially 100% recyclable without loss or degradation of the essential components, into materials with economic values and environmentally sound uses. I think the more of that we can do the better. I have been influenced by the writings - and real world achievements - of McDonough and Braungart that I first encountered in the doco "Waste Equals Food". Their book " Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things" further impressed me when the local library kindly sought out and provided a copy for me to read; it is made of polymer "paper" that can (in principle) be recycled to it's original quality rather than into a degraded, lesser quality. Even the inks, which are not toxic, can be separated out and re-used. But in practice our collective efforts to create a circular economy for the materials we use, that can eliminate the continuing loss of resources to intractable waste, lags so far that I'm not sure it counts as a real goal.

So much food comes in some form of packaging - from supermarkets and food outlets - that it represents a huge waste stream. A lot of it is - technically - recyclable, but a lot of food packaging ends up contaminated with food residues and almost all recycling, even when it's done well, is more correctly downcycling. ie materials can be re-used only at lesser quality and usually only a few times before ending up unusable. Separation of biological waste from other kinds of waste seems to me to be the most basic kind of separation and biological waste is the kind that can be most completely and efficiently recycled, via biological means. I can see that the kinds of foods that come in cans and glass, for long duration storage would be the most difficult to repackage, but is it technically possible? What might be the technical problems with all the short lived packaging being made of biological materials that can be composted or fed into sewage waste streams that can recover safe and usable biological materials?

I have wondered about island populations that began with small numbers - human and animal. Starting with single pairs may not be an absolute guarantee they will die out; perhaps depending on which specific minor mutations they carry?

Scherado, you have offered nothing except your opinions. Certainly not anything that even indicates the basis for that opinion. No references, no links, no reasons or reasoning. Not any qualifications that would show you are capable of doing a genuine critique of climate science. The US National Academy of Sciences, UK's Royal Society have had people with relevant expertise and deserved reputations for competence and probity look closely at climate science - you don't get to be Fellows in these institutions without. Lacking that competence myself I have no hesitation in taking their carefully considered conclusions ahead of your opinions. Yet even without that level of competence I have not found it that hard to gain a broad understanding. And develop the capability to differentiate unfounded opinion from that of people with genuine expertise.

Trying to find ways your hypothesis could be wrong, before you publish and have the errors pointed out, is a good way to avoid making a fool of yourself even if it sounds less noble than "I applied scientific scepticism to ensure the highest scientific standards" as motivation. Scientists are human too; that your peers will read, review and critique what you publish, and not hesitate to call out any mistakes is a cornerstone of science

I think the sailing ship analogy is very misleading - exploitation of asteroid resources will be nothing like it; those sailing ships were economically viable technologies already, making profits servicing existing markets. If they had not been economically viable the competition that enabled their ongoing improvements would not have taken place. Utilising resources in space is a whole different situation in that it requires technologies that don't yet exist, and thus does not have that kind of competition to prompt it's ongoing development. A whole lot of pre-investment is needed and it has to be done without any incomes from the desired activity itself.

If rare and valuable metals are found at ppm within nickel-iron alloys - my understanding is that this is so but I could be misinformed - then they are going to be very difficult to extract in any efficient manner, no matter that platinum group metals have been found in meteorites at above 100ppm, which would be worth mining on Earth were they oxides or other chemically bound ores. Until sampling has been done we won't know if they will be in forms more amenable to extraction - a significant cost if the Osiris-Rex mission is a guide; $US500M per kilo to collect and return small samples to Earth. The presence of abundant metals and other resources isn't in dispute; it's the costs of extracting them that makes them uneconomic.

Beecee - Generation ships face effectively the same problems that genuinely self reliant space colonies do; having an internal population and infrastructure - aka economy/society - of sufficient size and complexity to be capable of remaking every bit of tech that it uses and continue that capability through multiple generations - generations who won't necessarily come with the same levels of ability. With the added constraint of doing so without any outside resources, simultaneously with carrying the least possible mass.

Who is trying to prevent these grand project? I've even suggested a means by which humanity might reach another star - even if I think the many steps along the way must be economically viable in their own right for it to occur and it hasn't been demonstrated convincingly that they are likely to be. I do think some devil's advocacy isn't out of place in these discussions although I could hope for better, more content filled responses than "camels were cutting edge tech". Or "exploring is what humans do" for that matter. Exploring also finds places that are uninhabitable and resources that are not economically viable to exploit - which is about the stage we are at with space.

The quality of the 'camels were leading edge tech' argument leaves much to be desired, besides missing the essential point I made about hype supporting unviable enterprises. Should I bother countering it? There is so much wrong with it that I don't believe anyone here even believes it; not even pedantry but factually false. Amuse yourselves with it if you like but it's pure distraction. There is optimism and there is unfounded and excessive optimism. There are the developmental leaps that may overcome the obstacles in front of us, for which we may feel justifiably optimistic - but when the following ones are dependent upon the prior ones, in ongoing iterations it rapidly becomes fantasy, like homeopaths mixing a drop of something real and diluting it, over and over until it becomes pure optimism. True leading edge technologies - and this problem goes well beyond actual leading edge technologies - don't come cheap and whilst optimism may be essential, so are realistic expectations.

beecee, those ancient history examples of underestimating what is achievable don't really apply; we are far more capable now to figure out what is realistically feasible within the real universe, because we have a much better understanding of it's fundamental physics. And that fundamental understanding is an S-curve that we are much further along. Missions to other stars are not feasible.

BeeCee, I had an explorer great uncle in the early 1900's - he did okay out of it, doing expeditions into central Australia. The hype at the time about undiscovered gold and other riches prompted plenty of popular interest. He never found anything of significant value but he did okay, because investors were willing to hand him money to fund his explorations in a "share in the discovery" arrangement. I see real similarities - and differences; my uncle did raise enough that way to fund real expeditions. Not conducted with expensive, unproven, cutting edge tech but with camels.

Beecee - sorry but I think it's 99.999% fantasy to believe we will reach the stars, especially via any kind of direct flights. Should full self reliant space communities ever develop - reliant entirely on deep space resources without solar power - then perhaps growth and expansion, leap frogging from deep space object to deep space object could happen and some far future generations might reach another star. I think that level of self reliance is only possible with large, comprehensive industrial economies that only large populations can achieve; optimised down to bare essentials, the technology required is still likely to require more than an advanced Earth nation, depending on technologies that still exceed our combined capacities to perfect, like fusion power. There is nothing inevitable about it. Technological advancement is not exponential, it is an S-curve, no matter that at some points along that curve it can look that way.

I haven't seen the doco but it looks like hypothetical technologies to reach an impossible goal - but dressing up the primitive urge to hit the road when life gets difficult as supremacy of rational foresight to garner popular support. And would a society capable of living in a self reliant and sustainable way in space even need planets? I have real doubts that we can establish any kind of self reliant colonies in space without a long and sustained history of successful exploitation of space resources by an Earth economy that extends itself into space. A large, broadly capable and successful space economy is needed before any kind of genuine self reliance can emerge. And it will be an emergent property, not a primary objective. "Higher" objectives like providing a lifeboat for humanity might be popular but it is successful economics that make and break all these visions of the future.

I do recall speculation that frequency would increase but raising it as a possibility is not the same as claiming it as a certainty or strong likelihood. As an example of "climate scientists are wrong" it looks a bit strawfilled; the assertion that climate science "predicted" more frequent TC's is where the argument falls down. But for those who don't know and, like me, have heard it raised as a possibility - but aren't going to fact check - it could look compelling.

Airbrush - I don't know about "alarmists" but scientists studying tropical Cyclone/Hurricane (TC) frequency and intensity with global warming mostly aren't coming up with predictions of more frequency. They also admit a lot of uncertainty, in part because there is naturally a lot of variability; I haven't heard of any predictions from what I think are credible sources that haven't come with admitted high levels of uncertainty. But more intense but less frequent TC's is a more usual conclusion than more frequent; data examined do show a significant upturn in North Atlantic Hurricane intensity - Measure of total power dissipated annually by tropical cyclones in the North Atlantic (the power dissipation index “PDI”) compared to September tropical North Atlantic SST (from Emanuel, 2005) The basic premise that warmer sea surface temperatures affect formation and intensity seems sound. The evidence of a trend of warmer SST's looks solid. As Ten Oz points out, the data on precipitation also shows a significant upturn.

I hadn't noticed any "lefty-leaning hegemony" on this site. Certainly some subjects like climate change, nuclear energy, evolution or GMO's can reveal political or other biased assumptions or conclusions, prompting the examination of underlying motivations and heated discussion, yet strictly moderating out the political/ideological aspects can prevent discussion of matters of real significance.

I remain unconvinced about the financial viability of these kind of space activities, even with strong government/taxpayer support. I may come back to that discussion sometime, but later.

I wondered if meteorites have provided a comprehensive sampling of the kinds of asteroid materials - minus the volatiles - that can be expected to be found or if significant absences might remain. Samples of a few asteroids have been returned but samples all the major types haven't been gathered. Does the surface material mirror the overall mineral mix or would core samples by drilling be needed? Nickel-iron would need little refining if it's to be used or sold as nickel-iron - ease of processing would make it attractive, but not as attractive as either metal in pure elemental form. Finding native iron that is relatively pure and not alloyed with nickel would make mining more attractive. Finding native platinum group metals would be more attractive than extracting it at a hundred ppm from nickel-iron - it looks like the estimates of platinum content are based on presence in nickel-irons. Gold - would make money but I'd find it perverse if that were a primary target for asteroid mining. Perhaps it is the asteroids rich in copper rather than nickel-iron that could have better economic prospects - not native copper but a copper mineral seems abundant in some.