Global warming engineering

Reading this article gives yet one more data point in global warming. We really shouldn't need more data by this point.

For me it really hit home that global warming was real when I learned that throughout the early 1900's the Cornell Hockey team used to play a full season of ice hockey on Lake Cayuga. This is the same lake that rarely froze over for the four years I was there. On one hand there's a full season of hockey on >6 inches of ice, on the other hand there's an unfrozen lake. That's a pretty striking difference. (To those few left in denial: it might be the lake is polluted, or the waste heat from the power plant could keep the whole lake thawed. You're welcome to do the math.) (Of course, if you're in the "global warming is unfounded" camp, math probably isn't your bag.)

Anyway, I wanted to point out a few thoughts. First, increased heat from loss of reflection at the poles is a pretty big deal, however it is mitigated some by the angle of the Earth and the fact that the poles don't get that much light intensity to begin with.

Second, just tossing this out as a cheap and easy start, we could recover some reflection by requiring all new pavement (hundreds of square miles annually) be white instead of black. Maybe not a huge effect compared to melting poles, but it's cheap, easy and in our control.