Moderated Global Warming Discussion

[Furcifer]

Perhaps if they figured this bit out before they started raising everyone's taxes?

Exactly, is that too much to ask?

The plastic bag charge I mentioned is a con in my opinion.

The marketing is. They seem to want to tie everything into Global Warming. The bags make for litter and screw up landfills, that's why they need to go.

But the political 'spin' always applied to the issue is about us being the cause and this is used as a justification for raising taxes. This is dishonest and doesn't address the issue comprehensively.

Or whatever their pet project may be. Turbines, solar panels, plastic bags, LED lights, refrigerators, clothing, we need "green" things because the temperature is going to go up by some amount or some period of time.

There are many more practical and acceptable (by deniers as well as by accepters) reasons to improve our environment and reduce pollution and waste that don't require climate change as an excuse to implement them.
But they also don't give politicians the excuse they want for raising taxes.
Banning climate change conferences would cut down carbon footprints dramatically and cost us nothing.

It's fear mongering is what it is. If you don't vote for Prop 107 to raise electric rates by 43% you may as well take a club out on the ice a beat a baby polar bear to death. Hurricane Fred? That's your fault.

 

[Trakar]

Quite the opposite given the premise. Canada only produces less than 4% of the current GH emissions. I'm suggesting we would open our doors to those displaced by the over consumption by Americans and the Chinese.

How much of the problem is represented by canadian oil exports?

 

[Trakar]

The sea represents an almost unlimited source of natural fertilizer. It's just a matter of when it becomes economically feasible.

And how much energy is required to harvest, refine and distribute ocean fertilizer? Is this energy non-carbon sourced?

 

[Trakar]

It's just another way for our govermnets to tax us for our Carbon-footprint and use congestion charges. The climate might be changing but its nothing to do with us. The Earths climate has changed thousands of times over the course of its life, when humans were not around. Were Mammoths responsible for the last ice age?

Why do we as a society allow our goverment away with such obvious cons?

your beliefs are largely irrelevent and based upon flawed considerations and erroneous understandings.

http://www.skepticalscience.com/climate-change-little-ice-age-medieval-warm-period.htm

 

[Trakar]

You concede that the climate might be changing, but that we humans should take no action to address those changes?

Sounds irresponsible, regardless of what is causing them.


Microbial diseases have been around longer than humans, too. Maybe, by your argument, we should not address the impact they would have on our lives, either.

Actually, if humans did not bear ongoing responsibility for the atmospheric changes we are causing, I would not be as concerned about addressing the problems with rising CO2 and would be much more focussed on adaptation efforts than mitigation concerns and issues.

 

[Trakar]

I'd best clarify my position here before I respond to this.

I'm not a climate change denier.

Right, that out of the way. I doubt anyone can deny that the climate is changing nor that it has constantly changed since the formation of the planet billions of years ago.

No, you are a mainstream science/AGW denier. Parsing the language does not alter reality.

The question was roughly: How do we handle it?
Is the answer to tax people more and if so, how does this help?

Carbon taxes are one of the tools which should be employed in the addressment of AGW

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/jul/20/ipcc-pachauri-climate-change-cost

http://www.vtpi.org/carbontax.pdf

...Whilst accepting that human's have had a massive impact on our planet and accepting that they may be responsible for some climate change, to think that climate change will stop if we stop living our carbon wasteful lives is short sighted and plain wrong.

I don't know of anyone saying what you say above, got link or reference?

Instead of apparently putting all this effort into the present (politically motivated) tax raising and chasing our carbon footprints. There should also be an equal amount of resources put into figuring out ways of living with the natural climate change mechanisms that we can not control.

Which of these mechanisms do you feel is affecting climate change more than the human induced CO2 contributions to the atmosphere? Please provide links to the peer-reviewed mainstream science documenting these factors and relative contributions to the current climate change episode.

Having to pay 10p for a plastic carrier bag at the supermarket does not do anything to prepare for natural climate change nor does it slow anthropomorphic climate change down.

"Anthropogenic" - due to man
"Anthromorphic" - shaped like a man

any measure which tends to curb or change bad habits, is of benefit in the effort to make people more conscious of how many different aspects of their lives contribute to the problems we face.

 

[Trakar]

There are many aspects of the Global warming debate that deserve ones doubt.

as stated, possibly. Which areas in particular do you consider worthy of doubt?

 

[Trakar]

Global Alarmism is where the (grant & scam) money is. Global climate change is natural and cyclical. To what extent, if any, humans have/are playing a role is debatable.

only by those without the understandings and evidences provided by modern scientific investigation and research.

http://www.skepticalscience.com/global-warming-natural-cycle.htm

http://www.skepticalscience.com/its-not-us.htm

 

[macdoc]

You pay for other sewage services - why would you ever think you could use the atmosphere as a free sewer...?.

Just another denier trying to sound "practical".

Carbon needs to be taxed big time as it has been in Sweden and Norway since 1991 - seems they are doing okay with it.

Sweden is on track and on record to be carbon neutral by 2050 or sooner.

Norway is perhaps the best place to live on the planet.

Conferences are critical as it results in policies like the Montreal Accord.

Of course YOU have to acknowledge there is a problem and stop whining about taxes.

 

[Malerin]

You concede that the climate might be changing, but that we humans should take no action to address those changes?

Sounds irresponsible, regardless of what is causing them.


Microbial diseases have been around longer than humans, too. Maybe, by your argument, we should not address the impact they would have on our lives, either.

The climate is always changing. Northern Europeans survived the year without a summer. We made it through the Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age without going extinct.

Why do you think a degree or two of warming in the next hundred years will be the death of us all? We'll adapt, same as we always do.

 

[lomiller]

Great, but what will they farm in Manitoba and who will pay for it?

Not a thing. The notion that warming temperatures would turn Canadian Shield into farmland is beyond absurd. Even today temperature and gowning season have little to do with why agriculture is confined to the south western part of the province.

If you go north or east you are in areas with no more than a few inches of soil over some of the worlds oldest rock. Drainage is completely irregular so any area that isn’t nearly bare bedrock is either swamp or lake. It makes one of the worlds richest mineral regions but farmland it is not, nor could it turn into farmland without a few dozen millennia’s worth of soil deposition.

 

[lomiller]

We made it through the Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age without going extinct.

The “little ice age” was ~0.5 - 0.8 deg of cooling that occurred over a period of ~250 years (from the top ofthe MWP to the coldest of the LIA). The earth has warmed 0.6 deg C in the last 35 and we are looking at another 2 deg over the next century, there is simply no comparison between the Little Ice Age and the climate change currently occurring.

 

[macdoc]

You clearly do not understand the magnitude of what is coming nor the small magnitude of what happened during the Holocene.

A single year of volcano induced cooling is not climate change. It's a temporary anomaly as Pinatubo was ....S02 drops out after a couple of years. Carbon does not.

The entire Holocene the temperature did not swing more than a degree in either direction globally.
And even then there were pretty dire consequences for a world with 1/20th the population we have now or less.

Carbon does not drop out, each year it's impact builds on the year before.
If we stopped now - stabilization would take 3,000 years and full return 100k years.

You know nothing of what you are talking about.

These guys do

How bad could it be...

Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, the director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, said that if the*
http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/13/scientist-warming-could-cut-population-to-1-billion/


MITs updated assessment
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/05/090519134843.htm

 

[Mikemcc]

Going back 80 years, it has all the momentum of a sloth:

From 2000-2010, there's been 1/10 of a degree of warming.
1990-2010, there's been 1/10 of a degree of warming.
1980-2010, 3/10 of a degree
1970-2010, 4/10 of a degree
1960-2010, 4/10 of a degree
1950-2010, 8/10 of a degree
1940-2010, 4/10 of a degree
1930-2010, 6/10 of a degree
http://www.woodfortrees.org (Hadcrut3 variance adjusted global mean).

What is everyone freaking out about? ONE degree of warming in the next hundred years?

Because of the graph shown below. Both curves are gaussian distribution curves with a standard deviation of 9 degrees, one has a mean of 10 degrees, the other a mean of 12 degrees. You can see that the number of days where the temperature exceeds 30 degrees has increased substantially. A small change in the mean temperature can result in a relatively large change in the extremes.

 

[Mikemcc]

This seems to be rather overtly racist ie; "Would you want one of them in your house?". I don't see any issue with the migration of people displaced by rising ocean levels over 100 years. Countries aren't "full".

I refer you back to my comments earlier about the population of Bangladesh. Where would they move to given that their immediate neighbours are unlikely to be particularly welcoming to them.

 

[Furcifer]

How much of the problem is represented by canadian oil exports?

No idea, the figures aren't given by a practical metric. The way they measure carbon emissions is in need of a serious overhaul. Subtract all the carbon Canadian trees absorb, add the carbon from exported oil, subtract all the goods manufactured and exported for use in other countries, add the imports etc.and then you'll get an idea of what we actually contribute to the problem. This needs to be done before superlative action is taken to mitigate GW.

And how much energy is required to harvest, refine and distribute ocean fertilizer? Is this energy non-carbon sourced?

Manitoba is in the process of going nuclear. I haven't kept up to date on this, I'm sure SOT might know, but by the dates we are talking about it's highly likely to be nuke.

Carbon needs to be taxed big time as it has been in Sweden and Norway since 1991 - seems they are doing okay with it.
Sweden is on track and on record to be carbon neutral by 2050 or sooner.

Another AGW canard. Pick two small countries with a centralized population and no serious manufacturing capacity as an example.

It's like comparing the gas mileage between a Honda Civic and Hummer. If you want to get a realistic comparison the US and the EU are apples and apples.

 

[chipmunk stew]

The climate is always changing. Northern Europeans survived the year without a summer. We made it through the Medieval Warm Period and Little Ice Age without going extinct.

The present rate of change far exceeds the rate of expected cyclical changes.

Why do you think a degree or two of warming in the next hundred years will be the death of us all?

Most knowledgeable people don't, and Wowbagger made no such hyperbolic claim.

We'll adapt, same as we always do.

Of course we will, but the more gradual and less extreme the climate change, the easier the adaptation.

If we can come up with ways to smooth out the rate of change, why wouldn't we try to do so?

 

[lomiller]

Manitoba is in the process of going nuclear. I haven't kept up to date on this, I'm sure SOT might know, but by the dates we are talking about it's highly likely to be nuke.

You don’t have the faintest idea of what you are talking about. Manitoba has more undeveloped hydroelectric then it could ever use. Even using just the sites identified in the 50’s there are some 5000 - 6000 MWh of undeveloped potential along the Nelson River and the real number is probably double that.

 

[Furcifer]

The notion that warming temperatures would turn Canadian Shield into farmland is beyond absurd.

Nice strawman. Nobody said it would. It will obviously take improvements to the soil.

This is of course what is most objectionable about the IPCC report and how alarmists interpret it. The IPCC may be able to predict what the climate might do, but they have no idea what humans will do to adapt to and mitigate change.

 

[Stray Cat]

I appreciate the sentiment. But, alas, this is not a problem unique to climate change.

No, it's a problem with the inherent dishonesty of politicians.

To some degree, governments do try to figure these things out, before they start raising taxes. But, the system is certainly not perfect.

Not perfect is an understatement. I know that democracy is the best option amongst the alternatives, but the answer isn't raising taxes, it's cutting down on waste that's going to be the cure. But cutting down on stuff doesn't cost much so there's no real incentive to get people to do it.

If you have some good ideas about how to improve the efficiency of government spending, please let us know.

Why, are you politicians?

Can you elaborate on that? Do you think it is a deliberate con, forged from the malicious intent of some corrupt officials?

Or, is merely an innocent, well-meaning, but ultimately ineffective, inefficiency in spending? (which might not actually constitute a "con", unless someone was knowingly lying somewhere, in a significant manner.)

Or, something in between?

Why?

Yes, sure. We are told that plastic is polluting and carbon rich so we need to use less (which I fully agree with) it is clogging up land fill so we need to use less (which I fully agree with).
So charging 10p is going to do what exactly?
No one is saying how charging 10p is going to help, except for the notion that somehow people who used to need plastic carrier bags won't need them anymore.
Either ban them altogether (show 100% commitment to the cause) or
I'm sure everyone would be fine paying 10p for biodegradable bags, then at least the landfill problem will be being sorted for our 10p.
At the moment, I use just as many plastic bags as I always did and some one somewhere is getting my 10p (and I'm sure many other people's too). So what are all these 10p's doing to counter what the 10p charge was introduced for?
If the measure introduced does not solve or contribute significantly to solving the problem, it's a con.

Suppose we do find concrete evidence that one or more climate change policies were high-grade scams. Would that imply that all of climate change was one giant hoax? The science, the other policies, etc.?

I'm not saying that any of climate change is a con. I'm questioning what politicians are really doing about it and saying that in my opinion they are not handling it in an efficient or honest way. I'm certainly not arguing with the science.

A. Isn't this an issue, then, with how policy is communicated? Can you address how government policy, in actuality, has not been as comprehensive as you wish?

From my own PoV, I have heard a lot about how we cause climate change and all these measures (green taxes, carbon footprints etc) are needed to reduce emissions so that (it is certainly hinted at if not concisely stated) climate change can be stopped.
Not a single mention in anything I've read (from politicians) about natural climate change and how we will have to adapt to live with it.

B. Do you have evidence that we are not "the cause"? I think it is justifiable, if it can be reliably shown that we are at least a significant one. (I doubt we would be the sole cause, of course. Climate is too chaotic a system for anything to be the only cause of anything else, most of the time.)

I'm not saying that we are not the cause. I'm saying we are one of the causes and asking how will the politicians handle the other ones?
Of the natural and the man made, the man made is the easiest to counter and they aren't handling that one very well... even with all those extra 10p's