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johnd at 07:24 AM on 12 April 2011The e-mail 'scandal' travesty in misquoting Trenberth on
CBDunkerson at 06:20 AM, in the manner money is used as a analogy, the $ are mere numbers used to, well, enumerate. If making the analogy to measuring physical properties then that would require the measuring of the length, breadth and thickness of each note, then each bundle, then each stack, before being able to determine whether it can all be accounted for or not. -
A Plan for 100% Renewable Energy by 2050
Actually, DB, Sphaerica; I had something something more like this come to mind.Moderator Response: [DB] Warning: Mature content. -
invicta at 06:50 AM on 12 April 2011The e-mail 'scandal' travesty in misquoting Trenberth on
Surely when this statement was made Dr Trenberth was actually commenting on the lack of a global system that could adequately track and account for the heat he knew to be entering the system. The travesty was the lack of resources /funding on a global scale to properly monitor what has the potential to be among the most serious disasters the human race has faced. Rather like the accountant trying to run a billion pound company with a 100k system. -
scaddenp at 06:26 AM on 12 April 2011Has sea level rise accelerated since 1880?
My idea of a precautionary approach is to work with the information and science available and do risk assessment both ways. As far as I can see your position is largely uninformed and I have no faith in arguments from personal experience, including my own. Someone else pointed you to relevant section on Stern, but my point was that it was one of many in WG2. By contrast, you have not produced any report that suggests cost of climate change is less the cost of restricting emissions. However, I am glad that you are that do support actions that will reduce CO2 emissions which is the point of being interested in such debates. -
CBDunkerson at 06:20 AM on 12 April 2011The e-mail 'scandal' travesty in misquoting Trenberth on
johnd #32: "Trying to use money as an analogy is completely inappropriate. Try using something physical that can be measured." Like, say.... money? -
Dikran Marsupial at 06:04 AM on 12 April 2011Muller Misinformation #1: confusing Mike's trick with hide the decline
johnd@134 The waves in the tea cup are getting up a bit. ;o) On a more serious note, yes, they are different, but not in a way that matters in the context of a pretty picture for the cover of a report, especially when the caption gives you the information you need to find out everything you want to know if you can be bothered to look. -
johnd at 05:53 AM on 12 April 2011Muller Misinformation #1: confusing Mike's trick with hide the decline
Despite the convolutions that need to be performed to justify the act, by definition, instrumental data is not reconstructed data. -
daniel maris at 05:49 AM on 12 April 2011Has sea level rise accelerated since 1880?
DB - Influenced by discussion here I misread 880 mm as 8800mm. :) I have indicated why I opt for the lower end estimates - because the reported increases to date over the last century seem to have had no discernible effect whatsoever on life around the UK, which makes me wonder whether the data is correct or possibly overestimated. But as far as I am concerned 0.8M over 100 years is not a catastrophe for reasons I have already been through. -
johnd at 05:47 AM on 12 April 2011The e-mail 'scandal' travesty in misquoting Trenberth on
Trying to use money as an analogy is completely inappropriate. Try using something physical that can be measured. The litre of fuel that one receives from a service station is only a nominal litre. Try measuring it on a cold day and then a hot day. The 650 grams of a loaf of bread, or the 500 grams of a slab of butter are only accurate within a certain range pertaining to the applicable allowances. Are any departures from the nominal measures real even if they are not normally accounted for? -
Bibliovermis at 05:29 AM on 12 April 2011The e-mail 'scandal' travesty in misquoting Trenberth on
Jay, Your bank balance is steadily decreasing, but you don't know where the money is going and that is a travesty. Does that mean you aren't losing money after all? -
Steve L at 05:29 AM on 12 April 2011SeaMonster: an awesome new blog about the oceans
I often thought that ocean acidification would get some traction with snorkelers, SCUBA enthusiasts, sea kayakers, other boaters, sport fishers.... Best of luck! -
RSVP at 05:25 AM on 12 April 2011The e-mail 'scandal' travesty in misquoting Trenberth on
Tom Curtis 26 "Glaciers are warmed primarily by ambient air temperature" ...otherwise known as heat transfer via convection...Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] When you are wrong, it is generally better just to accept it with good grace. It happens to us all evey now and again. Replying with another error usually just makes things worse. -
Bob Lacatena at 05:17 AM on 12 April 2011A Plan for 100% Renewable Energy by 2050
Anyone know the airspeed velocity of an unladen swallow, in an atmosphere raised to 750 ppm CO2?Moderator Response: [DB] Which kind, African or European? -
Dr. Jay Cadbury, phd. at 05:16 AM on 12 April 2011The e-mail 'scandal' travesty in misquoting Trenberth on
So we can conclude that since Trenbirth cannot account for the lack of warming it may not exist at all, correct?Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] No. -
Bob Lacatena at 05:15 AM on 12 April 2011A Plan for 100% Renewable Energy by 2050
Actually, Dan, while I do not intend to feed him further, I do think it important for people to clearly see a troll for what he is finally and ultimately, with any veil of pretense removed. After devouring and defecating endless piles of steaming data and graphs and assertions, giving his position and his logic and his evaluation apparent depth and substance and meaning, his position is, in the end, merely to stand on the bridge and announce that "none shall pass."Moderator Response: [DB] Understood. -
shawnhet at 04:59 AM on 12 April 2011The e-mail 'scandal' travesty in misquoting Trenberth on
There is not much doubt that when Trenberth says we cannot account for the lack of warming, he is tacitly agreeing that there is a lack of warming *in the places we can measure*. The warming may be sitting somewhere we can't measure or it could be lost to space. Likewise, if our accountant were to see sales receipts of $100 and only see $90 of deposits in the bank, he might say that he cannot account for the $10 lack of funds in the bank. The lack of funds in the bank is real even if it turns up in someone's briefcase. Cheers, :) -
mspelto at 04:25 AM on 12 April 2011Zebras? In Greenland? Really?
Terminus calving events of a floating tongue the size of the Petermann Glacier are not expected to be related to a flow change over the period of time observed by Rigot and Steffen. This is not one of the rapid outlet glaciers of the Jakobshavn type with a small floating tongue that is less than a few months worth of movement long. Petermann instead requires many decades for ice to get from the grounding line to the terminus. Sweet Question in #7, I will have time to address it five hours hence. -
Bob Lacatena at 04:19 AM on 12 April 2011A Plan for 100% Renewable Energy by 2050
163, muoncounter, 164, JMruphy, These are interesting, based on the comment I just made to Gilles on the How I lived through a carbon tax thread, where he basically says the same thing. His position there is that a tax won't work, and nothing will work, so don't do anything. In fact, in the year of long, blathering, bombardments of posts by Gilles here and at RC, that has in fact been the recurring theme. He says he believes in climate change, and that we must ween ourselves from fossil fuels, so in that way he sounds like a concern troll, but his final position always comes down to the fact that nothing will work, so why try, or at least why not wait and see? I equate him to the man who jumped from the skyscraper and was heard to say, every time he passed an open window, "so far, so good!"Moderator Response: [DB] Yet by giving him the attention he so craves we feed into the trolling. In the spirit of living well being the best revenge, DNFTT. ;) -
Daniel Bailey at 03:46 AM on 12 April 2011SeaMonster: an awesome new blog about the oceans
Thanks, John! I look forward to having this in my regular blog rounds. The Yooper -
Bob Lacatena at 03:41 AM on 12 April 2011How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
150, Gilles, So in the end your answer is that now tax will work, and there is no solution, because it's not possible to get off of fossil fuels until civilization is destroyed, and that every attempt to do so will simply result in more use, and we are bound by a system of global supply, demand and competition in which intelligence, scientific knowledge and social responsibility are of no value. Your position is that governments and peoples are unable to work in their own self interests because they are so wedded to capitalism, in one form or another, that they won't do what's good for them, even when facing the effective end of civilization as we know it. And since fossil fuels must inevitably run out and will do so precipitously rather than gradually, the end of (our) civilization is inevitable in that sense, regardless of the realities of climate change. And since people will further be unable to effectively adapt to climate change without adequate power, and in your paradigm fossil fuels are the only adequate power source, we are doomed in that sense as well. So your position amounts to "don't try to tax fossil fuel use now and attempt to get out of the corner we're in, because it won't work, and I'm just as happy to see the world end after I die, as long as it means I get to live the high life now, and with a clean conscience to boot because in my own mind there was never anything I could have done about it." My, how convenient.Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] I have told Gilles that his idea of the real issue is off-topic. I have left this post as is, but (i) Gilles feel free to reply to only the issues that relate to the topic of the thread and (ii) please can we all be careful not to tempt Gilles to revisit off-topic issues. -
daniel maris at 03:23 AM on 12 April 2011Has sea level rise accelerated since 1880?
DB - I suggest you re-read my post. I wasn't seeking to substantiate a position - I was merely pointing to the variety of scientific interpretations of the data. All the references for the papers were set out in the Wiki link. I registered a personal preference for 0.8M but really that is no different from people who state a preference for 8M, despite that not being backed by the majority of scientists. I could have stated a preference for the study showing a reduction in sea level.Moderator Response: [DB] I re-read it. Again, you are lacking in properly substantiating your position: Upon what basis - other than guesswork and arrangement of internal organs - do you opt for 0.8 vs the latest best estimates of 1.2-2.0 meters SLR (the highest scientific estimate I've seen is from Hansen 2011, about 5 meters, so I have no idea where you get your 8 meter estimate)? The Hansen paper is in press, so it has not yet entered into mainstream consensus. -
JMurphy at 03:08 AM on 12 April 2011A Plan for 100% Renewable Energy by 2050
muoncounter wrote : "Nice. Take the easy way out; rather than endorse any course of action. Guarantees that you will hardly ever be wrong, at least in theory. However, like the broken clock, you're hardly ever right." Gilles's comment seems to be even more insidious than you may have noticed at first glance : he wrote that he wants to wait until he sees ("wait until I see"). This seems to mean that he can deny and discard anything unless he actually sees it personally for himself, i.e. projections and forecasts will not be accepted until they actually happen, and can be seen to happen to his own satisfaction ! Or is this just another case of Gilles's use of English as a second language creating a barrier between himself and the rest of us ? -
muoncounter at 02:40 AM on 12 April 2011A Plan for 100% Renewable Energy by 2050
Gilles #162: "Sorry for being irremediably skeptical, but I'll wait until I see." Nice. Take the easy way out; rather than endorse any course of action. Guarantees that you will hardly ever be wrong, at least in theory. However, like the broken clock, you're hardly ever right. -
Tom Curtis at 02:23 AM on 12 April 20112nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
LJRyan @997, the atmosphere has an upper side and a lower side. Because thermal radiation is the same in all directions, if the atmosphere were 303 K, then it would radiate 480 w/m^2 up, and the same down. That would violate conservation of energy. However, with an atmosphere at 255 K, it will radiate 240 w/m^2 to space and 240 w/m^2 towards the surface. It follows that there is no violation of conservationof energy, and I did not double count. -
dana1981 at 01:57 AM on 12 April 2011Christy Crock #1: 1970s Cooling
Wow. The primary site my office is cleaning up is contaminated with PCBs and dioxins. I've never seen anybody actually try to claim that their toxicity is due to "environmentalist scaremongering". Not surprisingly, Mastalerz is also a global warming "skeptic". It always makes me wonder where the "skeptics" dig these guys up. -
Dan Moutal at 01:42 AM on 12 April 2011How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
@Gilles "the lack of cheap energy in the near future" I shouldn't but here goes anyways. And that is exactly what a carbon tax aims to solve. By making FF use more expensive, and providing a clear price signal going forward. This gives the free market the ability to get creative and find solutions to the problem. And before you go on about extraction costs, please read my comment #127. I would also recommend you so some research into the different signals sent by a tax increasing at a known rate and the wild price fluctuations we have seen over the past few years. And finally I recommend again that you listen to the Jaccard interviews, because he directly answers the question why higher extraction costs are NOT a solution to lowering GHG emissions. (hint it was the high cost of oil which spurred a massive development in the Alberta tar sands) -
Gilles at 01:32 AM on 12 April 2011How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
sorry dan, I asked you to make clearer what you mean by "reducing emission", you didn't answer, so I gave 3 different answers for each meaning - what more do you want ? concerning "And are you opposed to policy which looks to internalize externalalities?" really : I don't care, it won't change the real problem - the lack of cheap energy in the near future. It's not that we disagree about solutions - it's that we disagree about the true issue.Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] It should be obvious to you that carbon taxes are intended to reduce the use of fossil fuels by those who are subject to the tax. If you are unable to work out what that implies for your A B and C criteria, perhaps you don't understand the issues as well as you think you do and perhaps should read a bit more and post rather less.The availability of cheap energy is clearly off-topic. If you want to discuss that, please do so elsewhere, and allow the discussion of the topic of this article to continue uninterupted. You have made your point.
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Gilles at 01:24 AM on 12 April 2011How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
Muoncounter : ( -Snip- ) Now I don't care about revenue neutral taxes. Actually I don't care about taxes - it's a normal way of smoothing inequalities and favoring good behaviors. I am *not* fighting against the principle of taxes. I'm just saying it won't reach the goal you seem to assign to it.Moderator Response: (DB) Off-topic thread derailment meanderings and moderation complaints snipped. -
Dan Moutal at 01:08 AM on 12 April 2011How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
@Gilles I strongly suggest you go back and listen to the two interviews I linked above with Mark Jaccard. You are lacking understanding of some of the basic principles of a carbon tax. I would also suggest to you read this (which I stole from Forbes a while back). But you still haven't really answered the questions I asked you (and raised a bunch more). All you did was explain some difficulties in reducing emissions. And you completely ignored the second question. I am loosing patience with you, and beginning to see why others were so quick to do so. -
Phila at 01:06 AM on 12 April 2011How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
If FF are truly the issue that many think they are (and many don't), and there becomes a great demand for the solution, then some ingenuitive capitalist(s) will find a way to solve the problem. Ingenious capitalists did find a way to solve the problem: By denying it exists. That's precisely why you can say that "many don't" accept a theory that has just as much evidence as theories they do accept. Markets depend on information. Bad information = bad decisions = bad outcomes. Why is it that the staunchest defenders of the "free market" always seem to overlook this basic point? -
grypo at 01:00 AM on 12 April 2011Christy Crock #2: Jumping to Conclusions?
@11 The first paper. (Solar-forced shifts of the Southern Hemisphere Westerlies during the Holocene, Varma et al., 2011) is about the sun's effect on ocean, which in turn has an effect on Southern Hemisphere Westerly Winds, which has several forcing/feedback components. The conclusions of the paper are fairly benign and very inconclusive in regards to how this would effect models, or indirect effects of of TSI in the Southern Hemisphere on century-long time scales. The underestimated effects (if true) could be positive or negative. For the second paper, I cannot get accces to the full paper, but if there is sunspot activity that is yet to be realized, and has an influence on climate, the future warming will be worse than we thought, and estimated projections will need to be adjusted upward -- if I understand the abstract correctly. But this thread is more about what we know and what our confidence is in certain statements. Neither of these studies, had Christy used them in his testimony, would have made his'jumping to conclusions' any more valid. I'm not sure what your last question is. Can you restate it? -
Tom Curtis at 00:54 AM on 12 April 2011Muller Misinformation #1: confusing Mike's trick with hide the decline
johnd @131, Dikran covers the answer pretty well. I would just add specifically, using the instrumental data rather than the proxy data over the instrumental period makes the reconstruction more accurate as a reconstruction, not less. It is not desirable in normal scientific literature because, as you point out it would make validation of the data difficult. You could work around that by validating the data with the proxy data over the part of the instrumental period, and then constructing the actual reconstruction using the instrumental data in the area of overlap. There is nothing intrinsically wrong about that practice, except that it obscures the method of validating the reconstruction. Where the nuts and bolts of the method are more important than the actual data, ie, in the scientific literature, that therefore makes the standard practice better. But that is not innately better, just better for the particular concerns of the publication. Outside of the standard scientific literature (ie, on a popular WMO publication as cover art), different concerns are involved so a different standard can rightly apply. In fact, Jones would have done nothing wrong if he had used instrumental data from 1850 forward in the WMO "reconstructions", so long as the trail is left for those who want to follow up the scientific details. The trail was left - therefore there is no issue. In short, Jones method would have been out of place in an actual scientific paper or an IPCC report. But in those contexts, his practice is appropriate and exemplary. But even in those places, his practice would have only been wrong because it was unconventional - although there are good reasons for the standard convention. -
Daniel Bailey at 00:39 AM on 12 April 2011Arctic Ice March 2011
Neven's Arctic Sea Ice Blog highlights PIOMAS' predictions for the current 2011 melt season:
http://neven1.typepad.com/.a/6a0133f03a1e37970b014e876618e4970d-pi
Note that PIOMAS bases its predictions on average conditions.
The Yooper
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Daniel Bailey at 00:20 AM on 12 April 2011Zebras? In Greenland? Really?
@ HR Thanks for pointing out the link to Rignot and Steffen (2008)! I will amend the text of the post above to reflect that shortly. Remember the focus of Rignot and Steffen (2008) is on the floating ice tongue of Petermann glacier only. Reading the paper shows that actual confirmation of the basal melt was made. And no, it's not good for the long-term stability of Petermann (or any other similarly-structured floating ice shelf). The statement about recent ice area lost is due to the recent calving events of those glaciers, primarily that of Petermann ice island B last year. Since that event was subsequent to the publication of Rignot and Steffen (2008) it is not at all contradictory to it. Thanks for your input, The Yooper -
Utahn at 00:10 AM on 12 April 2011Geologist Richard Alley’s ‘Operators Manual’ TV Documentary and Book… A Feast for Viewers and Readers
The website, linked above, also has a good FAQ section which should probably be linked as a nice "start here" reference... -
Gilles at 00:09 AM on 12 April 2011A Plan for 100% Renewable Energy by 2050
daniel 1. Nobody has said that natural gas and coal were about to peak - nevertheless if peak oil occurs now, it means that growth predictions like EIA's ones are over-optimistic and should not be believed like Gospels. And it also means that global peak follows closely that of conventional reserves - because unconventional reserves are nowhere near approaching the production capacity of conventional ones. Now if you apply the same idea to gas and coal, you would find a natural gas peak around 2030 and a coal peak may be around 2060- however the total will be of the order of the lowest SRES scenario, leading to around 550 ppm CO2 eventually. This may be too much for you - but I estimate it is unlikely it will be much less anyway. "2.The key factors are what technologies can be delivered at what cost. " That's basically a problem of supply and demand. "Certainly both Israel and Denmark are investing in the battery changing technology which I think will revolutionise road transport as the problem of range is now solved. " Sorry for being irremediably skeptical, but I'll wait until I see. -
Dikran Marsupial at 00:07 AM on 12 April 2011Muller Misinformation #1: confusing Mike's trick with hide the decline
johnd@131 The instrumental data are also used to calibrate the proxies. Only a subset (the "hold-out" set) is used for validation. Personally I would have just truncated the proxy and put in the instrumental data in a different colour. Having said which, the whole thing is a storm in a tea cup. The plot was for the cover of a report, designed to make it look pretty and broadly convey the message that there has been rapid warming. The fine detail regarding the divergence problem is irrelevant at that level of abstraction. The fact that some can't let it go is just silly, where it matters the divergence problem has been discussed openly. -
muoncounter at 00:05 AM on 12 April 2011How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
Gilles #137 "you persistently seem to ignore that many western countries have already achieved a carbon free electricity production : Iceland, Norway, several canadian provinces. ... However, they continue importing oil, gas and coal, even if they're totally deprived of them - which would make no sense if your claims were true." Your fascination with Iceland is touching, but irrelevant. Their percapita CO2 emissions are higher than the world average (Iceland approx 7.5 vs world approx 4.7 tons per World Bank figures), but are vanishingly small on a total emissions basis. Iceland's development of hydro - and geothermal - gives them one thing many western nations do not have and desperately crave: a measure of energy independence from foreign oil supplies. And you've forgotten that many countries still use coal and natural gas for heating and for industrial purposes. You've also forgotten conditions in eastern Germany and Poland due to excessive coal use prior to the '90s. Or maybe you favored the pollution of the Black Triangle as a symbol of Europe's industrial wealth? Once again, all of this absurdity drives the thread further from topic and closer to topics about which you enjoy pontificating. But you can make no case against the BC carbon tax presented here: it is revenue neutral. Any resultant reduction in carbon use under this tax does not alter individual 'wealth' at all. -
johnd at 23:36 PM on 11 April 2011Muller Misinformation #1: confusing Mike's trick with hide the decline
Tom Curtis at 21:04 PM, re "The use of instrumental data in developing the reconstructions is explicitly stated in the caption of the graph." It is accepted that instrumental data is normally used as the means to validate the modeling of any proxy data used to create the reconstruction. Therefore how can it then logically become an extension to the reconstructed data, replacing the data it is supposed to validate, or worse, part of it? The charting of instrumental data alongside the reconstructed proxy data would allow the validation of the proxy data to be substantiated, adding it as an extension does not. -
Bob Lacatena at 23:35 PM on 11 April 2011How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
Sorry, in my above post where I said "more expensive prospect of mitigation" I meant "more expensive prospect of adaptation." -
Tom Curtis at 23:32 PM on 11 April 2011A Flanner in the Works for Snow and Ice
Ken Lambert @57: From my 56:"Making this adjustment reduces the additional energy absorbed over the summer according to the conservative estimate from 2.2*10^21 to 1.7*10^21 That is still nearly double the 9.25*10^20 which we can expect from the additional forcing as calculated by Flanner over that period. It is still sufficient energy to melt 1.9 million square kilometers of 3 meter thick ice, or 25% of the remaining icecap. And it is still approximately 3 times the energy annual energy influx that Ken Lambert insists, "Therefore the Arctic must absorb less (much less) than the uniformly distributed portion of 6.4E20 Joules/yr." And it is still 17 times greater than the energy which Ken Lambert misrepresents Trenberth as indicating is the maximum absorbed in the arctic."
Emphasis added. Details of calculation in my 56 and my 54. I have not included in my calculations any of the effect of the original CO2 forcing. As is well known, this has a stronger effect at higher latitudes than as lower, so would tend to reinforce this effect. On the other hand, the water vapour feedback is stronger in the tropics. The strength of neither is relevant to the issue of whether the change in albedo due to arctic ice melt results in sufficient additional energy absorbed to be compatible with Flanner's calculated ice albedo forcing in the Arctic. -
HumanityRules at 23:27 PM on 11 April 2011Zebras? In Greenland? Really?
Interesting post. I only got as far as "Type 1: Northern, with Large Floating Termini" and got side-tracked into reading the Rignot and Steffen (2008) paper. Can you just confirm it's this one as there is no link for it? It would seem that warming water under the glacier is crucial here, are there any actual observations of that warming? I thought the Rignot and Steffen paper seems to actually highlight dynamical issues with regard to what is happening on this glacier. For example they highlight the role of channel formation at the bottom and it's potential role in "severing the glacier into large blocks". That can't be good for glacier stability. Secondly can you just help me reconcile your comment "The recent ice area lost by Petermann, Academy and Zachariae Ice Stream indicate these glaciers are being impacted by the increased melting at the surface and likely the base of the ice shelf for Petermann Glacier at least." with this from the paper "Ice velocity was mapped using Radarsat-1 InSAR data with a 10-m/yr precision at 50-m posting. We detect no interannual variability in speed averaged over 24 days between year 2000 and 2006...... Petermann Glacier has had stable flow conditions over the past decade." they seem to me to be related and contradictory. -
Bob Lacatena at 23:24 PM on 11 April 2011How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
Forgive the length of this post. I generally deplore long comments, but I couldn't help myself. 58, Harry Seaward,Name just one example where socialism or communism solved anything.
How about 5?- The U.S. Armed forces
- Public education
- Public police and fire services
- he U.S. Center for Disease Control
- The Federal Emergency Management Agency.
If FF are truly the issue that many think they are (and many don't), and there becomes a great demand for the solution, then some ingenuitive capitalist(s) will find a way to solve the problem.
This fails because by the time the climate effects are so strong that they are painful enough to create a profit motivation, it will be too late to do anything about them. Then capitalist efforts will instead go into the more expensive prospect of mitigation, which will in turn go only to those with enough wealth to pay for it, leaving billions of people to suffer unimaginable hardships. This fantasy that completely unrestricted capitalism is the only answer to all problems is not only silly, but obscene. Human history is a list of failed and imperfect systems. They are all imperfect. Some are useless (communism, anarchism), some are good for some things but not others (socialism, capitalism), some worked at some points in human history but we have outgrown them (absolutism), and some are downright evil (fascism, totalitarianism). As intelligent human beings it falls to us to find meaningful solutions to problems using our intelligence, not to develop knee jerk allegiance to some methods (capitalism) and knee jerk abhorrence to others (socialism) just because that's what we grew up with -- in a completely different world (the Cold War) -- or because that's what Fox News tells us to think. The fact is that some sort of tax (cap and trade, fee and dividend, something else) is the only solution to this problem that will have an effect soon enough to make a difference (eventually people will do it because they believe in it, once it becomes that obvious and painful, but as I've said, if we wait that long to start it will be too late). But what falls to us now is determining what tax mechanism will work best, not whether or not to do it. The capitalist minded should have been in love with cap-and-trade, because that's a capitalism modeled tax, but it wasn't good enough. Fee-and-dividend should have been a good next choice for the only-capitalism crowd, because it puts all of the power into the hands of the consumer and the economy, and leaves the least room for abuse. That was similarly assaulted. It soon becomes clear that it's not the mechanism, but the idea of regulating the indirect cost of FF (AGW) that is what bothers people. I will point out two more things. First is oil industry subsidies. If you are so in favor of market pressures, why are we helping an industry that already controls the energy and therefore lifeblood of the world? Why are we tipping the playing field toward fossil fuel use? Second is tobacco use. There is an unseen cost there, in health costs, that is paid for by society, the largest segment of which benefits from neither the "joys" of smoking, nor the profits of selling tobacco. I object very strongly to having to pay for "their" healthcare (through my increased premiums) just so that "they" could foolishly and callously smoke and tobacco companies could make huge profits. How does that fit into pure capitalism? This this is exactly the same as FF use today. Those who benefit from FF will suffer the consequences, as will everyone else, but there is no direct tie between the use and the consequences. Most people, like you, are thinking (your words) "If FF are truly the issue," and aren't ready to take action until we suffer a Pearl Harbor type event and things are undeniable. But unlike in WW II, in this case, that would be far, far too late to do anything about it. What distinguishes human beings from animals is our intelligence. It is our ability to see things like this coming, and to avoid it rather than trust to luck, that separates us from 450 million years of evolutionary dead ends. Or so I hope. -
michael sweet at 23:12 PM on 11 April 2011Zebras? In Greenland? Really?
Terific post. It is great to be able to read a carefully written and referenced account by people who know what they are talking about. Thanks a lot. Does the strength of the ice change much as the temperature changes from say -20 to 0C? How much difference is there in the flow rate of glaciers that are 0C compared to ice in the interior that is lower temperature? What is the temperature of the ice in the interior of Greenland and is it warming in response to AGW? Is there a reference to temperatures made during ice cores that I can read? -
clonmac at 23:12 PM on 11 April 2011Geologist Richard Alley’s ‘Operators Manual’ TV Documentary and Book… A Feast for Viewers and Readers
I watched this last night. I thought it was pretty decent. I thought it was going to cover more of the science of climate change than the renewable options, but it was still good. The parts that were about the science were concise and irrefutable. I also liked how it looked at the renewable options from a military perspective. The video also made a good point about how the military generally leads the way when it comes to cultural changes and that left me a little reassured about the future. -
Arkadiusz Semczyszak at 23:03 PM on 11 April 2011Christy Crock #2: Jumping to Conclusions?
My Firefox runs fine, so ... Many times on this site, I cited peer-reviewed scientific papers - arising after the publication of IV report - which said that some - important - natural factors have not been properly estimated - “assessing” the "force of nature. " For example, the last quoted - by me - scientific paper: Solar-forced shifts of the Southern Hemisphere Westerlies during the Holocene, Varma et al., 2011.: “... we propose that the role of the sun in modifying Southern Hemisphere tropospheric circulation patterns has probably been underestimated in model simulations of past climate change.” Sub-Milankovitch solar forcing of past climates: Mid and late Holocene perspectives, Helama et al., 2010.: “If neglected in climate models, this lag could cause an UNDERESTIMATION OF TWENTY-FIRST–CENTURY WARMING TRENDS.” How much? And do not dominate (comparison - CO2 RF) "this [natural] lag" (inestimable well - before) currently? -
Harry Seaward at 22:59 PM on 11 April 2011How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
DSL @ 55 Please explain what you meant with the following statement. Are you talking about a return to a more agrarian or even hunter/gatherer society? Are you implying population control? How is more sickness a good thing? How in the world is a carbon tax going to help any of this? "What we're doing with carbon taxing is paying for the sins of our grandfathers and fathers, many of whom are still alive. Had we had the collective foresight and the means to materially express that foresight, we'd probably have simpler machines, fewer people, less killing, more sickness, less medical fraud, a more effective democracy, less expensive but weaker armies, and certainly an atmosphere that isn't developing into a giant pain in the market." -
Bob Lacatena at 22:47 PM on 11 April 2011How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
69, actuallythoghtful,...there actually is a 4th way - social pressure.
81, theVille,...you missed out education from your list...
Sorry, I had a bad flu bug all weekend and was totally incapacitated. But I'd put both of these as either variations or factors under my second method, a "moral imperative," since social pressure and education are the places we primarily get such more imperatives... although I'd agree that this ultimately would be the very best way to do things. I find it amazing that we glorify the role of America in World War II, where people made great personal sacrifices and the will and power of the entire country was single-mindedly bent on the greatest threat democracy had ever faced. Yet today, people are too selfish to give up their Disney vacations and flat screen TVs and SUVs to fight the greatest threat civilization has ever faced. Of course, back then we had great, focused leadership (Roosevelt) and Pearl Harbor to shove us into action. We lack any serious political leadership today, and if we wait for an impetus such as Pearl Harbor it will have been far, far too late to take action. -
daniel maris at 22:44 PM on 11 April 2011Has sea level rise accelerated since 1880?
Scaddenp - I'm not claiming to be a climate scientist or oceanic specialist (I wonder how many of you are). Looking at Wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_level_rise it seems that you can take your pick of anything from a reduction since 2005 in sea level to plus 8 metres or more over the next 100 years - all estimates produced by reputable scientits. It ends up with a reference to a "more plausible" rise of 0.8M over the next 100 years, which if I had to choose would probably be my choice, purely because it reflects more the reality of my personal experience over a few decades. Of course the rise - if rise it be - might accelerate, but on the other hand perhaps the scientists who say it is going down are right.Moderator Response: [DB] Climate scientist/oceanic specialist or not, quoting Wiki on science blogs to substantiate a position is no way to gain credibility; links to peer-reviewed published articles supporting your position are best. Baseless and unattributed claims about "scientists", without naming names, similarly detracts from your credibility and amount to hand-waving. -
Marcus at 22:42 PM on 11 April 2011How I lived through a carbon tax and survived to tell the tale
"OK, tell that to the SRES team, because they don't think to know it." Wow, you really are completely *clueless* aren't you? SRES projections, as I've said time & again, are mostly based on *business* *as* *usual* scenarios. If you're simply not going to accept this basic fact, then I really don't see the point in debating the issue with you-as your understanding is so clearly & fundamentally *flawed*. Also, when are you going to decide which argument you actually support? After all, you've had *dozens* of posts where you've told us how fossil fuel use is going to increase well into the future-yet you equally claim that they're going to run out. Seems, Gilles, like you're *really*, *really* confused & contradictory. That's something very common amongst contrarians.Moderator Response: [Dikran Marsupial] AFAICS only A1F1 is strictly speaking "business as usual", i.e. fossil fuel intensive rapid economic growth. Others are clearly not "business as usual", for instance A1T (rapid economic growth with technological emphasis on non-fossil fuel energy sources). However this is not something I am that familiar with (I just gleaned that from p140 of Houghton's "Global Warming - The Complete Birefing" [sic] fourth edition). The B2 family also is not "business as usual" as it involved restricted economic growth in favour of environmental sustainability.
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