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Daniel Bailey at 23:04 PM on 27 November 2016It's the sun
Scientists use a metric called Total Solar Irradiance (TSI) to measure the changes in output of the energy the Earth receives from the Sun. And TSI, as one would expect given the meaning behind its acronym, incorporates the 11-year solar cycle AND solar flares/storms.
The reality is, over the past 4 decades of significant global warming, the net energy forcing the Earth receives from the Sun had been negative. That's right: negative. As in, the Earth should be cooling, not warming, if it was the Sun.
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jlfqam at 22:14 PM on 27 November 2016It's the sun
Hi,
it appears the sun is the main driver of climate.
Please, take a look at the plot in this link
https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BzqxWkmUnvnyVlhLUzh5bDY5SG8
As an example, It can be observed how the CET follow quite well the microwave flux from the sun. There's however a significantly different behaviour of CET relative to solar 10.7cm flux after 1991, that's likely the consequence of the Pinatubo eruption cooling on the ocean surface.
Looking back in time we can see a good correlation between CET and the monthly SSN on this linked plothttps://drive.google.com/open?id=0BzqxWkmUnvnyUGw4ejJhZHVlOG8
Data sources:
CET
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadcet/data/download.html
10.7cm fluxhttp://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/data/correlation/solar.data
SSN
http://www.sidc.be/silso/datafilesThanks for your attention
JLF
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MA Rodger at 21:07 PM on 27 November 2016Models are unreliable
jchoelgaard @997.
The answer is evidently 'yes' as Knutti et al (2002) demonstrates. However, the literature seems to show neural network models being used mostly to analyse particular aspects of climate rather modelling the global climate as a whole.
But as scaddenp @998 says, the main causes of historical global temperature fluctuations is ENSO. Add in a few other factors and a model can be built to fit certain historical data and having been thus 'curve-fitted' used to calculate an output that can be tested against other 'non-curve-fitted' historical data, as this recent Tamino post demonstrates.
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Tristan at 18:25 PM on 27 November 2016Models are unreliable
Question: Is a potential reason for three record hot years in a row the fact that aerosol production is peaking?
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Glenn Tamblyn at 17:57 PM on 27 November 2016Geologists and climate change denial
David
Some extra points. If it were a further breakdown of the ozone layer, that wouldn't change the amount of sunlight absorbed, just where it is absorbed. The UV would still be absorbed, just now it would be in the lower atmosphere. And nobody has reported any such change and since the advent of the ozone hole, we are monitoring that kind of stuff.
Also we are seeing cooling throughout the stratosphere, not just the ozone layer. This is a signature of more GH gases, particularly CO2. -
nigelj at 12:53 PM on 27 November 2016Trump or NASA – who's really politicising climate science?
lepidolite @10, sure I agree we should encourage Trump to take climate change seriously, reduce emissions and start seeing the upside of all this for business and the country. Yes Trump appears more flexible than the Republican Congress. (That would not be difficult).
However Trump is just so changeable its distinctly unusual. Basically I suppose people have to just hope he is pragmatic and does the right thing on the day. It's hopelesss predicting what he will do.
However at least 4 of Trumps companies have gone bankrupt owing billions and Trump is lucky to have excaped in one piece. This is the guy the whole world is supposed to trust to make the right decisions. I think it will be a very rough ride, and will not end well.
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chriskoz at 12:44 PM on 27 November 20162016 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #48
Worth reading the latest series about the deswtruction of GBR:
Especially the pro-Adani arguments by QLD govs that have fast-tracked this project:
- Emissions are measured in the country where they are released so those from the Carmichael mine belong to India, not Australia.
- About 300 million Indians don’t have access to electricity. India will build new coal power stations, and it will get the coal from somewhere. Why shouldn’t the Australian economy and Queensland communities benefit?(my emphasis)
My response: it's like giving your younger brother matches to start afire and then saying "my brother burnt my house not me. And BTW, if I did not give him matches someone else would". How could anyone listen to and agree with such logic? Unless they deny AGW & what's happening with GBR of course.
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scaddenp at 10:57 AM on 27 November 2016Models are unreliable
jchoelgaard, the main influence on year to year temperature is the ENSO cycle which is appears to be chaotic and neural networks are no better than any other curve-fitting in predicting such processes. You have a limited no. of inputs (measured values) and you know that imperfect measurement and subscale unknowns will invalidate the prediction eventually.
The situation is analogous to predicting mid summer day temperature 3 months out. You can state with great confidence that the temperature will likely be higher than mid winters day, because (like with increased GHG), there is more incoming radiation. However, exactly what that temperature will be is dependent on weather - an inherently chaotic process. Applying the ANN approach to climate modelling would face the same formidable challenges as applying to a long term weather forecast.
You can however make a pretty good punt at what the long term average mid summer day temperature will be and climate model predictions are like that.
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scaddenp at 10:41 AM on 27 November 2016Geologists and climate change denial
Also David, we are measuring the change in the incoming radiation (or outgoing radiation) and it has the spectral signature of CO2. The match between calcuated radation spectra and intensity for the CO2 increase and the measurement is extremely good. See the papers on this discussed here.
Unless you wish to abandon conservation of energy and Plancks Law, then you need explain why that measured increase in radiation from CO2 has not caused warming if you want argue for other causes.
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Rob Honeycutt at 09:58 AM on 27 November 2016Geologists and climate change denial
davidbennettlaing... One would be to look at the relative radiative forcing of all the potential factors. As here:
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davidbennettlaing at 02:44 AM on 27 November 2016Geologists and climate change denial
Devil's advocate here (non-economic geologist!). You state that increased radiative output from Earth is proof that rising CO2 causes warming, but suppose it's not really rising CO2 that has caused the warming, but something entirely different, such as anthropogenic chlorine photodissociated from CFCs depleting the ozone layer and admitting more high-frequency UV-B. What actual hard-data proof is there that CO2 is actually responsible for the observed warming and not something else? Tx.
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jchoelgaard at 01:07 AM on 27 November 2016Models are unreliable
I repeat this due to many typhographical errors:
It seems that many models give more or less accurate long term predictions of average temperature rises in the sea, land and atmosphere as well as ice and snow coverage. The major contributors are supposedly atmospheric levels of CO2 and water vapor and possibly methane and other gases, all assumed to induce positive feedback effects with some (presumeably individual) delays. The effects of volcanic eruptions, cloud coverage, ocean currents, sun spots, wobbling/perturbation of the earths axis, distance from the sun, etc., may or may not be inputs or possibly outputs from some of these models.
Being a layman, all this suggests a complexity that make it difficult for any model to simulate yearly variations in any historically known output of interest based on all (or allmost all) historically known ( measured) inputs. To me this suggests that a sufficiently sophisticated neural network could be trained to accurately simulate any climate effects (one or more chosen outputs) and causes (using the effects of several assumed driving forces as inputs). If such a model was implemented and sufficiently well trained (millions or billions of runs) it might reveal some surprising relationships, that could explain some short term known analomies or it might even reverse some theories about cause and effect (eg. by trying to exchange certain inputs and outputs and studying the results). If sufficiently accurate, such a model might even convince the sceptics.
Al, this is hust a lead-up to my question: Has any such neural network already been implemented or contemplated and if so what are the capabillties?
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350ppm at 23:49 PM on 26 November 2016Mitigation in Australia
On the topic of travel, I read today that 92 million barrels per day of oil are consumed globally (mostly for transport I assume). Apparently there is 315kg of co2 per barrel when burned. According to my pretty ordinary maths, this is 3Gt p.a.....the plan is to continue this with a small downward trajectory to 75million bpd in 2050....we have to stop converting the terrestrial C into atmospheric C and start using the abundance of atmospheric C for our fuels, but this needs to be economically rewarded. We must recognise the value of the commons (the commom wealth) in our Commonwealth.
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MA Rodger at 23:16 PM on 26 November 2016The simple, cheap instruments measuring global warming in the oceans
A final comment on plato525 - when I searched to see where else he may have had a web-presence, all I came across was an image of Plato with the incorrect dates (525-456 BC) which appears to be courtsey of (!!Yaggy and T. L. Haines is inosent!!) the Florida Center for Instructional Technology. (The dates are of course those of the dramatist Aeschylus.) So it is possible that even plato525's chosen name stems from a bad error.
Moderator Response:[JH] Off-topic.
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lepidolite at 21:12 PM on 26 November 2016Trump or NASA – who's really politicising climate science?
chriskoz @9
If he had been unable to connect and comprehend things, I don't think he would have won the election. He has been able to realise where the battleground was and campaigned with the right messages in places that were more useful to him that where Clinton did, for example.
Why do I see an opportunity? If Obama says that global warming is a thing, he convinces zero Republicans.Now, imagine, if this time someone convinces DJT to say something or take some action. Or even just leave the Clean Power Act as it is.
He has the power to settle the issue and completely leave hardcore oil-backed Republicans alone. Not even Republicans believe the Republican establishment anymore, the proof being DJT getting elected.
And DJT has proven to be as malleable as it gets. Even if he has said what he said in the past.
I guess it boils down to: who is more likely to change his ming on global warming? Mitt Romney/any other ideologically conservative establishment Republican, or notoriously "practical" Donald Trump?
Even his actual written positions give quite some room for global warming action:
https://www.donaldjtrump.com/policies/energy/Yes, he (for now) wants to push fossil fuels, but he wants full energy independence, something which is heavily aided by moving away from fossil. Let's find the common ground in there and try to push him for the latter rather than the former.
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lepidolite at 20:55 PM on 26 November 2016Trump or NASA – who's really politicising climate science?
I agree with rkrolph. I actually believe climate associations should be trying hard to reach Donald Trump, and they could actually sway him into taking action or, at the very least, not taking counter-action. He is no hard-core conservative. He is not a believer in completely free markets if he wants to keep companies from moving abroad.
It is time to find some common ground. The smugness that liberals have been accused of, and that probably got DJT elected should be avoided.If DJT wants to fight manufactured products from abroad, one excellent way would be to heavily tax products that do not meet certain environmental requirements. Companies in the US face tougher enviro. regulations than those in China, US products will be neatly favoured by such legislation. Let's pitch that idea and others to him.
A few Republican congressmen and senators may always be convinced for some action. -
chriskoz at 17:38 PM on 26 November 2016Trump or NASA – who's really politicising climate science?
rkrolph@5
I assume you responded to my post @4 but please note that 'christoz' is not me, next time please avoid such mistake.
I do not share your optimism about T-man's possible transformation. I also do not share pessimism of some doomsayers who predict rise of fascism or similar degeneration of US political system - opposing forces in Congress won't alow it. I'm simply a pragmatist, whose opinions about the world are shaped by the available evidence and can change as more evidence becomes available.
In case of T-man, the available evidence does not indicate that he cares any bit about US. Quite opposite: he cares how to deceive and ruin his country's economic balance. Proof: he extorted almost $1bln from Uncle Sam through a tax loophole. No need to say anymore about his morale. And there is no single piece of evidence about his ability to comprehend and connect the things. Everything, his incoherent & rambling speeches, his use of emotions therein and total lack of any substance in everything he says, point to opposite: an empty headed narcissist driven by random whims. This video by Sam Harris(watch just from 2:00 to 5:00 where Sam explain how the ideasin human brain are connected, therefore it is impossible to "pull out a diamond" out of it when you've pulled out tons of junk) matches my opinion quite well.
So, any signs that T-man recently may be "coming to his senses" cannot be inrterpreted as such, given the evidence above. Rather, they should be interpreted as a signs of a con man changing his propaganda because he realises he cannot go far with his previous deceits. Regarding climate science, I'm affraid, there is nothing that can stop the con man, with REP Congress in ever widening denial. I'm pessimist here and think this is the area most damage will be done in next 4 years of "dark age" in US mitigation policies. Unless of course you can show me something that will stop the con man in his ravings.
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One Planet Only Forever at 15:27 PM on 26 November 2016Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 5
Another brilliant brief presentation.
The only problem with brevity is the need to 'not say something'.
In this presentation it may have helped to add that the 'Curve of climate change' will be difficult to predict regionally. That means that planning regionally for the change is a gamble, and also means so much more.
What is certain is that almost all regional climates will be changing. What is less certain is exactly what the regional weather changes will be. And the faster the rate of change the more difficult it will be to use observations of recent regional changes to reliably forecast what will regionally occur in the near future, like an upcoming crop growing season.
So it is worse than needing to plan for the curve. It is more like being a batter trying to figure out if a curve or knuckle or fast ball is coming and what part of the plate it is going across. In baseball the batters get several attempts in a game and sometimes figure it out or guess right.
Unlike baseball which is just a game for the entertainment of humans, this economic game gambit of competing to get away with benefiting the most from burning fossil fuels will create more uncertainty and risk and challenges for others, particularly future generations of humanity.
Too many people have developed a taste for the possible benefits and are addicted to the pursuit of more. They excuse their desires by claiming everyone is to be freer to think for themselves and do as they please for their convenience, entertainment and enjoyment. And they will irrationally and unjustly fight against limitations to that freedom.
Unlike batters in baseball, future generations of humanity shouldn't have more 'swings that miss' just because a portion of a generation of humanity did not care to limit their personal pursuits of personal desire and do not care to actually understand how their desires and demands for freedom to do as they please are impediments to the advancement of humanity to a lasting better future for all, a future where climate science actually can improve the forecasting of regional growing seasons rather than scrambling to try to figure out what is going to happen (and not being sidetracked by the need to try to grab the attention of a population of people that are developing attention spans like goldfish and the desire to not have to do something harder and less personally entertaining if they might get away with an easier and cheaper more enjoyable action plan without having to consider that it is likely to cause problems others will end up having to deal with).
This leads to need to understand the way that a Business Mind can regard risk (My MBA helped me more clearly understand powerful motivations of the business mind). The business approach to risk is mitigation. Not mitigating the consequences created that others have to deal with. Mitigating the magnitude of potential negative consequences for the investors-executives (and hoping to be able to find someone responsible, like an employed professional person or other scapegoat, that they can blame for failing to keep them from getting away with what they very powerfully wanted to get away with). There is ample evidence of the damaging 'success' of this approach. Things like the 2008 global financial debacle, Deepwater Horizon and Union Carbide's Bhopal disaster each limited the consequences faced by investors and executives who benefited from the more profitable riskier approach to taking in money quicker (Trump proudly declared he would do that as America's Boss - grab and gather quicker than the others can, any way that can be gotten away with).
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Digby Scorgie at 13:00 PM on 26 November 2016Trump or NASA – who's really politicising climate science?
ubrew12 @2
We now know that Exxon actually did fund climate science in the 1970s. Their team of climate scientists confirmed what other climate scientists had concluded. Exxon used the information to safeguard its installations against the expected effects of climate change in the future. However, they also realized that to combat climate change, people had to reduce the burning of fossil fuel — which would hit Exxon in the pocket. To safeguard their profits therefore, they launched their campaign of deceit about climate change. You know the rest.
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nigelj at 10:42 AM on 26 November 2016Trump or NASA – who's really politicising climate science?
Trump's original position was climate change is a Chinese scam and he was adamant the USA would pull out of the Paris accord. Now Trump says humans are implicated in climate change to "some extent", and he is open minded about Paris. This has been in the news the last couple of days.
I suspect Trump lacks sincerity on this change of mind, and is just trying to be all things to all people. I hope Im wrong of course.
More significant is this. Trump is not going to find it so easy to get what he wants all the time, whatever that may be. He is used to running his family empire and will find government quite different. He has already appointed hard line climate sceptics, and his election has empowered the Republican Congress. Trump simply doesn't have the power to dictate what all these people think and do, and they are mostly all climate denialists. So even if Trump softens his position personally, it will spin out of Trumps control.
Memes do get out in the public, deliberately so. People hear the memes they like, and close their mind to anything that makes them feel uncomfortable. So many people are driven by gut feelings and emotions its scary.
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ubrew12 at 09:39 AM on 26 November 2016Trump or NASA – who's really politicising climate science?
Just a heads-up: The UK telegraph is saying the Robert Scott and Earnest Shackleton expeditions of the 1910's prove Antarctic sea ice area has not changed in a century. To quote the article "the levels in the early 1900s were between... 5.3 and 7.4 million square kilometres". The article goes on to suggest the current value is '6 million square kilometres'. Hence the title of the article: "Antarctic sea ice is not shrinking [in]... 100 years". This is all well and good, except the current minimum Antarctic sea ice extent is not 6 million square kilometres, but 3 million square kilometres. A Tamino reconstruction of Antarctic sea ice extent (10^6 km2) over the 20th century is shown here. The Telegraph will probably retract their statement in a week, claiming that they got their units (mi^2 versus km^2) confused. But the 'meme' will be out there, and that will not be retracted: which was the entire point of the article.
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rkrolph at 09:24 AM on 26 November 2016Trump or NASA – who's really politicising climate science?
I understand what christoz is saying but I am trying to be optimistic and hope Trump comes to his senses regarding climate science. He has already changed his tune some since the election. Does he really want to take the U.S. in a different direction that the rest of the world on this?
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rkrolph at 09:16 AM on 26 November 2016Global weirding with Katharine Hayhoe: Episode 5
Another fine video from Katharine. And I spelled her name right also.
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chriskoz at 09:03 AM on 26 November 2016Trump or NASA – who's really politicising climate science?
That is the start of the fallout from this irresponsible presidency by a con man. I'm really worried what will happen to Gavin and his staff. The con man realizes some of the grossest deceitfull and childish promisses that absurdly gave him a White House job (like prossecuting his opponents and building border walls) are getting him nowhere so he backs off with no regrets. But fighting the climate science is not one of them, so in his selfish, abhorrent desire, he will proceed dismantling climate science together with climate regulations. Like a child who does not see the reason the regulations are needed (FF burning -> AGW) trying to find a scapegoats (climate scientists) instead. Is there any way to stop that? Petition/letters of disapproval from world academies of science?
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nigelj at 07:07 AM on 26 November 2016Trump or NASA – who's really politicising climate science?
Excellent article.
"Climate research conducted at NASA had been “heavily politicised”, said Robert Walker, a senior adviser to US President-elect Donald Trump.This has led him to recommend stripping funding for climate"
I think the claim is empty. Walker provides no evidence, because there is none and hopes that bluff will win the day. The media need to start demanding these right wing schills provide hard proof, and it needs to be something more than some trivial rubbish or sophistry.
In my opinion the accusation is also a subtle form of bullying to try to cripple and intimidate the researchers by wearing them down with constant false accusations. We have seen other attacks on scientists documented on this website. Its more off the same.
In contrast the rhetoric of the denialists is full of political statements about liberal scams, Chinese scams, etc, etc, in a gish gallop of click bait designed to inflame people. Yet most in the media are so weak they let people get away with this without challenge.
I agree that climate denail is clearly related to political ideologies opposing government actions and roles. The correlation is striking. The reason is ultimately fear of change or constrraints on personal activities, and letting this reach an unhealthy level.
The consensus is really important, as it shows the climate community is of one mind (apart from a few eccentics that you will always get,) so hence the sceptics attack the consensus. I have emailed this consensus material to local media, and encourage others to do the same. The consensus studies are reasonably recent, and not part of IPCC releases, so many of the mainstream media are likely just not aware of them, and certainly not that there are several consensus studies finding much the same thing.
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ubrew12 at 01:42 AM on 26 November 2016Trump or NASA – who's really politicising climate science?
If the climate scientists are conducting a hoax, it could devastate the fossil fuels industry. Is the richest industry in the history of capitalism just unable to find the money to 'fact check' the climate scientists, and make sure this isn't a hoax? Yet, instead of the clamor of directly-fossil-funded scientific opinion challenging the IPCC, its the silence that is deafening here. It's the absence of directly-fossil-funded climate science, countering the standard viewpoint, that informs us more than the presence of fossil-funded doubt-mongerers. In fact, if you ask Exxon its direct opinion, you'll get a weak admission that the scientists are right and we should be preparing for warming.
So, of course the climate science is 'political'. Exxon just finds it more effective to 'make it political' than to do its own science, which it knows would just add more evidence to what scientists have compiled. There are two incidences in history, that I'm aware of, when fossil fuels directly funded science to challenge the standard viewpoint. In both cases, those efforts did little more than confirm the standard viewpoint. So, for the fossil fuels industry, it's Plan B, first elucidated by WC Fields: 'if you can't dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with bull'.
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mbryson at 00:50 AM on 26 November 2016Trump or NASA – who's really politicising climate science?
Singer, eh? Why am I not surprised. Multiple real surveys are obviously biased, but the mere opinion of a washed-up right-wing scientist who has a long history of getting things wrong ('Star Wars,' anyone?) is obviously reliable. That way madness lies (in truth we're already there).
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Tom Curtis at 11:55 AM on 25 November 2016The simple, cheap instruments measuring global warming in the oceans
chriskoz @4, opposition to free speech was implied by plato525's insistence that this website should be banned in a post that has since been deleted for sloganeering. His/her attitude was more "la la la la I can't hear you, and I don't want anybody else to be allowed to hear you either".
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chriskoz at 11:04 AM on 25 November 2016The simple, cheap instruments measuring global warming in the oceans
Tom@2,
plato525's argument is precisely this:
Or more figuratively, an ostrich picture in "Climate Change Denial" book by Cook/Washington on the right margin. Opposition to free speech may be associated but is not implied in his/her desperate plea.
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Larry E at 05:09 AM on 25 November 2016Mitigation in Australia
How about an item #13 to deal with travel, especially long-distance travel?
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Erwin at 01:23 AM on 25 November 2016Hansen's 1988 prediction was wrong
The Hanson 1988 paper link is dead. I think it is:
http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/1988/1988_Hansen_ha02700w.pdf
Hope this is right!
Moderator Response:[PS] Link activated. Thanks for that.
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DSL at 00:49 AM on 25 November 2016The simple, cheap instruments measuring global warming in the oceans
It's thanksgiving in the US. I think I can give thanks that plato525 didn't stick around to spew a bunch of anti-science garbage and put me off my mashed potatoes.
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Tom Curtis at 00:20 AM on 25 November 2016The simple, cheap instruments measuring global warming in the oceans
I see that plato525 reveals himself to be, in addition to free from rational thought, an opponent of free speech.
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plato525 at 23:52 PM on 24 November 2016The simple, cheap instruments measuring global warming in the oceans
How do I delete myself from this site or can you do it for me?
Please. I can't take anymore.
Moderator Response:[DB] Request granted.
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sauerj at 12:09 PM on 24 November 2016Mitigation in Australia
Wol @4 & nigel @6: When I said P&C costs, I meant these sorts of insurance costs to the entire economy. But, your points are valid, in that private business will not bear the direct brunt of the non-industrial portion of these costs; they will in an indirect way, but not a direct way. So, the totality of these costs won't ever show up directly on business (private only) balance sheets.
Another fallacy w/ my thinking is that it is ridiculous to think that an individual business could model true, long-term operating costs for an array of project options based on how each option might impact their future climate change (or operating) costs. Obviously, a single business is way too small for different project options to make a difference to their operating costs due to CC impacts. Total lapse of thinking on my part.
I therefore fall back on the need of carbon taxes to force these operating costs onto private & public endeavors. The tax has to 1) have enough bite to it (high enough operating cost) to make sustainable projects more profitable than non-sustainable options when conducting fully distributed cost evaluations (for either new projects, deciding when to abandon old plants, and for R/D investments), 2) ramped up at a brisk but economically tolerable rate & the ramp rate should be held firm to stablilize business planning, and 3) Be re-distributed in equitable and optimum ways for both economic stability and carbon cessation. Subsidies and regs could be used, if needed, for back-up support; i.e. a multi-prong set of forces.
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Glenn Tamblyn at 11:29 AM on 24 November 2016Mitigation in Australia
Just an update to the article. Hazelwood wont maybe close in 2017, it will close. It is being shutdown at the end of March.
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scaddenp at 11:13 AM on 24 November 2016Mitigation in Australia
" From past experience in Australia, the carbon tax revenue mostly went into building bigger government and subsidizing low income families",
Ohh, the right-wing deadly sins! And compensating polluters for higher prices, did you mention that?? Terrible thing to try and help people affected by higher energy prices isnt it?
How exactly was government made bigger by the spend in carbox tax?
I prefer pigovian tax myself but seems to me that government was trying to achieve much the same outcome.
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Art Vandelay at 10:22 AM on 24 November 2016Mitigation in Australia
A tax on carbon is great, as long as the revenue generated is used to subsidize or develop clean energy. From past experience in Australia, the carbon tax revenue mostly went into building bigger government and subsidizing low income families, as well as tv and media advertising to tell the population how great the carbon tax was.
In a country like Australia with a relatively small population that generates about 1% of global emissions, mitigation measures make us all feel good but can't ever make a measureable impact on the climate at any level.
For that reason, I think it's best to transition sensibly to low carbon generation with a broad environmental focus and with the expectation that emerging technologies will make many of today's green energy solutions obsolete within 20 years.
To that end, a country like Australia might be best served investing in clean energy R&D and putting carbon tax dollars into clean energy projects in developing nations where they'll achieve maximum carbon abatement.
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nigelj at 09:56 AM on 24 November 2016Mitigation in Australia
More variable weather, and more storms etc will impact on companies, but whether they insure against this is their business just like fire insurance. They will do it when the risks start to hurt their bottom line.
Given climate change is longer term, compared to the risk of fire for example, this could take some time. However smart companies should be thinking about it, especially where they build factories in relation to sea level for example.
Externalities are different. Companies damaging the environment do indeed cost the public, and so this becomes everyones problem. Companies historically have a poor record of any initiative in resolution of the problem. The only thing that has changed behaviour is government legislation, from bodies like the EPA in the United States. Right now they are the only body doing much, although they often seem to stop short of forcing companies to pay costs. And it appears Trump is determined to undo the EPA if possible.
But who would know. Trump has talked in so many contradictions I give up making sense of it.
However a carbon tax is one method of forcing companies to pay the cost of their polluting relating to climate change. This is certainly economically sound.
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Wol at 08:20 AM on 24 November 2016Mitigation in Australia
william @2: I'm increasingly of the opinion that economic arguments are a bit of a red herring in the context of global warming.
If a denier will not accept the fact of the earth's energy budget then no arguments over the economics of fossil fuel and renewables is going to make headway.
On a statistical basis, insuring your house and contents makes no sense for an individual since he is far more likely to spend tens of thousands over the years on premiums than he is to get back in claims. It's the risk factor that is ignored in that argument, and the same one that's ignored in the warming "debate".
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Wol at 08:12 AM on 24 November 2016Mitigation in Australia
sauerj @1: I would take issue with you on P & C premiums and taxes as being externalities. They are part of an industry's budget and fully accounted for.
The real externalities, the "phantom" ones and actually far more significant in the present context, are those costs which are borne by individuals, consumers and the public sector in mitigation of the consequences of the industry - industrial blight, waste, emissions and so on. Those are the costs which the budgets ignore but which are increasingly apparent.
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scaddenp at 06:17 AM on 24 November 2016Groups working with Republicans on climate are discouraged, but see a glimmer of hope
Always an extremely complicated question. What doesnt go down in developing nations, is being told that you cant develop by using the same cheap fossil fuel resources as rich nations used to become what they are. Since rich nations are responsible for virtually all of the problems and the poor nations taking most of the consequences, then that is certainly a sticking point. There a need for rich to help poor develop sustainably - the trick is how to do that without just lining the pockets of corrupt officials.
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RedBaron at 06:07 AM on 24 November 2016Mitigation in Australia
Good article. However when you said, "This list is by no means complete" I wonder why you left off the largest of all, BCCS?
Dr. Christine Jones has one answer.
Of the estimated 3060 gigatonnes of
carbon in the terrestrial biosphere, 82 per
cent is in soils.2 That’s over four times the
amount of carbon stored in the world’s
vegetation. Dr Jones asks, ‘If only 18 per
cent is stored in vegetation, why all the
emphasis on biomass, rather than soil, as a
carbon sink?
‘The answer is that people – including
most of our top scientists – simply don’t
understand soil carbon sequestration or
the role of the microbial bridge and have
therefore overlooked it.Some more information:
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william5331 at 05:03 AM on 24 November 2016Mitigation in Australia
The one break through that we need to make all forms of renewable energy completely practical is energy storage. When we crack that one, the last argument against renewables will crumble and then we will only have vested interests to fight against. They will be defeated by simple economics. Their energy will be more expensive than renewable energy.
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sauerj at 02:17 AM on 24 November 2016Mitigation in Australia
What is missing from today's business economic planning (private or public) is the correct operating cost. Because businesses use an incorrect operating cost (that does not include future CC external costs), when they evaluate project options based on fully distributed cost accounting, they are therefore not picking the most profitable option. If they would use the correct operating cost, then the mitigation efforts listed here would be the most profitable and the economic motivation would be 'naturally' in place to push their implementation.
Businesses mistakenly think that these future external costs are some sort of phantom cost or else costs that they will be able to escape (forever) & let that some other entity shoulder them. What they don't realize is that, no, these costs are not an academic exercise, some phantom number on paper that they, in the real world, won't ever come to ever bear. Wrong! These costs will become real costs, that will show up as real debits, increasingly so, on their balance sheets.
These costs will show up as 1) increased P&C insurance premiums (Property & Casualty damage), and 2) taxes (as military costs rise in order to maintain geo-political stability). For the first one, P&C premium costs are essentially 1:1 equal to the climate impact costs (floods, droughts, storms). To be clear on this statement, the CC impact costs that economists forecast, will show up to the global businesses (1:1) equal to all the P&C insurance costs that are incrementally more than a baseline, after scaling-up for %GDP rise.
One way to make these true operatings costs as immediately transparent & direct as possible (sooner than later) is to implement a carbon tax (inserted at the source). A revenue-neutral carbon tax, where the revenue is equitably re-distributed, is the least burdensome approach economically (link).
All of these mitigation efforts (listed in this article) would fall into place (economically) if businesses (private & public) used the correct operating costs (either voluntarily, unlikely to happen, or involuntarily, carbon tax). Then businesses (& consumers) would do the right (sustainble) thing, because the right thing would be the most profitable thing. The sooner we re-calibrate our thinking to think how business thinks (private & public), i.e. in terms of most profit (& based on correct operating cost, all of it), then the easier it is to talk with them on a common platform and get the business world to see & accept the right, ethical mitigation efforts.
There are solutions that we haven't even dreamt of. If positive-sustainable economics were in place, then investors would be coming out of the wall for R&D to uncover, more & more, better & better solutions; again, all because these R&D efforts would be highly profitable. Again, this is the "talk" , the "language" that moves business (profit), but make sure they understand that they need to use the correct operating cost. They will get it. They will intellectually understand & relate to this, and will also understand that the real costs (not phantom ones) will come to bear sooner or later, and that it is prudently profitable sooner than later to "make the books right".
Therefore, the top thing on the list should be a carbon tax, and then all of this (& more) will start to domino into place. Other approaches may help (subsidies, regulations, etc) & can be included if needed for backup support, but the carbon tax is the most effective means to move us off of status quo & toward the best sustainble solution efforts.
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MA Rodger at 19:23 PM on 23 November 20162016 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #47
Tom Curtis @3,
You may not recall plato525's previous visit to SkS a three months back in which the "video experiment with the black color solution that was added to water in a glass container to show the amount of CO2" was sought. It appears plato525 found the demonstration unconvincing.
And as plato525 is not what you'd call chatty, establishing why he remains unconvinced, or indeed the reasons for his apparent doubt on there being rising global temperatures @1 or his branding AGW as "hoax" @2; all this may remain unresolved.
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Tom Curtis at 16:40 PM on 23 November 20162016 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #47
plato525 @1 and @2 shows all the commitment to clear reasoning we have come to expect from AGW deniers /sarc.
With regard to his post @2, taking a different angle - Iron represents 670 ppmv of the human body. By plato525's implicity reasoning, changes in its proportion in the human body can make no difference. Much of that iron, however, is found in various globulins, of which the best known is haemoglobin. Without iron, there is no haemoglobin, and hence no transport of oxygen from the lungs to the muscles. Without iron in the body, that is, we would suffocate in seconds.
Of course, with too much iron (50 ppm by mass) in your dietary intake will result in severe iron poisoning. If sustained, it will you will suffer acute pain as you vomit blood more or less continuously untill you eventually die of kidney failure.
This is just one more example among thousands in which plato525's "reasoning" simply fails. In fact, the counterexamples to his claim are so numerous, and so well known that his claim is not entitled to the claim of reasoning. It is, most likely, empty rhetoric; and quite possibly a belief siezed on desperately to avoid thinking clearing on the topic.
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plato525 at 15:11 PM on 23 November 20162016 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #47
Every 2500 molecules in the air has only one CO2 molecule.
And you think it will make a change. Hoax.
Moderator Response:[JH] Sloganeering snipped.
[PS] This discussion belongs on "CO2 is just a trace gas" myth. I wonder if Plato would enter a room with only 1 in 2500 molecules being HCN?
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plato525 at 14:56 PM on 23 November 20162016 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #47
If there is global warming then CO2 is not the cause.
Go and look elsewhere.
Moderator Response:[JH] This comment is pure, unadulterated sloganeering which is prohibited by the SkS Comments Policy.
Please note that posting comments here at SkS is a privilege, not a right. This privilege can be rescinded if the posting individual treats adherence to the Comments Policy as optional, rather than the mandatory condition of participating in this online forum.
Please take the time to review the policy and ensure future comments are in full compliance with it. Thanks for your understanding and compliance in this matter.
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Haze at 14:45 PM on 23 November 2016Groups working with Republicans on climate are discouraged, but see a glimmer of hope
This report from Reuters"My only worry is the money," said Tosi Mpanu Mpanu of Democratic Republic of Congo, who heads a group of the 48 least developed nations. "It’s worrying when you know that Trump is a climate change skeptic," (in.reuters.com/article/us-usa-election-climatechange-nations-idINKBN1370BD). At first glance this doesn't come across at all well. Is the cooperation of developing nations entirely dependent upon cash from the developed nations? Will climate change sceptics seize on this and use it to claim it is money not reduction of carbon dioxide emissions that is the force driving action against change?
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