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BBHY at 19:08 PM on 9 July 2016Aerosol emissions key to the surface warming ‘slowdown’, study says
"In its latest report, the IPCC calculated (pdf) that global surface temperatures between 1998 and 2012..."
You lost me right there. Using 1998 as a starting point is the ulrimate in cherry picking. Did they get the same result using 1997 or 1999 as the starting poiint? No? Then the whole thing is completely useless, IMHO.
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scaddenp at 18:40 PM on 9 July 2016Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
mr_alanng - I think it would by a lot simpler to just get off using fossil fuels rather than trying to sequester CO2. Also, while methane is an issue, it is less than 30% of total forcing from CO2 because the emissions are far smaller.
" Some researchs said that cow milk is not for human."
I dont think any food is "for human" except breast milk but evolution has equipped us to use it. The gene for lactase persistance is highly selected for since the paleolithic particularly in european populations. Ie once you had settled agricultural, humans with lactase persistance survived and bred better than those without.
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ubrew12 at 05:43 AM on 9 July 2016Climate scientists are under attack from frivolous lawsuits
Mother: "What did you learn in school today, Exxon?" "Today we learned all about the First Amendment!" "And what about the First Amendment did you learn?" "We learned that exercising our Free Speech means paying others to sift through decades of emails of Climate Scientists, cherry-picking discriminating information, and releasing it to a soundbite-conditioned public to take out of context, thereby clouding that Science by ruining the public reputations of its practitioners, and warning young Scientists to pick another subject ... or else!"
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Rolf Jander at 02:42 AM on 9 July 2016Aerosol emissions key to the surface warming ‘slowdown’, study says
So during the period between 1940 and 1970, poloution was enough to temporarily cancell out the warming effect of our co2 output. If this research is acurate. now even the massive poloution put out by China and the fires in Indonesia could only slow it down.
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mr_alanng at 18:58 PM on 8 July 2016Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
Everyone on the world needs to glow at least 10 tree in his/her life. Assume only half of population can grow the trees for some reasons. The current population is 7.4 billions. Then we have 3.7 billions of people grow the trees, eventually, we have more 37 billions of tree. Each big trees can absorb 1 ton of carbon dioxide a year. Each year, 370 billions of carbon dioxide will be absorbed by trees. And we have schedule to control the tree, say to cut away the old trees, to collect the wood (solid carbon oxide) as recycle, reusable materials. The next thing we need to do is to get rid the dairy farm. As we know, the green effect of the methane is 12 times of CO2. A dairy cow can produce 110kg CH4 a year. Some researchs said that cow milk is not for human. Some countries not rely on the cow milk. I think these two method can improve the green house effect.
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Tom Curtis at 06:20 AM on 8 July 2016It's methane
MA Rodger @26, thankyou for the correction.
Redoing the calculation using CH4 concentrations expressed in part per billion (ppb) rather than ppm, ie, the typical unit used to express CH4 concentrations, I obtain a forcing of 0.576 W/m^2, with the remainder of the difference being due to my leaving of the NO2 correction. Clearly the units used is critical in this equation.
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Dipper at 02:29 AM on 8 July 2016It's methane
Sincere thanks to HK, Tom Curtis and MA Rodger for responding so quickly and thoroughly. Lots of stuff for me to go and read up on. My simple calculations clearly not what is needed. Much appreciated!
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MA Rodger at 00:36 AM on 8 July 2016It's methane
Tom Curtis @25,
That CH4 forcing cannot be right.
Rather than test my own arthmetical skills, there is a year-by-year table 1979-to-date for the various GHG forcings is given by ESRL on that very page you link to. For 2015, CO2=1.939 Wm^-2 & CH4=0.504 Wm^-2.
Mind, the global temperature increase since pre-industrial times (I assume this is Dipper's "excess heating we experience this year") results from the whole bucket of GHGs. If the analysis includes them all, CO2 & CH4 are only 82%. And if we are to consider that forcings of past emissions continue to operate, different GHGs have quite different concentrations histories.
So, Dipper @23.
How sophisticated do you want to get?
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Tom Curtis at 23:43 PM on 7 July 2016It's methane
Dipper @23, the Global Warming Potential is defined by the IPCC as follows:
"Global Warming Potential (GWP) An index, based on radiative
properties of greenhouse gases, measuring the radiative forcing following
a pulse emission of a unit mass of a given greenhouse gas in the presentday
atmosphere integrated over a chosen time horizon, relative to that of
carbon dioxide. The GWP represents the combined effect of the differing
times these gases remain in the atmosphere and their relative effectiveness
in causing radiative forcing. The Kyoto Protocol is based on GWPs
from pulse emissions over a 100-year time frame."You will notice that, first, the GWP is a function of mass, not volume (as pointed out by HK @24); and, second, that it is a function of emitted mass, not atmospheric concentration.
If you want to calculate the relative effect from atmospheric concentrations, you just use the formula for radiative forcing.
Thus, for CO2, the formula is 5.35 x ln(C/Co), which for the values you give is 1.82 W/m^2.
For Methane, the formula is ΔF = 0.036(M½ - Mo½) - [f(M,No) - f(Mo,No)]
where f(M,N) = 0.47ln[1 + 2.01x10-5 (MN)0.75 + 5.31x10-15M(MN)1.52] and M stands for a Methane concentration, and N stands for a Nitrogen Oxide concentration.
Ignoring the Nitrous Oxide adjustment, and using your figures, this yields Methane forcing of 0.02 W/m^2, or 1/91st of the forcing due to CO2. There is a further, small adjustment due to the relative effectiveness of different forcings but it does not bridge the gulf in the relative impacts between the two. The result is that, per unit concentration, methane is approximately 12% more effective at warming than CO2 at near current cocentrations, but the significantly larger increase in CO2 concentration means that CO2 is the primary warmer.
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HK at 22:53 PM on 7 July 2016It's methane
@23 Dipper:
Your math seems to be correct!I think the problem is that the warming potential for CO2 vs. methane compares units of mass while your calculation compares units of volume.
CO2 is 2.75 times heavier per molecule (or ppm) than methane, so the numbers for methane have to be divided by that if you are comparing the climate impact from each on a ppm basis.Doing that, you get these results for methane vs. CO2:
100 years: 28 / 2.75= 10.2
20 years: 84 / 2.75 = 30.5
Instantly: 110 / 2.75 = 40And from pre-industrial to 2011:
CO2: 113
Methane: 121 / 2.75 = 44This figure shows the annual growth of forcings from the well-mixed greenhouse gases after 1950. Since the late 1990s the contribution from non-CO2 has only been about 20-25 %, but that fraction was up to 50 % until the early 1990s. Note that the methane forcing nearly stabilized in the early 2000s, but has started to increase again.
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Dipper at 20:06 PM on 7 July 2016It's methane
I've done some calculations and got to the following point and would like someone please to tell me where I've gone wrong.
My question is "what are the relative contributions of greenhouse gases to the excess heating we experience this year?"
Firstly, for excess we need to take the difference from pre-industrial levels, so CO2 is (2011 levels) 391 - 278 = 113 ppm and for methane is 1.803 - 0.7 = 1.103 ppm.
Second is the rel warmoing potential which for CO2 is 1 and for methane over a 100 year period is 28. But that 28 is because methane progressively breaks down in to CO2 so for the last 50 years or so most of the methane has disappeared. To calculate the warming potential of methane right now I took the 100 year number, the 20 year number of 84, took logs and extrapolated back to 0 to get a native number of 110.
so
contribution from CO2 = 113 x 1 = 113
contribution from CH4 = 1.103 x 110 = 121
Hence the extra warming generated this year comes slightly more from methane than from CO2.
I've tried to work out what is wrong with this but have failed. Can anyone help?
thanks
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José M. Sousa at 02:59 AM on 7 July 2016The inter-generational theft of Brexit and climate change
As I said above, the EU is not that better - if at all - than UK concerning climate change:
Commission and Big Energy keep cooking the climate, despite Paris Agreement
Moderator Response:[PS] Fixed link.
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denisaf at 21:44 PM on 6 July 2016The inter-generational theft of Brexit and climate change
Climate change is an irreversible natural process brought on by the emisssion of greenhouse gases by technical systems. It is the unintended conseqence of lack of understanding of natural processes b those making the decisions. Most people do not understand that fundamental physical reality. This discussion only deals with how peole have responded to two issues that are only related in the views of people. it leads to misunderstanding about what should be done to cope with the irreversible climate change. The most that can be done is to reduce the rate of greenhouse gas emissions as rapidly as is physically possible. That requires the powerful in society acquiring understanding they have yet to exhibit.
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bozzza at 18:27 PM on 6 July 2016After 6 years of working on climate at Harvard, I implore it to show the courage to divest
We all have the power to implore...
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chriskoz at 16:36 PM on 6 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
Tom@13,
Your video without comment does not adhere to the comment policy (no link only posts) although it's self explanatory, with almost 100% of it very much on topic here.
It's worth noticing that in it, John Oliver provides extensive critique of a distorted image of science not just by media but also by politicians. Remarkable is John's assertion at 8:00-8:20:
No shit ... This is science and not the US senate.
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chriskoz at 16:22 PM on 6 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
"If you care about attacks on climate science and the rise of authoritarianism [you should read that book]"
This, parallel to the war on science issue, is only mentioned but disapointingly, not explained by John in this article. What is it about? Perhaps related to the "Trump phenomenon" as we discussed in another thread? Anyone knows more about the book to reveal its take on "authoritarianism"?
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scaddenp at 09:24 AM on 6 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
I also very much like that video!
"Post modernism is possibly an outgrowth of extreme liberalism". Or is liberalism in your sense of the word an outgrowth of post-modernism? Post-modernism is a many-faceted cultural phenomenum with extremely complex origins and development. Distinquishing cause from effect is difficult and probably not productive.
However, it is the cultural reality we find ourselves in, and one in which we still have to find a way to make scientific communication effective. The Oliver video shows how broken some of that is but also I think accurately identifies the cause - most of us are lazy media browsers and we get the media we deserve.
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nigelj at 09:00 AM on 6 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
Scaddenp @ 12
I can definitely go along with all that. I broadly trust the science community, and it mystifies me how people become so distrustful. I'm not naive. I realise science is a work in progress and sometimes gets it wrong, but its vastly preferable to anything else, and far more rigorous.
I even sometimes get annoyed when science does not give results I was expecting, or threatens my own belief system, but I tend to mainly adjust my belief system, I dont end up with a deep misstrust of scientists.
Post modernism is possibly an outgrowth of extreme liberalism that seeks to legitimise individualism and tolerance of widely divergent viewpoints. Maybe it has gone too far at times.
Looking at the video in the Tom Curtis link, the media have often drawn the wrong conclusions about research and over simplified things or exaggerated things, presumably to grab peoples attention. This is very unfortunate and irresponsible. Real scientific conclusions are often nuanced, and that is what the media should be honest about. They can still portray science in a colourful way, without so blatantly distorting the findings. The mass media have confused issues, and thus hurt the reputation of science. The video was spot on and very amusing.
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Tom Curtis at 13:20 PM on 5 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
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scaddenp at 11:46 AM on 5 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
I dont think it is a case of "hate science". For the myriad of reasons you mention, they perceive that science gets the "wrong answer", therefore they mistrust science and/or scientists. When there is a perception that acceptance of science results is undermining their values, then the antagonism goes deeper than mistrust. Time to shoot the messenger by defunding or whatever. I would say some of this is definitely a deep misunderstanding of science and scientists work (some classic examples of projection out there in denierland), but it is also a fact of post-modernism where there is no one way to apprehend to truth. Whatever route someone used to get the "right answer" is seen as just as valid as science. Like it or not, post-modernism permeates our cultural understanding.
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nigelj at 11:30 AM on 5 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
Scaddenp @10
You seem to be saying some people just hate science, all science. Maybe you are right, but there has to be a reason.
It could be because of specific ideological reasons like religion (Im not suggesting here all religious people hate science), or that they have massive vested interests in something like fossil fuels that takes over their entire attitude to science.
It could be related to conservative beliefs. There is some polling / research that suggests conservatives are not hugely comfortable with science. This suggests a deep cause.
Or is it because some people just aren't very good at science? So they are just dismissive of science, unless it happens to generate something they like.
Personally I think there are probably millions of different reasons for the war on science, reflecting the millions of individuals who are so engaged in this war. I doubt there is one root cause.
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Mike Hillis at 11:21 AM on 5 July 2016Venus doesn't have a runaway greenhouse effect
Glenn @202
From your charts there is still plenty of water vapor above Mauna Kea, which doesn't surprise me because of the tropical latitude. Thedon't resemble the polar charts much in the water vapor Q-band (15-23 um), but they also don't resemble sea level tropical transmittiance charts. From Mauna Kea the Q band transmittance stays around 50% up to 28 um.
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scaddenp at 07:54 AM on 5 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
OPOF - what you are describing fits my definition of War on Science. You say "They love science that will benefit them" - but they dont. They love the results. It could be created by witchcraft or religious incantations for all they care. That is very different from an attitude to the discipline itself.
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APT at 06:00 AM on 5 July 2016The inter-generational theft of Brexit and climate change
Leave voters can put forward all the excuses they want, but whatever their age and whatever their reasons (and even the best arguments I've seen for leaving the EU suggest a tendency towards isolationism rather than working together to solve problems), they voted for a campaign based on anti-intellectualism, and on racist and xenophobic lies. This is the important point, and it's inexcusable in my view. It has done untold damage whether the UK leaves the EU or not.
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braintic at 23:29 PM on 4 July 2016It hasn't warmed since 1998
There has certainly not been a pause in US temperatures.
Considering 1995-99 as the base (zero) period:
The period 2000 to 2009 was 0.16 degrees C above zero.
The period 2010 to May 2015 is 0.33 degrees C above zero.
See this video showing how the changes from the 1990s to the 2000s were distributed across the US:
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BBHY at 21:10 PM on 4 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
What bothers me the most is that they try to paint science as the same thing as religion and a large number of people, and most of the media, never question that.
Science is basically the opposite of religion. Religion is based on faith, and requires no objective evidence. Science eschews faith and is based enitrely on objective evidence.
The fact that this is not obvious to most people is a huge failure of our educational system. Kids from grade 5 or 6 on should fully understand this difference, let alone adults.
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Paul D at 16:39 PM on 4 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
The issue is whether a science subject is profitable or not.
Genetic Modification is seen as profitable and it is all about control of the environment, hence it gets the thumbs up. Climate change is seen as disruptive and largely as costly to us all, so it gets the thumbs down.
Remember that ideology drives what science is acceptable. Why would a political ideologist and activist accept a science that would mean they would have to change their ideology or activity? -
One Planet Only Forever at 14:26 PM on 4 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
scaddenp@6
Many people may be responding in the way you describe but they are motivated into that way of thinking by influential messages from people who abuse their understanding of how to influence such easily impressed people to get what they want (the pros change their messaging based on data evaluation of the response they get - science of marketing).
And the people who respond to such appeals are a symptom of the real problem. The real problem is the people who deliberately abuse better understanding to gain unjustifiable personal advantage rather than trying to advance humanity to a better future. They love science that will benefit them.
Political Science and Business Science (particularly marketing) that promote the understandably damaging economic status-quo are conspicuously free from having a war on science waged against them.
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nigelj at 11:36 AM on 4 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
OPOF @ 4.
Agree with your reasons why science is being attacked, but it has unfortunately spilled over into a more general attack.
The war on science is mostly coming from people with vested interests. They have some financial interest (and as you say may partly know this is not an entirely ethical interest) and the science threatens their interests. The science may also threaten their world view, or prejudices, etc. As a result they may extend their response to a sweeping attack on all science, to strengthen their case.
The attack is indeed on the idea that "you use data to change your mind" but the attack is only happening because of pre existing vested interests. It is not an attack on scientific method just for the sake of it.
Science has challenged ideas about creationism, and homosexuality (by suggesting its largely genetic), and has suggested we are degrading the environment. That challenges a lot of vested interersts or cherished beliefs.
Science, or "evidence based thinking" also challenges dubious politics, or foreign affairs exploits, and whether very liberal gun ownership is a good thing. In fact evidence based thinking challenges both sides of the gun debate!
With so many things recently science in general has thus come under attack.
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scaddenp at 10:10 AM on 4 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
OPF - I am inclined to disagree. The fight is actually against the very idea of science - that you use data to change your mind. Obviously no one objects to data that doesnt conflicts with wishes/ideology/values. However, we are increasing seeing an attacks on science when there is a conflict, especially when it generates value conflicts since scientists themselves have values too. There is no acceptence of hypothesis evaluation by data in these and so in fact a rejection of scientific method.
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One Planet Only Forever at 09:06 AM on 4 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
It is important to clarify that the fighting is not against any and all Science.
Science can be described as the development of better understanding of what is going on through observation and experimentation (and as such must exclude Spirituality which is a relevant area of thought that cannot be observed or experimented upon).
What is going on is some people are fighting against raised public awareness and understanding of certain types or areas of developing better understanding.
The fight against certain areas of better understanding is done by people who get away with becoming wealthy or powerful through actions they come to understand, or always knew, are not justifiable sustainable improvements of global humanity. They then need to fight against the deserved end of their developed method of acquiring wealth and power.
However, to be fair, many of those people love to abuse a development of specific better understanding that would allow them to temporarily personally gather more wealth and power such as a new drug that can make lots of money before its negative consequences are understood.
So it is not fair to say they are fighting against all science. In fact, the science of marketing and the ability to create popular support through careful marketing message creation and delivery is a favorite of those people.
So it is no a "War on Science". It is a fight by people who have developed undeserved perceptions of prosperity, wealth and power against any increased awareness and understanding that is contrary to their interests.
A good example of this distinction is the recent Conservative government of Canada. They did not dislike all science. They redirected government funding to areas of research and reporting (message development and dissemination) that they believed would be beneficial for the interests of the likes of them. They also deliberately reduced funding for areas of research that could be contrary to their interests or tried to carefully control the reporting of the results of such research (refer to "The War on Science: Muzzled Scientists and Wilful Blindness in Stephen Harper’s Canada" by Chris Turner).
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scot at 03:58 AM on 4 July 2016Development banks threaten to unleash an infrastructure tsunami on the environment
'... as natur bats last!'
In fact, 'Nature' has done very well since nearly 4 billion years, as it has not just survived, but thrived despite extremely hazardous conditions. It will be just fine without our protection.
More important is how we will do in the long run with the changes to the environment that are happening as natural consequences of the changes we make to the environment.Plenty food and drink is available in the supermarket, fresh air comes through the window, clean water comes out of the faucet, electricity out of the wall, and for all other things we simply go to strip mall. How may this change as a natural consequence of how we treat our natural environment?
Looks like we are all in for finding out the hard way. Though, it seems that quite a few who are smarter than that and can, already are heading and securing for themselves the high ground instead of at least tying to help fighting the fire, while lucky others still remain in deep sleep. -
chriskoz at 19:55 PM on 3 July 2016The inter-generational theft of Brexit and climate change
Haze@36,
"Britons never never never shall be slaves" resonate with many Britons even of today, particularly the elderly.
While this and all your analysis may be reasonable, it's also accurate to say that the world has moved on long way since those centuries ago when britain was an imperium and rest of the world their "slaves". In today's highly globalised economy, national diversity domestically, and big global companies internationally, play more and more important role. National snobism as you describe, will be not just jingoistic annoyance but simply a thing of the past on few years. Just as slavery became thing of the past over a century ago.
If some brits voted leave because they support this anachronic attitude (likely other factors e.g. disappointment with current govs were more at play IMO), they already came to realise their mistake, hence we've got Bregret now.
I have few brit friends here in Australia. All of them, expats like you, but do not share your view. They are actually shocked by the silly outcome of that referendum and saying that britain stepped into a big mess that they despise. They supported and voted Bremain. And these are people aged 40-50+, therefore not "young" as defined by Brexit demographics, but their view closely resembling their "young" domestic counterparts. Admitedly, my friends are not a representative population sample but still a good sample of brit expats in OZ.
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braintic at 02:44 AM on 3 July 20161934 - hottest year on record
This video shows how temperatures of the 2010s compare to those of the 1930s in the US. The hot area of the 1930s is clearly limited to a small band, with most of the US being warmer now. It also applies mainly to daily maximum temperatures, with daily minimums being higher now in the vast majority of the US:
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ubrew12 at 02:12 AM on 3 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
Article: "Over the... next forty years... science is poised to create more knowledge than... in all of recorded history... democracy is facing an existential challenge" Indeed, if, as seems possible, China heads up many of these scientific advances and leads in Climate remediation, she could triumphantly claim 'who needs Democracy?', and others around the World might listen.
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John Hartz at 23:56 PM on 2 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
Recommended supplemental reading:
The GOP’s Denial of Science Primed Them for the Illogic of Trump by Phil Plait, Bad Astronomy, Slate, June 30, 2016
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Haze at 21:55 PM on 2 July 2016The inter-generational theft of Brexit and climate change
Tom Curtis@ 3. Your last para suggestrs you do not understand the English who in large part are responsible for the reuslt of the referendum, a result that I personally deplore. Unlike the citizens of the US, Australia, New Zealand and (probably) Canada, Ehnglish citizens live in a society with traditions going back to at least 1066, some 950 years. This is greater than the sum total of the history of the US, Australia, New ZeaLnd and (probably) Canada. The current way of life in these countries is largely due to the Brtish. You also don't understand that the English are conscious that they are the descendants of men and women who forged the largest and one of the greatest empires the world has ever seen, A country that essentially made the modern world. Think of the rule of law, habeas corpus, liberalism, civil rights and that has a very proud military history (at least till the end of the second world war). Although deplorably jingoistic, the words in Rule Britannia "Britons never never never shall be slaves" resonate with many Britons even of today, particularly the elderly. Many Britons consider the EU taken away the right of Britons to govern themselves and in so doing has trespassed on the independence so dear to many Britons. And as for the comaliants of the young, if they cannot be bothered to vote and 64% couldn't, it is entirely their own fault that the outcome of the referendum is not as they would like. I doubyt many Australians would be impressed by a Britobn pontificating on Australia and similarly I doubt any Briton wrelishes an Australian pontificating on the UK
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nigelj at 09:04 AM on 2 July 2016The War on Science will change how you see the world
I will be buying a copy of this book. I agree with your comments about post modern ideas about alternative sources of "truth" and how bizarre this is, and the resulting fake balance issues in the media especially on climate change.
Another issue is science expertise in the mass media, or the lack of this in some cases. By mass media I mean traditional newspapers and television, not websites like this. In the past the mass media, such as newspapers seemed to have science editors and quite decent science articles. I have noticed this has fallen away recently, and wonder if competition between the internet and traditional media has eroded traditional media, and people employed with some science expertise have been the first casualties of job cuts.
Of course there are excellent science based websites like this one, however most people don’t have huge time to read and get their overall impression from news articles on television or in the newspaper. I'm not sure what the answer is, other than to implore all media outlets to have some qualified science writers of repute, and having respect for mainstream science positions. It would also be great if the mass media was better aware of specialist websites like this, and referenced them more often.
Another issue is we may be a victim of our own success. Science has delivered a prosperity some people take for granted, and now feel free to indulge in their anti science conspiracy theories when it suits. They are in effect biting the hand that feeds.
Certain people also seem able to achieve the mental feat of believing in both science and creationism, and I just don’t know how they do this.
Of course we also have this attack on science from various ideologically driven groups. Ideology is about belief, and science is about evidence, and they make for uncomfortable bed fellows.
The attacks on science from groups with vested interests, or religious or political ideologies is quite vicious.
Conservative think tanks are not always friendly towards science, although doubtless some liberal ones may not be either. However the more interesting thing is what drives this. Make no mistake these bodies wield a pervasive power beyond their apparent size. Maybe the drive in recent decades towards belief in "free markets" and the private sector has created the environment that generates powerful and well funded behind the scenes lobby groups and policy foundations that become in turn quite driven by their own need to exist and prosper, the same criticism that has been made of government bureaucracies!
However the bottom line is these attacks on science are rarely soundly based, and are driven by vested interests, ignorance and fear in many cases.
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Glenn Tamblyn at 22:01 PM on 1 July 2016After 6 years of working on climate at Harvard, I implore it to show the courage to divest
Divestment isn't a powerful tool, but for those organisations there may be few other tools. But it shouldn't be underestimated either.
On the basis of 'pure fundamentals' divestment counts for little - someone else will buy them. But markets are seldom 'pure fundamentals'. Because many markets are not about the economics of the businesses traded in the market. They are about the sentiments of the people doing the trading.
And divestment acts strongly here. 'This stock is being sold because of sentiment' translates into 'Oh my God, sentiment is shifting... time to get out before I get burned by the impacts of other peoples sentiments'.
Markets aren't rational, they are emotional. And symbolism exists to manipulate emotion. -
scaddenp at 20:27 PM on 1 July 2016After 6 years of working on climate at Harvard, I implore it to show the courage to divest
But oil companies aren't offering shares. Buying existing shares puts no money into fossil fuel extraction. It shows your institution can recognize that the companies will making a profit. If enough people divested to undervalue those shares, then you just make management buyout profitable. In some industries, divestment would be powerful but I am blowed to see what it achieves in oil.
To my mind it is just a feel good option, and bad news if people do this instead of something effective.
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ColabMaster at 16:57 PM on 1 July 2016After 6 years of working on climate at Harvard, I implore it to show the courage to divest
Divestment is critical, the alternative is investment. If you or your organisation is a shareholder in a specific business or industry for which you produce research, then this can be considered a "conflict of interest". If Harvard produces scientific research on Climate Change, and Climate Change is clearly caused by the Oil and Coal industry, then having investments in such an industry could make Harvard hold back, over simplify and more. Divestment says "I refuse to opperate with a conflict of interest", or "Not in our name". Divestment proves you are reading your own publications Harvard, it proves your own papers have merit otherwise you apear to be a joke.
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Ger at 14:17 PM on 1 July 2016After 6 years of working on climate at Harvard, I implore it to show the courage to divest
If you do not want to divest as a university, but make a change, advise/force to change to other renewable, sustainable feedstock. Bio-crudes from fast pyrolisis for example. Sureley a university has the intelligence and research capabilities to provide knowledge on technology and supply chain issues for retrieving the feedstock.
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Pointfisha at 13:29 PM on 1 July 2016Breathing contributes to CO2 buildup
It's a bit of rhetorical sleight of hand to appeal to the carbon cycle in order to claim that human breath is neutral, since the factor that should be taken into account is that human consumption negates the collection of carbon performed by those plants that are used for food, in addition to deforestation for conversion into agriculture. The impact of human consumption and breathing is that the sink that would naturally be functioning ceases to operate when human consumers are eating it. That biomass (now negated through its function as food) is precisely the kind of sink that stripped atmospheric carbon long ago and created the fossil fuel deposits, which are currently being liberated through human activity back into the atmosphere.
Moderator Response:[PS] Changes/carbon loss from vegetation change is accounted for under "Land Use Change".
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chriskoz at 12:47 PM on 1 July 2016Discovery exposes fragility of Antarctica’s Larsen C ice shelf
To put the Hubbard's numbers into perspective, one must know the thickness of the iceshlf itself. A number which is very obvious to Hubbard himself having lived there for years, but not obvious to outsiders.
Wikipedia lists iceshlf thickness around the world as varying from 100m to 1000m https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_shelf
Surviving Larsen shelves appear to be around 220m (parhaps 200m to 300m) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Larsen_Ice_Shelf.
So "a 100m-thick river of ice" appears to be up to scale on the last figure, occupying roughly upper half of Larsen C shelf.
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scaddenp at 11:58 AM on 1 July 2016After 6 years of working on climate at Harvard, I implore it to show the courage to divest
Well I am with William on this one. Divestment might be worthwhile in coal but in oil? Any big oil company really needing to go to market or banks to raise capital? Since oil still pays nice dividends, then if market undervalues, management buys and does very nicely. If you want to hurt oil companies (and do the climate a favour into the bargain), then get off the plane and out of the auto.
If demand dries, then disinvestment makes good investor sense as well, but until then...
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Dave2042 at 10:13 AM on 1 July 2016After 6 years of working on climate at Harvard, I implore it to show the courage to divest
William. You are missing two points.
First, companies frequently raise additional capital, for example to expand their business. They do this either by issuing new shares (this is largely the reason you bother to list on an exchange), or issuing debt. The price of new debt or equity is significantly affected by the current share price. In the case of raising equity, it is almost entirely set by the share price; in the case of debt it is more complex, but the share price, which signals the overall value of the business is still a very fundamental driver. So a falling share price can completely undermine this process.
Secondly, senior executives typically get much or even most of their remuneration either in shares, or in a form linked to the share price. A falling share price is a disaster for them, and so share price is a huge driver of their behaviour.
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Tom Curtis at 10:04 AM on 1 July 2016The inter-generational theft of Brexit and climate change
william @33, I would have thought that the older generation, having lived through the periods of dominance of Pol Pot, Francisco Franco, Fidel Castro, General Suharto, Mao Zedong, Augusto Pinochet etc, would know very well that the EU is not a dictatorship. They should probably recognize that government by a commission appointed by an indirectly group of indirectly elected officials, and subject to the veto of a directly elected parliament is arguably more democratic than the US (where the President is indirectly elected, and appoints his "cabinet" without possibility of veto by Congress). It is not greatly different from the process in Brittain itself where the Prime Minister is indirectly elected from among the membership of a directly elected body, and where his cabinet need not be elected officials themselves (they may be members of the House of Lords), but can be vetoed by a directly elected body. The EU, like the US, and Britain and Australia is imperfectly democratic, but democratic none-the-less.
I would also have hoped the older generation would have had the sense to realize that the concerns afflicting them are shared by US citizens, Australians, New Zealanders and (probably) Candadians and therefore that the problem does not lie in EU membership.
I guess they are about to learn that the hard way.
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scaddenp at 08:31 AM on 1 July 2016The inter-generational theft of Brexit and climate change
That simply sounds like rhetoric to me. Which acts by an unelected officials in the EU do you blame for the current situation?
I might also ask did they destroy unionism? Did they lower the taxes? However, I am more interested in what you perceive to be the answer to first question.
"They want out of the dictatorship by a few non elected commissioners which is the EU and which America finds much more easy to control and influence than 28 individual democracies." That sounds like conspiracy theorist territory. What is the evidence that convinces you of this?
If Brexit results in real improvement for lower classes in Britain, then I will delighted - and extremely surprized. Worst protest vote ever in UK is my guess.
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william5331 at 08:13 AM on 1 July 2016The inter-generational theft of Brexit and climate change
I reject this constant theme that the greedy older generation voted for Brexit while the virtuous younger generation wanted to stay. The older amongst us have experienced the decline of democracy and the rise of neoliberalism (read Laisse Faire) and globilization in which massive international corporation, primarily out of America can do what they want and devil take the rest of us. They want out of the dictatorship by a few non elected commissioners which is the EU and which America finds much more easy to control and influence than 28 individual democracies. The young are seduced by the baubles that come from being in the EU and don't have the experience or vision to realize what is happening in the world and its likely consequensis. We have only had some reasonable senblance of democracy in the western world since the new deal by FDR. Before that there was a knock down drag out fight to achieve some semblance of justice for all. We are now on the way down agian and the Brexit vote, as much as anything, was a vote against this slide back into a neofeudalism.
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william5331 at 07:57 AM on 1 July 2016After 6 years of working on climate at Harvard, I implore it to show the courage to divest
I;m no economist as will be immediately apparent but I fail to see how divestment helps. Surly you divest by selling your shares to someone else. If you are a big share holder, this may push the price of your shares down and someone else, potentially gets a bargain. If you decide simply to burn your shares, then the rest of the shares outstanding go up in value. Money only goes to the company when they issue their shares. After that, they are bought and sold by third parties (and can be bought back by the company in some cases) so how does this effect the coal companies.
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