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All IPCC definitions taken from Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. Working Group I Contribution to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Annex I, Glossary, pp. 941-954. Cambridge University Press.

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Search for 2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup

Comments matching the search 2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup:

CO2 limits will harm the economy

One Planet Only Forever at 10:05 AM on 2 April, 2023

retiredguy @112,

As Bob Loblaw has pointed out, serious pursuers of better understanding may not have bothered to do 'yet another' detailed debunking of Lomborg's nonsense. I read some of his earlier books and was able to easily identify many misleading claims he made. He has a history of changing his claims, but not his motivation to be misleading regarding the climate impact problem and its solutions.

Based on the title of the 2020 Lomborg item, I am almost certain that this version of his misleading story-telling efforts can be effectively corrected by reading helpful detailed documents like the UNDP's Human Development Reports. I particularly recommend the 2020 HDR which includes a robust evaluation that dispels the myth that GDP is a meaningful measure of advancement.

Other documents that help people learn how to dismiss the claims of people like Lomborg include:

The series of documents in the SkS "New reports spell out climate urgency, shortfalls, needed actions"

The Story of the Week in the 2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #5: "Social change more important than physical tipping points" and the "Hamburg Climate Futures Outlook 2023" it summarizes.

The Problem with Percentages

One Planet Only Forever at 07:41 AM on 21 February, 2023

Evan,

I think it would help to insert points along the line of your earlier post about the importance of watching the Keeling Curve for evidence that efforts to reduce climate impacts are being successful.

Examples of the type of items to include would be trends of:

Fossil fuel consumption (burning of coal, oil, nat. gas)

CCS on fossil fuel use (the short-term helpful reduction of Carbon emissions)

CCS from the atmosphere (the CCS that needs to be developed)

And the future of the trends should only be speculated about based on evidence of effective helpful transitions of social drivers as presented in the Hamburg Climate Futures Outlook: The plausibility of a 1.5°C limit to global warming - social drivers and physical processes (Story of the Week in the 2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #5).

And the severity of the challenge can be highlighted by examples like the massive new coal plants in South Africa that are planned to be operated until the 2070s.

Blooberg report: Giant New Power Plants Undermine South Africa’s Emissions Pledge

Who will pay to compensate the investors and South Africans for their lost opportunity to profit and benefit from these facilities for 50 years?

That is an absurd question. The people who made a bad bet should lose their bet. But all the people making Bad harmful bets know that the history of humanity is loaded with examples of wealthy people, and powerful large groups of people, being well compensated when they lose an opportunity to benefit from being harmful to Others (because they won't stop being harmful until they feel they are adequately compensated for not being allowed to continue believing and doing what they developed a liking for).

The Problem with Percentages

One Planet Only Forever at 10:12 AM on 20 February, 2023

Evan,

I agree with your reluctance to be 'too positive' about the transition away from fossil fuels.

I have seen many reports indicating successful resistance to approvals of new electricity transmission infrastructure and new renewable generation facilities. The Story of the Week and first two comments 2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #7 indicate that significant efforts to impede the development of renewable need to be overcome. That will require a significant systemic transition that dramatically reduces the success of efforts to delay the required rapid transition.

The Hamburg Climate Futures Outlook 2023 that is Story of the Week in 2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #5
robustly evaluated the current state of affairs and considers it very unlikely that the USA (and many other developed nations) will meet their current Paris Agreement NDCs. And those NDCs that are unlikely to be met are weaker than what is required to limit impacts to 2.0 C.

The Hamburg Outlook appears to be a more justified perspective than perceptions based on speculation about the continuation of past rates of renewable development. It can be easy to produce a significant rate of increase when starting with a small amount. It is harder to continue that rate of increase, especially when efforts to resist the renewable developments are also increasing.

One final point ... tragically there is very little discussion and leadership promotion of the benefits of limiting 'unnecessary energy consumption'. Admittedly there are many people who need increased energy consumption to live basic decent lives. But they are not the problem. Their per-capita energy demand will be small. The problem is the high energy consumers who believe that 'More consumption is necessary for them to enjoy their life' and everyone who aspires to develop to be Great over-consumers like them.

If unnecessary energy consumption was significantly and rapidly reduced the curtailing of fossil fuel use would be more rapid sooner.

Skeptical Science News: The Rebuttal Update Project

One Planet Only Forever at 04:46 AM on 20 February, 2023

John Mason @8,

To be clear, I am not suggesting an end to human efforts to combat misinformation. And I am sure that constant human monitoring would be required to ensure that an AI ChatBot was as effective as possible. And human monitoring and input would also be required to identify and counteract 'novel developed attempts to impede the effectiveness of the helpful AI ChatBot'.

Thinking a little more about it, it is likely that harmful pursuers of advantage in obtaining personal benefits to the detriment of Others are already working on developing AI ChatBots for their interests.

As is often noted, there is an endless possibility for developing 'harmfully appealing misleading claims'. And the efforts to limit the harm are always too little too late.

Trying to correct harmful misunderstandigs is fighting an uphill battle. There is a profusion of harmful misleading unjustified positive impressions and unjustified anxieties and fears (negatives) that impede learning to be less harmful and more helpful to Others. The Story of the week in 2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #7 and the first 2 comments are evidence of a globally coordinated effort to oppose the interests of the future of humanity. And the Story of the Week in 2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #5 provides a detailed evaluation of the success of such efforts impeding the achievement of the Paris Agreement objective, making that achievement 'not plausible' (Limiting impacts to 1.5 C not plausible even with significant systemic transformation starting today. And limiting impacts to 2.0 C requiring significant systemic transformations starting today).

A significant systemic transformation could be one powerful ChatBot developed collaboratively by the UN (UNICEF, UNDP, UNEP, ...). That could help the 'effort to educated people' on the many matters of concern regarding the future of humanity, not just the climate impact challenge. But I would suspect very few current day powerful governments would support the effective development of something like that. They almost all have their power because of a lack of eductation of the population that gives them the power they have.

2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #7

One Planet Only Forever at 13:12 PM on 19 February, 2023

I just read this NPR report about how pursuers of benefit from fossil fuel use appear to be coordinating misleading 'local' campaigns against renewable energy developments.

An activist group is spreading misinformation to stop solar projects in rural America

The following is a quote from the article about the group coordinating opposition to Solar developments:

"Analysts who follow the industry say Citizens for Responsible Solar stokes opposition to solar projects by spreading misinformation online about health and environmental risks. The group's website says solar requires too much land for "unreliable energy," ignoring data showing power grids can run dependably on lots of renewables. And it claims large solar projects in rural areas wreck the land and contribute to climate change, despite evidence to the contrary."

The success of this type of 'claimed to be grass-roots' campaign is a reason that the "Hamburg Climate Futures Outlook 2023" (Story of the Week in 2023 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #5) indicates there is a very low likelihood that the US will meet its current Paris Agreement NDCs (NDCs that need to be ratcheted up if global impacts are to be kept below 2.0 C).

Skeptical Science News: The Rebuttal Update Project

John Hartz at 05:05 AM on 16 February, 2023

John, Baerbel, Ken & Doug:

I have been sifting and winowing through the internet for more than a decade now to identify quality news articles about manmade climate change and related matters.* During this time, I have seen a signifigant growth in debunking articles generated by journalists, scientists, blog authors, and others.

One such article was posted just two days ago. It is:

Myth-buster: Why two degrees of global warming is worse than it sounds by Daisy Simmons, Climate Explained, Yale Climate Connections, Feb 13, 2023

In the context of the rebuttal update initiative described in the OP, I thought it would be interesting to see which of the Skeptical Science (SkS) rebuttals Simmons' article best pairs up with. It appears that would be the SkS rebuttal, #3 It's not bad.

Having said the above, the existing SkS rebuttal, #3 It's not bad covers almost the complete universe of climate science. Therefore, the best Advanced version of the rebuttal would in essence be the most recent scientific report of the IPCC.

My basic recommendation re this ball of wax is to slice and dice the the SkS rebuttal, #3 It's not bad into distinct chunks.

___________________

*The first SkS "Bi-Weekly News Roundup" was posted on Nov 16, 2012.

Don’t get fooled: Electric vehicles really are better for the climate

One Planet Only Forever at 07:21 AM on 6 January, 2023

Doug Cannon @20,

Please explain your belief better than "They propose the same theory of lying to ourselves about using the mix of fuels to generate electricity as do many other reports. It just doesn't work that way."

I live in Alberta, Canada. Several years ago I was looking into buying an EV. Tesla was the only EV with a decent range. I was thinking about being less harmful, not saving money. But I did not buy the Tesla. At the time, the Alberta electricity generation included a lot of coal generation. And the government intentions indicated coal might be burned until 2040. And the burning of natural gas was going to be the major replacement for coal. I did my homework and determined that the most efficient hybrid available at the time would produce far less harmful emissions than an EV powered by Alberta electricity.

Things are different today. My hybrid still produces less emissions than an EV powered by Alberta electricity (which is similar to the worst US locations). However, the last coal burning in Alberta is expected to be ended by the end of 2023 (but that will be converting the last coal burners to burning natural gas - meaning less harmful but still very harmful).

The future, however, looks much better. The plan is for new electricity generation in Alberta to primarily be wind or solar. If the developments go as planned, by 2030 my very efficient hybrid will be more harmful than an EV powered from the Alberta grid.

You may be lacking imagination regarding the future of electricity generation.

Some relevant questions:

Were you aware that the use of fossil fuels is causing harmful climate change impacts?

If you were aware of that, how are you justifying more harm being done by the promotion of prolonged fossil fuel use?

Do you understand the need to end fossil fuel use to stop making things worse for the future generations? (refer to Overshooting climate targets could significantly increase risk for tipping cascades which is the Story of the Week in the 2022 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #52)

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