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Climate Change Denial, Everywhere
Posted on August 20th, 2010 No commentsHere follows an extract of a conversation I have had with members of the Claverton Energy Research Forum, which I have cut-and-paste into a more easy-to-read fashion below the fold :-
As you can see, there are Climate Change sceptic-deniers everywhere, even in the most knowledgeable and respectable circles.
Countering Climate Change denial from so-called “sceptics” takes a lot of time and energy, and is a bump-in-the-road nuisance/irritation distraction from the main priority for human civilisation, which is how to stop being addicted to Fossil Fuels.
Bad Science, Be Prepared, Big Picture, British Sea Power, Burning Money, Carbon Capture, Climate Change, Coal Hell, Delay and Deny, Divide & Rule, Energy Revival, Faithful God, Fossilised Fuels, Geogingerneering, Global Singeing, Global Warming, Growth Paradigm, Low Carbon Life, Non-Science, Nuclear Nuisance, Nuclear Shambles, Peak Energy, Peak Oil, Regulatory Ultimatum, Renewable Resource, Resource Curse, Science Rules, Screaming Panic, Social Change, Solar Sunrise, Technological Sideshow, The Data, Unconventional Foul, Unnatural Gas, Wind of Fortune Claverton, Claverton Energy, Claverton Energy Research Forum, Climate Change, delayer, denial, denier, Emotional Investment, Financial Climate, Financial Investment, Financial Redirection, Global Warming, have you read the IPCC report ?, IPCC, obstruction, Sceptics, Skeptics, timewasters, timewasting -
Suck On This
Posted on July 16th, 2010 2 comments
Proponents of the proposed Great Engineering Feat of Carbon Capture and Storage, portray their heroic efforts to suck Carbon Dioxide out of industrial processes, and even out of the sky itself, as the last chance to save us from ourselves and our untidy emissions.
Thing is, even if all the extra Carbon Dioxide in the Atmosphere from the last 150 years of human Fossil Fuel burning activities could be swallowed down into rocks, filters, artificial trees, real trees and caves, all at once, when we have invented and fully developed the Geoengineering Technology for it, we would still have a globally warmed world, and still plenty of excess Carbon Dioxide in the Oceans and Land, which can still make its way out into the Atmosphere…
The enduring challenge is that we must curtail and rein in Carbon Dioxide emissions, as soon as possible, starting now. We cannot carry on burning and wait for Carbon-sucking technological marvels, that may never materialise, as Ken Caldeira and his research colleague Long Cao demonstrate :-
http://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/5/2/024011/fulltext
“Atmospheric carbon dioxide removal: long-term consequences and commitment : Long Cao and Ken Caldeira : [Department of Global Ecology, Carnegie Institution, Stanford, CA, USA] : Environ. Res. Lett. 5 (April-June 2010) 024011 : doi:10.1088/1748-9326/5/2/024011″
Carbon Capture, Climate Change, Geogingerneering, Global Singeing, Global Warming, Science Rules, The Data Anthropogenic Carbon Dioxide, Anthropogenic Climate Change, Anthropogenic Global Warming, Atmospheric Gingering, Carbon Dioxide, Climate Change, CO2, Geoengineering, Geogingerneering, Global Warming -
Climate Union : Sharing Principles
Posted on June 28th, 2010 No comments
Image Credit : Gilbert & George, “Nettle Dance”, White Cube
I’m in the Climate Union. Are You ?
Soon we could all be, if the expansionist plans of a group of social campaigners come to fruition.
Taking in the unions, faith communities and the usual rag-tag bunch of issues activists, the Climate Union aims to establish itself as a political force for Low Carbon.
First of all, however, it has to tackle the uneasy and prickly problem of the exact name of the movement, and the principles under which it will operate.
The flag has been flown : a set of principles has been circulated for discussion amongst the “Climate Forum”. I cannot show you the finalised document yet, but I can offer you my comments (see below).
If you want to comment on the development of this emerging entity, please contact : Peter Robinson, Campaign against Climate Change, mobile/cell telephone in the UK : 07876595993.
Comments on the Climate Forum Principles
Jo Abbess
28 June 2010I am aware that my comments are going to be a little challenging. I made similar comments during the review of the ClimateSafety briefing, which were highly criticised.
I expect you to be negative in response to what I say, but I think it is necessary to make sure the Climate Forum does not become watered-down, sectorally imprisoned and politically neutered, like so many other campaigns.
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The History of Climate Denial Funding
Posted on December 28th, 2009 No commentsFollow the money : take a peek behind the Climate Change Denier-Sceptic propaganda theatre stage curtain and you will find large Fossil Fuel interests offering financial resources to unseat the Climate Change Science.
Ross Gelbspan calls this a “manufactured campaign”, and lays some of the obligations for rooting it out on those who work in the Media.
“We may already be witnessing…runaway Climate Change” is his conclusion on the consequences of 20 years of delay in setting effective policy.
Virtually no group in society escapes Gelbspan’s probing gaze. He invites comments :-
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Deep Pockets : Carbon Sinks News
Posted on November 9th, 2009 No comments
Possibly some good news from the world of Carbon Sink science : the Earth may be soaking up progressively more Carbon Dioxide as time goes by instead of refusing to do so :-
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Superfreakonomics Flunks Climate Science
Posted on October 20th, 2009 2 commentsNow even friends break ranks with Levitt and Dubner over their new tome Superfreakonomics – a clear throw-back to the 1980s.
Is it time to ask for a reprint with all the errors corrected ?
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&sid=aVKXZg_Z.vMY
Oct. 20 (Bloomberg) — Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner are so good at tweaking conventional wisdom that their first book, “Freakonomics,” sold 4 million copies. So when Dubner, an old friend, told me their new book would take on climate change, I was rooting for a breakthrough idea.
No such luck. In “SuperFreakonomics,” their brave new climate thinking turns out to be the same pile of misinformation the skeptic crowd has been peddling for years.
“Obviously, provocation is not last on the list of things we’re trying to do,” Dubner told me the other day. This time, the urge to provoke has driven him and Levitt off the rails and into a contrarian ditch.
…Having downplayed the problem, they try to solve it with a set of silver-bullet technologies known as geoengineering. One would shoot millions of tons of sulfur dioxide 18 miles into the air to artificially cool the planet. This could work; it also could have dire unintended consequences.
Caldeira, who is researching the idea, argues that it can succeed only if we first reduce emissions. Otherwise, he says, geoengineering can’t begin to cope with the collateral damage, such as acidic oceans killing off shellfish.
Levitt and Dubner ignore his view and champion his work as a permanent substitute for emissions cuts. When I told Dubner that Caldeira doesn’t believe geoengineering can work without cutting emissions, he was baffled. “I don’t understand how that could be,” he said. In other words, the Freakonomics guys just flunked climate science.”
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/10/superfreakonimics-climate-change-controversy.php
http://www.theatlanticwire.com/features/view/feature/SuperFreakonomics-on-Global-Warming-220
“It all started with climate activist Joe Romm accusing the authors Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner of global warming denial and misrepresenting the research of a key climate scientist. They pushed back, and fellow New York Times blogger and celebrated columnist Paul Krugman jumped in the fray…”
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All Shook Up
Posted on September 29th, 2009 No comments
Image Credit : A Sound of Thunder Movie
Students of Chaos Theory well know what is known as the Butterfly Effect – apparently small changes in system forcings result in major outcomes.
We’ve heard repeatedly about rising sea levels resulting from Global Warming, but there are more bugs crawling out of the woodwork now.
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Everybody Dance Now !
Posted on September 2nd, 2009 No commentsWhenever you hear government ministers or public figures telling the people that technology will save us, remember this : the word “technology” is synonymous with the word “business”.
“Technology” is Big Engineering, and this is what is done by large companies and corporations. Large organisations that make profit by selling manufactured products and Energy always have a surplus set aside for their communications budgets, and that includes persuading government people that their business is invaluable and needs promoting.
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Bjørn Lomborg : Climate Joker
Posted on August 14th, 2009 No comments
In his own, special, blond, way, I feel Bjørn Lomborg is as dangerous as Martin Durkin. They both act like incarnations of The Climate Joker in my view, showing different capricious sides to the destructive force of mankind’s inhumanity to man (and beast and tree).
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Cloud Ships. Yes, But…
Posted on August 10th, 2009 No comments
Geoengineering. Sounds great. Treat the Earth like one big motoring machine, get under the hood (bonnet) and tinker with it.
But what if actually this is the equivalent of putting the Planet on a life support system ventilator, and the plug could be pulled at any time ?
How sustainable are some of the Geoengineering proposals ? Are they guaranteed to work ? Won’t they have knock-on side-effects ? Are they reversible if they prove unhelpful ? And how much will they cost ?
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