Great News

[mikemurphy]

Driving into work today, I was listening to that "Bleeding Heart" liberal-type news that we have up here in Massachusetts and I heard some great news. It seems that in spite of all the scientific evidence & research that has been done on Global Warming and the Greenhouse Effect, President Bush has said that there is no real evidence after all and that he will NOT to anything to reduce emissions in the air as he feels it will hurt our economy. I have, of course, paraphrased what Doctor Bush has said, but the point is still valid.

With that said, I guess it's cool to go out and purchase those SUVs and other gas guzzlers again. The heck with those hybrids. Maybe he'll even bring Regular gasoline back again (sorry kids, read your history books).

I'm so psyched!!

mike

[Mark Weitz]

That's what I love about Bush. He seems to always be one step ahead of the scientists who have tried to persuade him otherwise.

Must be that C average education he got at Yale.

Mark

[Tokezu]

I just read a very pertinent quote in a Yoshikawa novel last night. I can't quote it directly at this time, but it goes something like this:

When someone without the proper abilities seeks to rule a nation, the world will be enveloped by disaster.

(excerpt paraphrased from Taiko, Eiji Yoshikawa, pg. 464)

When I read that, I got chills.

I was trying to figure out how I was going to post the thread. But you saved me the trouble.

Frightened about the future,
DLF

[benzocaine]

Yeah...

OK Mr President. Explain the artic Ice cap shrinking .. very noticably since the 70's.

In around 15 years glacier park will nave no more glaciers

Mount Killamonjaro(sp?) in Africa is rapidly losing it's snowy peak.

But there's no proof of global warming. Besides Rush Limbaugh has been saying for years that Global warming is just an invention of enviromental "wackos". Rush is Right... right?

[Bill Glasheen]

I don't mind you having your fun here, Mike.

It's a bit irritating... Kind of like Watts and Reagan who were talking about trees being the major source of pollution.

However, be very careful about jumping to conclusions, or you'll look just as foolish as the self-serving pro-business "whackos." The only thing worse than an extremist is the counterpart on the other side.

Check out this position in the scientific debate.



Research Interests

There are plenty of articles in the peer-reviewed journals to back up his "provocative" position.

What is "trend" and what is "cyclic noise"? How strong is the trend? We don't know yet. We do know that CO2 levels have risen dramatically from the burning of fossil fuels, but we don't yet know what the consequences are. Alarmists are preaching everything from global warming to another ice age (a recent movie).

The bad news? We have about 200 years of oil left. The good news? We have about 200 years of oil left.

In the mean time, we need to let the scientists duke this one out. It's not as simple as you think. For example, most of the mathematical models that they've come up with to show trends in temperature changes come out with a "white earth" scenario just with baseline conditions. This shows a pretty primitive understanding of what's going on. There is much to learn.

- Bill

[Bill Glasheen]

O'Beirne: Professor, global warming is being blamed for causing droughts out West and floods in Europe. That confuses me. Which is it, droughts or floods?

Patrick Michaels, Senior Fellow, Cato Institute: Confuses me too. Our greener friends blame every weather event that they can find on global warming. But when you look at the actual numbers, their claims don't hold up.

O'Beirne: Has there been any climate change in the last century?

Michaels: Sure. The temperature of the planet's about 1 degree Fahrenheit warmer than it was 100 years ago. In the last 50 years, there have been changes that look like greenhouse effect changes, meaning the coldest air of the winter has warmed up, Siberia's warmed up from minus 40 to minus 38 in January. Don't hear people complaining about that.

You don't see much change in the summer temperatures. Growing seasons have lengthened, crop yields have quintupled, lifespan's doubled.

O'Beirne: The federal government spends well over $2 billion a year on climate change research. What are we getting for this money?

Michaels: Not much. Our computer models are really not much better than they were 10 years ago before we started to spend all this money. There's another way to look at the issue, which doesn't cost very much money at all, which is to look at how much the planet has warmed as the greenhouse effect has changed.

And when you do that calculation, you realize that it's going to warm up at about -- for about 1.5 degrees Celsius in the next 100 years, which isn't very much. We're going to prosper, we're going to adapt, we're going to live with it...

O'Beirne: Private industry funds some of your research. Are they getting what they pay for?

Michaels: Well, you know, most of my funding, the vast majority, comes from taxpayer-supported entities. I would make the argument that if funding colors research, I should be certainly biased more towards the taxpayers, of which I am one, than towards industry. But the fact of the matter is, numbers are objective.

And what you look at the global warming numbers, you cannot come to any conclusion other than the fact that we pretty much know how much it's going to warm in the next 100 years. It's not going to be that much. And you can't stop it.

O'Beirne: Al Gore saw the disagreement over the extent of global warming as a struggle between good and evil. Why is research on climate change so emotional and political?

Michaels: It's -- it is very emotional. But if you think about it, it's like everything here in Washington, D.C. It revolves around money and power. You cannot generate funding for a large issue unless you threaten people children. Look at the competing apocalypses, AIDS, cancer, heart disease, global warming. Their budgets are all about the same. Now, can you imagine going in front of Congress and saying, Well, this is really an overblown problem, please save your money?

O'Beirne: Why does the public, though, professor, seem to be so readily accept doomsday scenarios about the state of the environment?

Michaels: We certainly have run through a lot of apocalypses in my professional lifetime. Let's see, there was population explosion, then we were going to run out of resources from the limits to growth, then there was global cooling and the next ice age, then acid rain was going to cause a, quote, "ecological silent spring" and global warming.

You think people would get tired of this? The answer is, I think they are.

O'Beirne: Last month you were among the witnesses at a House oversight hearing on global warming. What was Congress concerned about?

Michaels: Congress was concerned that a new report that is being used to generate an awful lot of policy, not only in Washington but in the states, was based upon two computer models that did worse than a table of random numbers when applied to U.S. temperatures.

I think it's a tremendous scandal. I think it's the biggest scandal in the history of the environmental sciences that we're using models like this and proceeding with policy.

O'Beirne: Professor, if the Kyoto Treaty were fully implemented, there would be economic costs for sure, but wouldn't it help the environment?

Michaels: No. The Kyoto Treaty would cost a fortune, between 1 and 3 percent of GDP per year. But the amount of warming that it would save would be 0.07 degree Celsius in the next 50 years. That was the argument that killed Kyoto in front of the Bush administration, that it costs a fortune, and it does nothing.

[RACastanet]

I for one am glad to hear this great news.

For those of you who are parroting your political pundits I ask if you are certified and qualified to comment on the subject? What are your credentials?

I am a licensed engineer with 30 years of real world industrial experience in 'smokestack' industries. Plus, I have been involved in large projects pretty much everywhere in the world.

First, the data being used to proclaim global warming covers at best 100 years. The really good satellite technology goes back only 40 years. Making predictions of geologic change on a planet billions of years old with so little data just does not work. The weather service cannot even reliably tell me about tomorrow, let alone 100 years from now. The available data is not even a blip in astronomical time.

Mike mentioned history. If you are old enough, perhaps you would remember that scientists in the 60s and 70s were predicting a return to the ice age. What happened there?

What is occuring to the climate might just be the natural order of things. We have not been around long enough to really know.

Bill said: "It's a bit irritating... Kind of like Watts and Reagan who were talking about trees being the major source of pollution."

Well, it is not trees in particular but life in general that is the problem. Decaying vegetable matter, animal matter and wastes give of methane gas. Methane is a volatile organic compound and contributes much more to the greenhouse effect than CO2 ever did or ever will. And do not forget the volcanic contributions to greenhouse gasses. Mankind is a puny contributor compared to mother nature.

Now, back to the engineer/capitalist mode.

The problem with the Kyoto treaty is that it exempts deveolping nations from having to restrict their emissions. While the US is a huge consumer of energy, it is not the worst polluter. It is the Chinas and Indias and Brazils of the world.

China and India make little or no effort to curb pollution. Both of those countries rely heavily on coal and heavy distillate fuels for energy. Both countries still utilize coal and oil fired steam locomotives for their railroads. When China decides to do some type of industrial expansion, they do not have an EPA watching them or do a study, they do what they please! And sometimes destroy millions of acres of land and displace millions of people in the process.

Eastern Europe is also pretty nasty. Russia has dead zones the size of New England states as a result of 'industrial' accidents. The rivers are heavily polluted as is the air. They drive a car called the Trebant, with an innefficient 2 stroke oil burning and smog producing engine. Plus, Russia will not tell anyone where they have dumped or are dumping the nuclear reactors from decommissioned ships and subs, but most likely are dumping them in the ocean above the arctic circle.

And Brazil... They are merrily burning away the largest rain forest in the world.

So, the 'underdeveloped' nations are happy to sign off on Kyoto as it will only help them by restricting the developed world. But it will be a boat anchor to the rest of the world.

The US is the engine that drives the world economy. By limiting our growth potential, the world would suffer.

Rich

[Bill Glasheen]

Good post, Rich.

A couple of points though...

Well, it is not trees in particular but life in general that is the problem. Decaying vegetable matter, animal matter and wastes give of methane gas. Methane is a volatile organic compound and contributes much more to the greenhouse effect than CO2 ever did or ever will.

But this is baseline, Rich. And the ecosystem already absorbs all that and does just fine, thank you very much.

What is germane to the argument is not what is, but what is changing and how the ecosystem is responding to that change.

If you read the material by Pat Michaels and others, you realize that the system responds somewhat to this. More CO2 can cause more plant life to grow (including ocean algae), which absorbs the CO2 and turns it back to oxygen. So homeostasis may prevail.

The weather service cannot even reliably tell me about tomorrow, let alone 100 years from now.

Hyperbole, my friend. That doesn't help your argument.

Frankly at this point I believe the empirical modelists (such as Michaels) more than I do the first principles modelists. At least the former shows trends and information that is better than noise. The only concern is "aliasing" from low frequency events being interpreted as trend. And that artifact could be in either direction, meaning things could be better OR worse than what Dr. Michaels' research is suggesting.

Plus...at some point, mathematical chaos may prevail. This is somewhat what you mean with your flip comment, Rich. The butterfly effect may prevail. We may not be able to predict what will happen, however hard we try. And thus trending may be fruitful for the short term at best.

Not enough information...yet.

- Bill

[RACastanet]

"But this is baseline, Rich. And the ecosystem already absorbs all that and does just fine, thank you very much."

Not correct. The livestock industry is huge and pig waste, cow dung, chicken droppings and the like generate enormous amounts of methane that are not part of the normal ecosystem. We are talking about tens of millions of animals that just eat and poop. Plus, methane is a larger contributor to the problem on a per unit volume, as are most VOCs. It is not absorbed back into the environment as CO2 is. I will do a search to see if I can quantify the contrinbution of methane to greenhouse gasses.

Rich

[Guest]

Chicken schit could be an oppourtunity to reduce your dependancy on foreign energy

[RACastanet]

That is quite true. Did you see the 'Mad Max Thunderdrome' movie about 20 years ago? An entire city was being run on pig stuff.

I do know it has been tried on a small scale around the world but it has not caught on... yet.

A few industrial plants in Virginia are running gas turbine generators on methane being piped in from landfills. Normally the landfill flares it off so it does not become dangerous to the area. The generators can power a small portion of the plant and the fuel is essentially free. The cost to build the accumulator and distribution system to the plant is pricey but can be ammortized over 20 years or so.

rich

[Stryke]

First, the data being used to proclaim global warming covers at best 100 years. The really good satellite technology goes back only 40 years. Making predictions of geologic change on a planet billions of years old with so little data just does not work. The weather service cannot even reliably tell me about tomorrow, let alone 100 years from now. The available data is not even a blip in astronomical time.

Ok so lets wait abillion years or so and see if we survive and then do something about ....

Fine for you folks who dont have a hole in the ozone layer on your doorstep

You have an simple situation here, pollution makes the world a worse place for all in the long run , forget the terrorists , you may end up living in squaller anyhow .

World leader my ass , get in line with world opinion or choose to band up with the third world countrys .

oh I forget it`s not the global veiw it`s self interest ....

Rant off

it`s kind of a simple scientific theory when it comes down to it ... Dont Schit were you eat .....

[Guest]

are not part of the normal ecosystem

Are chickens and pigs part of the ecosystem? Are people part of the eco system, are plants part of the ecosystem? Is crap part of the ecosystem? I think so! So is methane. It's not like we imported the gas from Mars. It's always been part of the system and it's released into atmoshphere during the digestive process. Animals eat plants and animals fart They always have and always will.

Methane is also released from rotting waste. Animal species ebb and flow, rise and fall over time. Gases ebb and flow as well with the concentrations changing. Water levels rise and fall over time as well.

This continent has been pretty much covered by a rather thick sheet of ice on more than one occassion. So the glaciers are melting, so what, they form they melt thats what glaciers do.

I live in an area that was under almost 2 kilometers of ice ten thousand years ago. We still have some retreating glaciers. If I climb up to 8500 feet I can find fossils of fish on the top of the mountain, these peaks were once the bottom of an inland sea. Temperatures cycle over time, water levels cycle over time, composition of the atmosphere cycles over time.

I don't buy into the enviro mental rant that golbal warming is causing the sky to fall.


Bill is right, we don't understand the system yet. The earth cycles over time but on a scale much larger than our short experience.

Leave it up to the scientists....well yes and no these are the people that gave us thalidamine after all they are not perfect. Actually many a scientist started this knee jerk reaction about global warming.

It is unfortunate that the so many people are accepting the hype. Governments in many countries are enacting worthless measures to battle rising temperatures. You can't control the system your part of it! It's not broken so it doesn't need fixing! I think MR. Bush is doing the right thing.


Pumping poison into the air, and creating lakes of crap is not a good thing....thats pretty much common sense. All we need is some common sense.

Scientist's and eviro mentals fear mongering and promoting saving the planet is not required. Mans efforts in tinkering and tampering with the ecosystem have been abismal failures. We can not repair what we do not understand.

end of rant.

[RACastanet]

Keep in mind that the worst polluters are outside of North America. We cleaned our act up remarkably well in the last 40 years.

On to the ozone layer... the same questionable science is at play here. The thinning in the ozone layer at the poles was not discovered until fairly recently. The question remains... did we cause it or is it a natural long term phenomona?

Scientists came up with the theory that freons from AC systems and aerosol sprays were attacking the ozone layer so we must get rid of freons! The worst culprit was R12. So, the US (did Canada do this as well?) banned the use and manufacture of R12 at some point in the early 90s. Existing R12 could be recycled and reused..

duPont and other US companies ceased the manufacture of R12. The heating and cooling industry and carmakers were forced to design new systems around another less effective refrigerant - R34 I believe. R34 would not work in an R12 system so if you had a problem with an R12 system you had to replace it or pay about 20X the price for the available R12.

This whole affair has cost consumers and manufacturers $bilions. If you have an old car or refrigerator and it has a problem, you are screwed.

Even getting repairs on new systems with R34 is much more costly because the coolant must be pumped out before the system can be worked on. Would not want any R34 escaping. Do you think that in India or China or Mexico they worry about leaking freons?

Now, the world is such a fair place, most of it still manufactures and uses R12. There is a black market for the stuff in the US and it is smuggled in from Mexico. No kidding.

So, the ozone layer is still thinning in spite of the US absorbing $billions in cost to convert to an inferior product. Is it because the rest of the world just gave the freon scare lip service or is it because there is a natural cycle occuring.

And, there is a thinning, not really a hole at the poles as you so often hear about on the evening news.

Rich

[Stryke]

Scientist's and eviro mentals fear mongering and promoting saving the planet is not required. Mans efforts in tinkering and tampering with the ecosystem have been abismal failures. We can not repair what we do not understand.

I`m usually with ya mate but got to disagree here , I think the enviromental stuff gets taken way to far , a certain snail poster comes to mind , but when it comes to big buisness cutting back on waste and emissions I see no problems .

most of the times it comes down to money , thats it , profit margains , the whole we dont understand bollocks is to easy , do some research and come up with a solution then ... this turn a blind eye stuff is nonsense .

you must of noticed how quickly one gets a tan when in AUs .. It`s not a good thing ... NZ is even worse ... check on which countrys have the highest rates of skin cancer in the world ....

the envoroment is being effected , the majority of the world has agreed to enviromental measures , heck I`m not saying save the snails I`m saying dont produce excess waste .

nothing wrong with creating carbon sinks , cleaner technology , less waste ...

were really just talking saving the big guy a few bucks , and yeah the consumer will get some/most of it , but were not all lucky enough to live in a natural paradise ....

I just think a cleaner world would be nice to live in