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birgco
Joined: 01 May 2007
Posts: 302
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 Posted: Mon Oct 29, 2007 3:46 pm Post subject: |
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We need to get beyond the "what is causing global warming " syndrome,
it really doesn't matter.
Al Gore is an idiot, so what?
Polluted air and water are real, acid rain is a fact, childhood asthma is an increasingly alarming statistic.
A common sense approach of making our environment as clean as possible is the only reasonable thing to do.
Burning coal is dirty, burning oil is dirty......solar is super clean, geothermal is super clean.
Do the math.
We have the technology to reduce the comsumption of fossil fuels.....
but let's argue about it??? |
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csintexas
millennium club
Joined: 06 Feb 2006
Posts: 2174
Location: USA
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| Posted: Tue Oct 30, 2007 7:13 am Post subject: |
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Yes I agree. We also have a very limited supply of fossil fuels.
The first half of our oil resources lasted 100 years. The remaining half won't last nearly that long so we need to start preparing for the transition because as the supply becomes limited the price will rise much faster than inflation.
I think even if 100% of Americans decided global warming is caused by CO2 and decided to stop burning coal China and other developing countries will just pick up the slack anyway until it becomes an irreversible problem.
6 billion people on the planet are always going to put a huge strain on the ecology of the Earth. It isn't just the coal, it's all the chemicals we use and all the human waste we send down stream. I just heard that we are currently using resources 30% faster than they can be replaced. I don't know exactly how that is calculated and what it means but I do know we are starting to see big strains on the natural system (for example the sudden decrease in the bee population)
Also fresh water is starting to to become in short supply and any sustained drought will cause big problems.
The reasons we should be more conservative are many.
_________________
-Chris Stewart
http://bcshdb.blogspot.com >
The B/CS Home Design Blog |
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psudonym
Joined: 28 Oct 2007
Posts: 7
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| Posted: Wed Oct 31, 2007 7:06 am Post subject: |
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We need to get beyond what is causing global warming? Do we need to get beyond truth? The truth is important and words have meaning.
I am not arguing against cleaner sources of energy. I think we should invest heavily in it. It is so freaking obvious. Where is the argument?
I am also for radical changes to the american lifestyle to reduce the burning of fossil fuels. But people in the states (to name one place) love their china made crap and their altra convienant lifestyles. And then there is the economy....don't want to upset anything there.
cs, We don't get to decide what causes global warming. But, I agree it is more than just coal.
We need the truth so that intellegent decisions can be made as how to move forward. Running around like henny penny does no one any good. It only damages your credibility and takes resources away from the real issues.
Here is a suggestion that everyone can take or leave. If your so against coal and convinced the people who use it are evil and go on to state information as fact, list your sources. |
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csintexas
millennium club
Joined: 06 Feb 2006
Posts: 2174
Location: USA
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| Posted: Wed Oct 31, 2007 2:19 pm Post subject: |
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Of course we all decide. You seem to have decided that this is a naturally occurring event which can't be stopped and TLWalker decided it is man made and can be stopped. I decided it is partly both and can't be stopped because people are basically stupid.
We all seem to agree that there are other reasons besides global warming to stop burning coal but still (at least) Americans as a whole are not interested.
Burning coal is certainly not "evil" in itself. Leaving future generations a mess because we are to busy living the good life and not behaving responsibly is.
_________________
-Chris Stewart
http://bcshdb.blogspot.com >
The B/CS Home Design Blog |
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TLWalkerAIA
Joined: 16 Apr 2004
Posts: 130
Location: Seattle Washington, USA
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| Posted: Wed Oct 31, 2007 5:42 pm Post subject: PSUDONYM, HERE is my RESPONSE TO A PUNDIT |
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By Terry L. Walker, AIA:
Sir, the science speaks for itself. It always has and always will by it's nature speak to the truth as demonstarted by tests in physical reality. If you want to advocate the use of fossil fuel when there are better alternatives go right ahead. For your information however, the credibility of science or the scientific observations, and thereby Mr. Gore & Mr. Mazria's public statements, and mine for that matter, are soundly based upon facts.
Scientists do not care, and I do not care about conjecture not supported by the physical evidence and the mainstream of science has denounced such conjecture ast you have cited. They do not care what the court decides or the politicians have to say, because it is not relevant to scientific methods. They have proven the conjecture false. Science is about establishing what is so by testing in physical reality. The arguments in the press or the court room are to protect some vested interest between parties not to establish the physical realities. The majority of scientist agree that in terms of cause and effect that human activity is the primary cause of global warming. Say what you want, I am in good company here and well informed by scientists who have their hands on the work.
For a long time in the US court room there was insufficiently clear evidence that smoking caused cancer and the courts were deciding that claims that smoking did cause cancer were not supportable. Those defending the tabaco companies, many with fine credentials and good intentions, eventually found themselves out of touch with the physical realities. That was long ago and many deaths behind us. You can cling to your beliefs but it is unlikely that the vast majority of the worlds scientists have decided to perpetrate a hoax on the whole world. Enough said. The ice core studies do not support your theory of a 1500 year climate cycle.
I am quite convinced that the great efforts to maintain the existing energy paradigm are rooted in politically inspired fantasy rather than science. Probably hatched in Oklahoma somewhere. That is my opinion. The AIA as an organization, is in line with the science of world climate and the interpretation of the climate data by a large number of scientists, witch includes the UN IPCC panel of scientists.
Let's talk about COAL as that is the central subject in this discourse.
Although it is possible to clean the carbon from the gas arising from the use of coal for power generation, it is difficult for me to comprehend why this would be better than spending the same money on the solar alternative. Hydrogen fuel cell technology has the capacity to store energy collected by PV panels. This is established technology and is the storage media of choice.
There appears to be some challenge regarding my knowledge of the COAL POWER issue.
COAL POWER is "old technology". Carbon capture from coal is wishful thinking and is not a mature available technology.
Here is what they have in mind:Carbon Capture;
CO2 is captured using technologies that have been developed and proved in other applications. Currently, there are three main CO2 capture approaches:
• From combustion products from power plant flue gases
• Before combustion in gasification systems (see below)
• By burning coal or gas in oxygen to produce a concentrated CO2 flue gas.
The leading technology in use today involves separating CO2 from flue gases or other streams using an amine solution, and then recovering the CO2 by steam stripping.
Hydrogen production / Carbon dioxide separation
Gasification of fossil fuels (see above) produces a hydrogen and carbon monoxide gas stream, which when reacted with steam (the water shift reaction) produces a mixture of hydrogen and carbon dioxide, which can be separated (by pressure swing adsorption).
The hydrogen can then be used as:
• A chemical feedstock,
• A fuel in a gas turbine combined cycle plant or a fuel cell to produce electricity,
• A fuel for transportation.
The carbon dioxide can then be stored or sequestered in some way.
Perhaps CO2 Compression and transport
after capture CO2 is compressed to a liquid state at ~80 atmospheres pressure and pumped to the storage site. The CO2 may then be injected into the target geological formation. Really?
CO2 is largely inert and is already transported in high pressure pipelines. For example, the Weyburn project in Canada currently transports over 1 million tons of CO2 through 320 kilometer long pipeline.
Is sequestration or Carbon Storage Feasible?
For CO2 storage to be an effective way of avoiding climate change, the CO2 must be stored for several hundreds or thousands of years.
CO2 storage also requires minimal environmental impacts, low costs to be affordable, and conformity to national and international laws.
The main options for storing CO2 underground are in depleted oil and gas reservoirs, deep saline reservoirs and un-minable coal seams.
CO2 is stored in gas-tight natural reservoirs, such as those that already hold oil, gas or water. These must be at depths greater than 800m, where the CO2 can be stored in a comparatively dense form.
Monitoring and verification
If CO2 storage is to be used as a basis for emissions trading or to meet national commitments on emission reductions, it will be necessary to verify the quantities of CO2 stored. We would have to prove that it was not leaking back into the atmosphere.
Measurement of the amounts of CO2 injected during geosequestration uses established and well understood technologies. However the quantities that would need to be stored are formidable. The issue is making sure the CO2 stays where it is placed; and hence requires both;
An understanding of the reservoir geology, and recognition of both secure versus potentially leaky storage sites; and
An ability to measure CO2 both at point of placement and thereafter should it leak.
Major oil and gas companies and their contractors can track gas flows in underground reservoirs using seismic and well logging techniques and reservoir simulation tools. These technologies are being successfully applied in sequestration projects in Europe and North America.
Further development of these technologies is required, along with the demonstration of techniques for measuring and controlling small gas leakages.
What has actually been done in coal-fired capture?
There are commercially operating plants throughout the world that utilize CO2 captured from the flue gas of coal fired power stations. This is then used as a raw material for use in food and chemical processing plants. However these operations typically only recover of the order of one to two hundred tons of CO2 per day which would represents less than TWO PERCENT (2%) of the DAILY TOTAL of CO2 emitted from a typical 500 MW coal fired power plant. (SEE http://www.tmm.com.au/zets/faq/faq.htm )
Little or no actual demonstrated feasibility.
The goal of carbon sequestration is to take CO2 that would otherwise accumulate in the atmosphere and put it in safe permanent storage. This can be done in really big natural or man made bottles underground or chemically trapped. We must question what sorbet would be used in the latter case and how that sorbet could be recycled if at all. You see whatever it is; it will take a lot of it to scrub the CO2 from all that coal. It will have to be kept scrubbed for a very long time.
It is kind of like nuclear waste you see. There is really no place to put the waste product.
On site capture may be a sensible approach for the large sources such as a coal plant if there was some place to put the captured CO2, but obviously it is not feasible for small or mobile sources. Where do we dump it? How do we secure it? How much is that going to cost? What makes that the best alternative?
A paper written by Klaus S. Lackner, Pattrick Grimes and Hans-J Ziock explores the options and suggests that extraction of CO2 from free air flow could provide a viable cost effective alternative to changing transportation infrastructure to non carbonaceous fuels. This paper suggests that first we burn the coal and consequently pollute the air, live in that polluted air and then clean it in a big air laundering facility.
Although possible, in reality the feasibility of 100% CO2 capture has not been demonstrated anywhere and is simply not available for implementation at this time. The sorbents required to my knowledge have not been identified and are not available. Before you wade in with your right wing rhetoric please show us your science. Before we build those coal plants show us an operating economically feasible cost competitive working model.
This is not high school science. In a classroom experiment we can bubble air through calcium hydroxide solution and remove the CO2 component. Under controlled conditions we can scrub CO2. However, in real life we are faced with the scale of the task which can not be economically addressed! Where do we put the calcium carbonate? How do we keep the CO2 chained to it?
Giberto Rozenchan arrived at the price of $10 to $15 per ton of CO2 using capture and storage by an active recycles sorbent. The significant cost involved in carbon capture and storage is the capture process. Various studies by the IEA GHG R&D program and others have assessed the costs of capturing CO2 from new pulverized coal, integrated coal gasification and natural gas combined cycle power plants, which range from approximately US$15 to 90 per ton CO2 avoided or about 75 percent of the whole problem solution cost of CO2 capture, transport and sequestration.
It is estimated that transport and storage costs are typically in the range US$5 - $15 per ton, depending on transport distance and storage method.
Current estimates from the Electric Power Research Institute on the cost of electricity from power plants with carbon capture and storage indicates a 40 – 50 % increase in the cost of electricity for new integrated gasification combined cycle plants and approximately an 80 – 90 % increase for new pulverized coal plants utilizing conventional processes.
Is the coal option viable where the cost of solar collection plant has at the most a one time installation cost of $30/kwh without the forever cost burden of the fossil fuel itself and the associated cleanup burden.
We are currently adding globally a net 10 billion tons of carbon to the atmosphere every year!
Wake up to the reality that the amount of CO2 is measurable, has been measured and that this is hard science and not political smoke.
According to US agencies, that is simply what is so.
The net zero carbon economy works better than expanding the fossil fuel economy, obviously existing solar power plants in operation do not add to the CO2 burden at all. Obviously they are also cheaper when subjected to a rational analysis of the cost. We have reason for high hopes.
Where we have hydro electric facilities we save power as water behind the damn that will be there when we need it each year. With existing fossil fuel plants we will have plenty of fossil fuel in the ground as a back-up fuel supply. All of the necessary existing plant and distribution infrastructure, the externality, is in place and long since amortized.
The pundits will talk about the cost. So while we are at it let us defuse the argument. But industry experts point out; "The installation price of photovoltaics and other alternative energy production options are actually just an externality. "
The high initial installation cost is a sunk cost, not an ongoing cost like those of fossil fuels! Just like the hydro electric damn. Does anyone take into account the cost of building the entire drilling, shipping, storage and refining infrastructure for crude oil, when analyzing the price of gasoline? No they do not. Or the similar costs when analyzing the price of coal plants or hydro-electric plants? No they don't. These costs are long-ago amortized, and are no longer reflected in the price we pay.
The economic problem associated with photovoltaics isn’t their ongoing operational or replacement cost, which is minimal; it is the cost of building a photovoltaic infrastructure on American rooftops- building the installed base - from scratch. The current cost wholesale to build that infrastructure is about $10.00 per watt installed.
Coal is not a sustainable source of power. There is simply no logic in planning a future around non-renewable sources of power.
For your information:
The following article is published on the Web at
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/27/AR2006062700780.html
You are dead wrong about the IPCC panel and Mr. Gore
Scientists OK Gore's Movie for Accuracy
By SETH BORENSTEIN
The Associated Press
Tuesday, June 27, 2006; 9:15 PM
WASHINGTON -- The nation's top climate scientists are giving "An Inconvenient Truth," Al Gore's documentary on global warming, five stars for accuracy.
The former vice president's movie _ replete with the prospect of a flooded New York City, an inundated Florida, more and nastier hurricanes, worsening droughts, retreating glaciers and disappearing ice sheets _ mostly got the science right, said all 19 climate scientists who had seen the movie or read the book and answered questions from The Associated Press. The AP contacted more than 100 top climate researchers by e-mail and phone for their opinion. Among those contacted were vocal skeptics of climate change theory. Most scientists had not seen the movie, which is in limited release, or read the book.
But those who have seen it had the same general impression: Gore conveyed the science correctly; the world is getting hotter and it is a manmade catastrophe-in-the-making caused by the burning of fossil fuels.
"Excellent," said William Schlesinger, dean of the Nicholas School of Environment and Earth Sciences at Duke University. "He got all the important material and got it right."
Robert Corell, chairman of the worldwide Arctic Climate Impact Assessment group of scientists, read the book and saw Gore give the slideshow presentation that is woven throughout the documentary.
"I sat there and I'm amazed at how thorough and accurate," Corell said. "After the presentation I said, `Al, I'm absolutely blown away. There's a lot of details you could get wrong.' ... I could find no error."
Gore, in an interview with the AP, said he wasn't surprised "because I took a lot of care to try to make sure the science was right."
The tiny errors scientists found weren't a big deal, "far, far fewer and less significant than the shortcoming in speeches by the typical politician explaining an issue," said Michael MacCracken, who used to be in charge of the nation's global warming effects program and is now chief scientist at the Climate Institute in Washington.
One concern was about the connection between hurricanes and global warming. That is a subject of a heated debate in the science community. Gore cited five recent scientific studies to support his view.
"I thought the use of imagery from Hurricane Katrina was inappropriate and unnecessary in this regard, as there are plenty of disturbing impacts associated with global warming for which there is much greater scientific consensus," said Brian Soden, a University of Miami professor of meteorology and oceanography.
Some scientists said Gore confused his ice sheets when he said the effect of the Clean Air Act is noticeable in the Antarctic ice core; it is the Greenland ice core. Others thought Gore oversimplified the causal-link between the key greenhouse gas carbon dioxide and rising temperatures.
While some nonscientists could be depressed by the dire disaster-laden warmer world scenario that Gore laid out, one top researcher thought it was too optimistic. Tom Wigley, senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, thought the former vice president sugarcoated the problem by saying that with already-available technologies and changes in habit _ such as changing light bulbs _ the world could help slow or stop global warming.
While more than 1 million people have seen the movie since it opened in May, that does not include Washington's top science decision makers. President Bush said he won't see it. The heads of the Environmental Protection Agency and NASA haven't seen it, and the president's science adviser said the movie is on his to-see list.
"They are quite literally afraid to know the truth," Gore said. "Because if you accept the truth of what the scientific community is saying, it gives you a moral imperative to start to rein in the 70 million tons of global warming pollution that human civilization is putting into the atmosphere every day."
As far as the movie's entertainment value, Scripps Institution geosciences professor Jeff Severinghaus summed it up: "My wife fell asleep. Of course, I was on the edge of my chair."
Hope that adds clarity.
TLW
IT IS BAD BUSINESS TO LOCK INTO OLD TECHNOLOGY
Many conservative business leaders are against coal plants according to the news paper in Austin. "We wish more of them were outspoken about the dirty business of coal power plants." There are businesses people opposing coal plants in just about every state but some may be surprised that even in Texas coal power is seen as bad business. The reality is that in Texas many Texas business leaders are opposed to coal power.
The founders of the Dallas-based Texas Business for Clean Air, an unlikely coalition of conservative, practical, free-market prominent business leaders oppose Texas' 17 proposed pulverized coal power plants; they paid a visit to Austin early this year. Co-founder David Litman, the father of Hotels.com, argues that utilities' coal proposals, especially those of TXU (proposing 11 plants), don't reflect the plants' true costs, which will "go out the smokestacks and into the lungs of our workers and their children," exacerbating federal air-quality non-attainment status in places like Dallas and Houston and choking off growth statewide. "Bottom line, it's bad for business," Litman said.
Litman joined with Dallas real estate mogul Trammell Crow and Container Store co-founder Garrett Boone to start TBCA in 2006, and they've armed themselves for a showdown to fight the utilities using their own weapon of choice – lobbyists. Boone joked that between 40 and 60 of the lobbyists the group contacted prior to the legislative session were either directly engaged by or had a conflict of interest with TXU. They learned that even one of Crow Holdings' own lobbyists had a TXU conflict, Crow said. TXU listed 58 paid lobbyists on a recent Texas Ethics Commission report.
Coal plants are bad business. According to Boone, the TBCA's business-perspective problem with the coal plants is based on a number of unanswered questions, such as the plants' cumulative impact on air-quality attainment, their associated health-care costs, and their effect on the area's ability to attract the best and brightest employees and industries.
Coal has an enduring history of lung disease and other illnesses associated with it that spans more than 100 years.
Litman noted that Toyota and Boeing have already declined to locate near Dallas, as it struggles to reform its air quality.
With the world watching Texas' critical coal decisions, Boone said building the plants could solidify the state's reputation as a backwater when it comes to energy policy. The world is indeed watching not just Texas but the nation as a whole. Coal is a problematic energy solution and not the best choice anywhere.
There are better alternatives in Texas and in the rest of the nation as well. It is bad business to lock into old technology, particularly of the unhealthy variety. The TBCA and its three lobbyists are working to propose solutions both for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and the state's Public Utility Commission, Boone said. Coal and other fossil fuels should be held in reserve and used only as a last resort. He explained that the group favors "maximizing energy efficiency and renewable energy and using coal as judiciously as possible with the best available emissions control technology." He added, "We must take advantage of this time of rapidly advancing technology. It's a bad business decision to lock into old technology now."
TO SET THE RECORD STRAIGHT
According to the nany pundits; Among the Scientists on the IPCC there was a wide spread dissent. Let me straighten that out for you.
OK here it is.
There is a BIG LIE being told. This statement is true, there was dissent, but as is crystal clear in the facts and news reported (see below), the dissent was in the opposite direction of the puindits implication, it was dissent by scientist's over the watering down of the scietist's conclusions by the politicians of the Bush administration, in the UN!
PLEASE SEE THE ARTICLE BELOW.
“IPCC Scientists Vow Never to Participate Again.”
An international global warming conference approved a report on climate change April of 2007 after a contentious marathon session that saw angry exchanges between diplomats and scientists who drafted the report.
"We have an approved accord. It has been a complex exercise," chairman Rajendra Pachauri told reporters after an all-night meeting.
Finalizing the report, which was years in the making, came down to an all-night session, described as very contentious, reports CBS News correspondent Mark Phillips.
"I'm wearing the same suit I wore yesterday morning and I've been sitting in a chair all night," said Pachauri.
Several scientists objected to the editing of the final draft by government negotiators but in the end agreed to compromises. However, some scientists on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change vowed never to take part in the process again.
The climax of five days of negotiations was reached when the delegates removed parts of a key chart highlighting devastating effects of climate change that kick in with every rise of 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit, and in a tussle over the level of confidence attached to key statements.
The United States, China and Saudi Arabia raised the most objections to the phrasing, most often seeking to tone down the certainty of some of the more dire projections.
The leader of distortion serving political interests was from the United States. The lead U.S. official at the meeting, Sharon Hays, said climate change is a global challenge that needs more study.
"Science in this area is evolving. Determination of the certainty that scientists can place any particular finding is important," she said. Pressed to describe changes sought by the U.S., Hayes would only say, "Every aspect of this report generated discussion."
The disturbing truth here is crystal clear. The Bush administration remains opposed to mandatory caps on greenhouse gas emissions, reports CBS News White House correspondent Peter Maer. It prefers international cooperation to curb pollution. The president has argued that the mandatory caps on greenhouse gas emissions would hurt the economy.
The Bush administration did what they could to conceal the truth. But the major thrusts of the report could not be watered down. It concludes that those who are already suffering most in this world, are going to suffer worst due to global warming, reports Phillips.
The final report is the clearest and most comprehensive scientific statement to date on the impact of global warming mainly caused by man-induced carbon dioxide pollution.
It predicts that:
up to 30 percent of species face an increased risk of extinction if global temperatures rise 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit above the average in the 1980s and 90s.
Areas that now suffer a shortage of rain, in particular the already parched areas of sub-Sahara Africa, will become even more dry, adding to the risks of hunger and disease, and making those areas less able to support populations.
The world will face heightened threats of flooding, severe storms and the erosion of coastlines. The low-lying areas of Asia — called the mega-deltas — will be most vulnerable.
"It is the poorest of the poor in the world who are going to be worst hit, least able to adapt," said Pachauri.
But the rich countries are not immune, notes Phillips. The report warns of increased risk of brushfires in California and of insect infestations and increased frequencies of heat waves in the American cities already prone to them.
And the U.S. has its own low lying areas in the Southeast whose vulnerability will increase.
Meanwhile, Britain, as president of the United Nations Security Council, has called an open meeting April 17 to debate what its ambassador, Emyr Jones Parry, calls "one of the big challenges for the world for the next century." It will focus on the impact of global warming on issues that can spark conflicts including border disputes and access to energy, water and food.
That will raise the level of international attention and include the idea that global warming presents threats to international security, with a view to action that could be taken by the United Nations to control human-created greenhouse gasses in the future," says CBS News foreign affairs analyst Pamela Falk.
Global warming is an issue that is already moving away from science and into politics, reports Phillips.
The IPCC report will be presented at a Group of Eight leaders summit in June in Germany, which the EU will use to pressure President Bush to sign on to international talks to cut emissions.
James Connaughton, chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, rejected a reporter's characterization Friday morning that the administration is sitting out the Kyoto process as a "gross mischaracterization of the U.S. role internationally," reports Maer. Connaughton said the U.S. is engaging developing countries on strategies to reduce greenhouse gasses.
The final document will be the product of a United Nations network of 2,000 scientists as authors and reviewers, along with representatives of more than 120 governments as last-minute editors.
It will be the second volume of a four-volume authoritative assessment of Earth's climate being released this year. The last such effort was in 2001.
The new global warming report issued Friday by the United Nations paints a near-apocalyptic vision of Earth's future: more than a billion people in need of water, extreme food shortages in Africa, a planetary landscape ravaged by floods and millions of species sentenced to extinction.
READ THIS
But despite the harshness of its vision, the report was quickly criticized by scientists who said its findings were watered down at the last minute by government bureaucrats seeking to deflect calls for action.
"The science got hijacked by the political bureaucrats at the late stage of the game," said John Walsh, a climate expert at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks, who helped write a chapter on the polar regions.
Even in its softened form, the report outlined a range of devastating effects that will strike all regions of the world and all levels of society. Those without resources to adapt to the changes will suffer the greatest impact, according to the study from the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
The report is the second issued this year by the United Nations, which marshaled more than 2,500 scientists to give their best predictions of the consequences of a few degrees increase in temperature.
The first report, released in February, characterized global warming as a runaway train that is irreversible, but that can be moderated by societal changes. That report said, with more than 90 percent confidence, that the warming is caused by humans, and its conclusions were widely accepted because of the years of accumulated scientific data supporting it.
In contrast, the second report was more controversial because it tackled the more uncertain issues of the precise effects of warming and the ability of humans to adapt to it.
The report, in a sense, is a more focused indictment of the world's biggest polluters - the industrialized nations - and a more specific identification of the victims.
The last-minute negotiations led to deleting timelines for future events and scaling back the degree of confidence in some projections. Both actions will ease the pressure on industrialized nations to reduce their emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that are gradually warming the planet.
Several scientists vowed afterward that they would never participate in the process again because of the political interference.
"Once is enough," said Walsh, who was not present during the negotiations in Brussels, but kept abreast of developments with e-mails from colleagues. "I was receiving hourly reports that grew increasingly frustrated."
The report paints a bleak picture of the future, noting that the early signs of warming already are here:
Spring is arriving earlier, with plants blooming weeks ahead of schedule.
In the mountains, the runoff begins earlier in the year, shrinking glaciers in the Alps, the Himalayas and the Andes.
Habitats for plants and animals, both on land and in the oceans, are shifting toward the poles.
Nineteen of the 20 hottest years on record have occurred since 1980, according to previous studies. The report said more frequent and more intense heat waves are "very likely" in the future.
In some places, warming might seem like a good thing, at first. For example, worldwide food production is expected to increase with the first few degrees of temperature rise. For a time, an expanded fertile zone in the higher latitudes could offset losses in the tropics. But at a certain point, as drought conditions spread, crops everywhere will suffer.
By mid-century, temperature rise and drying soil will replace tropical forests with savannas in Brazil's eastern Amazonia, the report predicts.
In North America, snowpack in the West will decline, causing more floods in the winter and reduced flows in the summer, increasing competition for water for agriculture and municipal use. California agriculture will be decimated by the loss of water for irrigation, experts have previously said. Water will come more often around the world in its least welcome forms: storms and floods.
Rising temperatures will reconfigure coastlines around the world, as the oceans rise and seawater surges over land. The tiny islands of the South Pacific and the Asian deltas will be overwhelmed by storm surges as sea levels rise.
In the Andes and the Himalayas, melting glaciers will unleash floods and rock avalanches. But within a few decades, as the glaciers and snowpack decline, streams will dwindle, cutting off the main water supply to more than one-sixth of the world's population.
Africa will suffer the most extreme effects, with a quarter of a billion people losing most of their water supplies, the report said. Food production will fall by half in many countries and governments will have to spend 10 percent of their budgets or more to adapt to climate changes, the report said.
At least 30 percent of the world's species will disappear if temperatures rise 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit above the average levels of the 1980s and 1990s, the report said.
"Don't be poor in a hot country, don't live in hurricane alley, watch out about being on the coasts or in the Arctic, and it's a bad idea to be on a high mountain," said Stephen Schneider of Stanford University, one of the scientists who contributed to the report.
The Bush administration quickly made it clear that it would not be stampeded by the report into taking part in the U.N.'s Kyoto Protocol, which seeks to limit emissions of carbon dioxide. The U.S. withdrew from the protocol in 2001, saying it was too expensive and did not impose enough controls on developing nations.
"Each nation sort of defines their regulatory objectives in different ways to achieve the greenhouse reduction outcome that they seek," said Jim Connaughton, chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, during a teleconference Friday from Brussels.
Sharon Hays, associate director of the White House Office of Science and Technology, noted in the same teleconference that "not all projected impacts are negative." Initially, the warming will increase agricultural output in the mid-latitudes and in northern regions.
Other governments, such as China, Russia and Saudi Arabia, had already expressed their displeasure with parts of the report by demanding changes - some of them seemingly minor in the grand scheme of climate change.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a prepared statement that political agendas need to be left behind and quick action taken to cut emissions.
"Global warming is already under way, but it is not too late to slow it down and reduce its harmful effects," she said. "We must base our actions on the moral imperative and the scientific record, free of political interference."
Hope that clears the matter up regarding who is distorting the facts.
PSUDONYM you are a stranger to the truth and a traitor to reason, the world you want to exist, is not consistant with the science.
TLW
_________________
Terry L. Walker, AIA
Terry L. Walker, Architects
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TLWalkerAIA
Joined: 16 Apr 2004
Posts: 130
Location: Seattle Washington, USA
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| Posted: Wed Oct 31, 2007 5:45 pm Post subject: again |
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By Terry L. Walker, AIA:
Sir, the science speaks for itself. It always has and always will by it's nature speak to the truth as demonstarted by tests in physical reality. If you want to advocate the use of fossil fuel when there are better alternatives go right ahead. For your information however, the credibility of science or the scientific observations, and thereby Mr. Gore & Mr. Mazria's public statements, and mine for that matter, are soundly based upon facts.
Scientists do not care, and I do not care about conjecture not supported by the physical evidence and the mainstream of science has denounced such conjecture ast you have cited. They do not care what the court decides or the politicians have to say, because it is not relevant to scientific methods. They have proven the conjecture false. Science is about establishing what is so by testing in physical reality. The arguments in the press or the court room are to protect some vested interest between parties not to establish the physical realities. The majority of scientist agree that in terms of cause and effect that human activity is the primary cause of global warming. Say what you want, I am in good company here and well informed by scientists who have their hands on the work.
For a long time in the US court room there was insufficiently clear evidence that smoking caused cancer and the courts were deciding that claims that smoking did cause cancer were not supportable. Those defending the tabaco companies, many with fine credentials and good intentions, eventually found themselves out of touch with the physical realities. That was long ago and many deaths behind us. You can cling to your beliefs but it is unlikely that the vast majority of the worlds scientists have decided to perpetrate a hoax on the whole world. Enough said. The ice core studies do not support your theory of a 1500 year climate cycle.
I am quite convinced that the great efforts to maintain the existing energy paradigm are rooted in politically inspired fantasy rather than science. Probably hatched in Oklahoma somewhere. That is my opinion. The AIA as an organization, is in line with the science of world climate and the interpretation of the climate data by a large number of scientists, witch includes the UN IPCC panel of scientists.
Let's talk about COAL as that is the central subject in this discourse.
Although it is possible to clean the carbon from the gas arising from the use of coal for power generation, it is difficult for me to comprehend why this would be better than spending the same money on the solar alternative. Hydrogen fuel cell technology has the capacity to store energy collected by PV panels. This is established technology and is the storage media of choice.
There appears to be some challenge regarding my knowledge of the COAL POWER issue.
COAL POWER is "old technology". Carbon capture from coal is wishful thinking and is not a mature available technology.
Here is what they have in mind:Carbon Capture;
CO2 is captured using technologies that have been developed and proved in other applications. Currently, there are three main CO2 capture approaches:
• From combustion products from power plant flue gases
• Before combustion in gasification systems (see below)
• By burning coal or gas in oxygen to produce a concentrated CO2 flue gas.
The leading technology in use today involves separating CO2 from flue gases or other streams using an amine solution, and then recovering the CO2 by steam stripping.
Hydrogen production / Carbon dioxide separation
Gasification of fossil fuels (see above) produces a hydrogen and carbon monoxide gas stream, which when reacted with steam (the water shift reaction) produces a mixture of hydrogen and carbon dioxide, which can be separated (by pressure swing adsorption).
The hydrogen can then be used as:
• A chemical feedstock,
• A fuel in a gas turbine combined cycle plant or a fuel cell to produce electricity,
• A fuel for transportation.
The carbon dioxide can then be stored or sequestered in some way.
Perhaps CO2 Compression and transport
after capture CO2 is compressed to a liquid state at ~80 atmospheres pressure and pumped to the storage site. The CO2 may then be injected into the target geological formation. Really?
CO2 is largely inert and is already transported in high pressure pipelines. For example, the Weyburn project in Canada currently transports over 1 million tons of CO2 through 320 kilometer long pipeline.
Is sequestration or Carbon Storage Feasible?
For CO2 storage to be an effective way of avoiding climate change, the CO2 must be stored for several hundreds or thousands of years.
CO2 storage also requires minimal environmental impacts, low costs to be affordable, and conformity to national and international laws.
The main options for storing CO2 underground are in depleted oil and gas reservoirs, deep saline reservoirs and un-minable coal seams.
CO2 is stored in gas-tight natural reservoirs, such as those that already hold oil, gas or water. These must be at depths greater than 800m, where the CO2 can be stored in a comparatively dense form.
Monitoring and verification
If CO2 storage is to be used as a basis for emissions trading or to meet national commitments on emission reductions, it will be necessary to verify the quantities of CO2 stored. We would have to prove that it was not leaking back into the atmosphere.
Measurement of the amounts of CO2 injected during geosequestration uses established and well understood technologies. However the quantities that would need to be stored are formidable. The issue is making sure the CO2 stays where it is placed; and hence requires both;
An understanding of the reservoir geology, and recognition of both secure versus potentially leaky storage sites; and
An ability to measure CO2 both at point of placement and thereafter should it leak.
Major oil and gas companies and their contractors can track gas flows in underground reservoirs using seismic and well logging techniques and reservoir simulation tools. These technologies are being successfully applied in sequestration projects in Europe and North America.
Further development of these technologies is required, along with the demonstration of techniques for measuring and controlling small gas leakages.
What has actually been done in coal-fired capture?
There are commercially operating plants throughout the world that utilize CO2 captured from the flue gas of coal fired power stations. This is then used as a raw material for use in food and chemical processing plants. However these operations typically only recover of the order of one to two hundred tons of CO2 per day which would represents less than TWO PERCENT (2%) of the DAILY TOTAL of CO2 emitted from a typical 500 MW coal fired power plant. (SEE http://www.tmm.com.au/zets/faq/faq.htm )
Little or no actual demonstrated feasibility.
The goal of carbon sequestration is to take CO2 that would otherwise accumulate in the atmosphere and put it in safe permanent storage. This can be done in really big natural or man made bottles underground or chemically trapped. We must question what sorbet would be used in the latter case and how that sorbet could be recycled if at all. You see whatever it is; it will take a lot of it to scrub the CO2 from all that coal. It will have to be kept scrubbed for a very long time.
It is kind of like nuclear waste you see. There is really no place to put the waste product.
On site capture may be a sensible approach for the large sources such as a coal plant if there was some place to put the captured CO2, but obviously it is not feasible for small or mobile sources. Where do we dump it? How do we secure it? How much is that going to cost? What makes that the best alternative?
A paper written by Klaus S. Lackner, Pattrick Grimes and Hans-J Ziock explores the options and suggests that extraction of CO2 from free air flow could provide a viable cost effective alternative to changing transportation infrastructure to non carbonaceous fuels. This paper suggests that first we burn the coal and consequently pollute the air, live in that polluted air and then clean it in a big air laundering facility.
Although possible, in reality the feasibility of 100% CO2 capture has not been demonstrated anywhere and is simply not available for implementation at this time. The sorbents required to my knowledge have not been identified and are not available. Before you wade in with your right wing rhetoric please show us your science. Before we build those coal plants show us an operating economically feasible cost competitive working model.
This is not high school science. In a classroom experiment we can bubble air through calcium hydroxide solution and remove the CO2 component. Under controlled conditions we can scrub CO2. However, in real life we are faced with the scale of the task which can not be economically addressed! Where do we put the calcium carbonate? How do we keep the CO2 chained to it?
Giberto Rozenchan arrived at the price of $10 to $15 per ton of CO2 using capture and storage by an active recycles sorbent. The significant cost involved in carbon capture and storage is the capture process. Various studies by the IEA GHG R&D program and others have assessed the costs of capturing CO2 from new pulverized coal, integrated coal gasification and natural gas combined cycle power plants, which range from approximately US$15 to 90 per ton CO2 avoided or about 75 percent of the whole problem solution cost of CO2 capture, transport and sequestration.
It is estimated that transport and storage costs are typically in the range US$5 - $15 per ton, depending on transport distance and storage method.
Current estimates from the Electric Power Research Institute on the cost of electricity from power plants with carbon capture and storage indicates a 40 – 50 % increase in the cost of electricity for new integrated gasification combined cycle plants and approximately an 80 – 90 % increase for new pulverized coal plants utilizing conventional processes.
Is the coal option viable where the cost of solar collection plant has at the most a one time installation cost of $30/kwh without the forever cost burden of the fossil fuel itself and the associated cleanup burden.
We are currently adding globally a net 10 billion tons of carbon to the atmosphere every year!
Wake up to the reality that the amount of CO2 is measurable, has been measured and that this is hard science and not political smoke.
According to US agencies, that is simply what is so.
The net zero carbon economy works better than expanding the fossil fuel economy, obviously existing solar power plants in operation do not add to the CO2 burden at all. Obviously they are also cheaper when subjected to a rational analysis of the cost. We have reason for high hopes.
Where we have hydro electric facilities we save power as water behind the damn that will be there when we need it each year. With existing fossil fuel plants we will have plenty of fossil fuel in the ground as a back-up fuel supply. All of the necessary existing plant and distribution infrastructure, the externality, is in place and long since amortized.
The pundits will talk about the cost. So while we are at it let us defuse the argument. But industry experts point out; "The installation price of photovoltaics and other alternative energy production options are actually just an externality. "
The high initial installation cost is a sunk cost, not an ongoing cost like those of fossil fuels! Just like the hydro electric damn. Does anyone take into account the cost of building the entire drilling, shipping, storage and refining infrastructure for crude oil, when analyzing the price of gasoline? No they do not. Or the similar costs when analyzing the price of coal plants or hydro-electric plants? No they don't. These costs are long-ago amortized, and are no longer reflected in the price we pay.
The economic problem associated with photovoltaics isn’t their ongoing operational or replacement cost, which is minimal; it is the cost of building a photovoltaic infrastructure on American rooftops- building the installed base - from scratch. The current cost wholesale to build that infrastructure is about $10.00 per watt installed.
Coal is not a sustainable source of power. There is simply no logic in planning a future around non-renewable sources of power.
For your information:
The following article is published on the Web at
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/27/AR2006062700780.html
You are dead wrong about the IPCC panel and Mr. Gore
Scientists OK Gore's Movie for Accuracy
By SETH BORENSTEIN
The Associated Press
Tuesday, June 27, 2006; 9:15 PM
WASHINGTON -- The nation's top climate scientists are giving "An Inconvenient Truth," Al Gore's documentary on global warming, five stars for accuracy.
The former vice president's movie _ replete with the prospect of a flooded New York City, an inundated Florida, more and nastier hurricanes, worsening droughts, retreating glaciers and disappearing ice sheets _ mostly got the science right, said all 19 climate scientists who had seen the movie or read the book and answered questions from The Associated Press. The AP contacted more than 100 top climate researchers by e-mail and phone for their opinion. Among those contacted were vocal skeptics of climate change theory. Most scientists had not seen the movie, which is in limited release, or read the book.
But those who have seen it had the same general impression: Gore conveyed the science correctly; the world is getting hotter and it is a manmade catastrophe-in-the-making caused by the burning of fossil fuels.
"Excellent," said William Schlesinger, dean of the Nicholas School of Environment and Earth Sciences at Duke University. "He got all the important material and got it right."
Robert Corell, chairman of the worldwide Arctic Climate Impact Assessment group of scientists, read the book and saw Gore give the slideshow presentation that is woven throughout the documentary.
"I sat there and I'm amazed at how thorough and accurate," Corell said. "After the presentation I said, `Al, I'm absolutely blown away. There's a lot of details you could get wrong.' ... I could find no error."
Gore, in an interview with the AP, said he wasn't surprised "because I took a lot of care to try to make sure the science was right."
The tiny errors scientists found weren't a big deal, "far, far fewer and less significant than the shortcoming in speeches by the typical politician explaining an issue," said Michael MacCracken, who used to be in charge of the nation's global warming effects program and is now chief scientist at the Climate Institute in Washington.
One concern was about the connection between hurricanes and global warming. That is a subject of a heated debate in the science community. Gore cited five recent scientific studies to support his view.
"I thought the use of imagery from Hurricane Katrina was inappropriate and unnecessary in this regard, as there are plenty of disturbing impacts associated with global warming for which there is much greater scientific consensus," said Brian Soden, a University of Miami professor of meteorology and oceanography.
Some scientists said Gore confused his ice sheets when he said the effect of the Clean Air Act is noticeable in the Antarctic ice core; it is the Greenland ice core. Others thought Gore oversimplified the causal-link between the key greenhouse gas carbon dioxide and rising temperatures.
While some nonscientists could be depressed by the dire disaster-laden warmer world scenario that Gore laid out, one top researcher thought it was too optimistic. Tom Wigley, senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, thought the former vice president sugarcoated the problem by saying that with already-available technologies and changes in habit _ such as changing light bulbs _ the world could help slow or stop global warming.
While more than 1 million people have seen the movie since it opened in May, that does not include Washington's top science decision makers. President Bush said he won't see it. The heads of the Environmental Protection Agency and NASA haven't seen it, and the president's science adviser said the movie is on his to-see list.
"They are quite literally afraid to know the truth," Gore said. "Because if you accept the truth of what the scientific community is saying, it gives you a moral imperative to start to rein in the 70 million tons of global warming pollution that human civilization is putting into the atmosphere every day."
As far as the movie's entertainment value, Scripps Institution geosciences professor Jeff Severinghaus summed it up: "My wife fell asleep. Of course, I was on the edge of my chair."
Hope that adds clarity.
TLW
IT IS BAD BUSINESS TO LOCK INTO OLD TECHNOLOGY
Many conservative business leaders are against coal plants according to the news paper in Austin. "We wish more of them were outspoken about the dirty business of coal power plants." There are businesses people opposing coal plants in just about every state but some may be surprised that even in Texas coal power is seen as bad business. The reality is that in Texas many Texas business leaders are opposed to coal power.
The founders of the Dallas-based Texas Business for Clean Air, an unlikely coalition of conservative, practical, free-market prominent business leaders oppose Texas' 17 proposed pulverized coal power plants; they paid a visit to Austin early this year. Co-founder David Litman, the father of Hotels.com, argues that utilities' coal proposals, especially those of TXU (proposing 11 plants), don't reflect the plants' true costs, which will "go out the smokestacks and into the lungs of our workers and their children," exacerbating federal air-quality non-attainment status in places like Dallas and Houston and choking off growth statewide. "Bottom line, it's bad for business," Litman said.
Litman joined with Dallas real estate mogul Trammell Crow and Container Store co-founder Garrett Boone to start TBCA in 2006, and they've armed themselves for a showdown to fight the utilities using their own weapon of choice – lobbyists. Boone joked that between 40 and 60 of the lobbyists the group contacted prior to the legislative session were either directly engaged by or had a conflict of interest with TXU. They learned that even one of Crow Holdings' own lobbyists had a TXU conflict, Crow said. TXU listed 58 paid lobbyists on a recent Texas Ethics Commission report.
Coal plants are bad business. According to Boone, the TBCA's business-perspective problem with the coal plants is based on a number of unanswered questions, such as the plants' cumulative impact on air-quality attainment, their associated health-care costs, and their effect on the area's ability to attract the best and brightest employees and industries.
Coal has an enduring history of lung disease and other illnesses associated with it that spans more than 100 years.
Litman noted that Toyota and Boeing have already declined to locate near Dallas, as it struggles to reform its air quality.
With the world watching Texas' critical coal decisions, Boone said building the plants could solidify the state's reputation as a backwater when it comes to energy policy. The world is indeed watching not just Texas but the nation as a whole. Coal is a problematic energy solution and not the best choice anywhere.
There are better alternatives in Texas and in the rest of the nation as well. It is bad business to lock into old technology, particularly of the unhealthy variety. The TBCA and its three lobbyists are working to propose solutions both for the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality and the state's Public Utility Commission, Boone said. Coal and other fossil fuels should be held in reserve and used only as a last resort. He explained that the group favors "maximizing energy efficiency and renewable energy and using coal as judiciously as possible with the best available emissions control technology." He added, "We must take advantage of this time of rapidly advancing technology. It's a bad business decision to lock into old technology now."
TO SET THE RECORD STRAIGHT
According to the nany pundits; Among the Scientists on the IPCC there was a wide spread dissent. Let me straighten that out for you.
OK here it is.
There is a BIG LIE being told. This statement is true, there was dissent, but as is crystal clear in the facts and news reported (see below), the dissent was in the opposite direction of the puindits implication, it was dissent by scientist's over the watering down of the scietist's conclusions by the politicians of the Bush administration, in the UN!
PLEASE SEE THE ARTICLE BELOW.
“IPCC Scientists Vow Never to Participate Again.”
An international global warming conference approved a report on climate change April of 2007 after a contentious marathon session that saw angry exchanges between diplomats and scientists who drafted the report.
"We have an approved accord. It has been a complex exercise," chairman Rajendra Pachauri told reporters after an all-night meeting.
Finalizing the report, which was years in the making, came down to an all-night session, described as very contentious, reports CBS News correspondent Mark Phillips.
"I'm wearing the same suit I wore yesterday morning and I've been sitting in a chair all night," said Pachauri.
Several scientists objected to the editing of the final draft by government negotiators but in the end agreed to compromises. However, some scientists on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change vowed never to take part in the process again.
The climax of five days of negotiations was reached when the delegates removed parts of a key chart highlighting devastating effects of climate change that kick in with every rise of 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit, and in a tussle over the level of confidence attached to key statements.
The United States, China and Saudi Arabia raised the most objections to the phrasing, most often seeking to tone down the certainty of some of the more dire projections.
The leader of distortion serving political interests was from the United States. The lead U.S. official at the meeting, Sharon Hays, said climate change is a global challenge that needs more study.
"Science in this area is evolving. Determination of the certainty that scientists can place any particular finding is important," she said. Pressed to describe changes sought by the U.S., Hayes would only say, "Every aspect of this report generated discussion."
The disturbing truth here is crystal clear. The Bush administration remains opposed to mandatory caps on greenhouse gas emissions, reports CBS News White House correspondent Peter Maer. It prefers international cooperation to curb pollution. The president has argued that the mandatory caps on greenhouse gas emissions would hurt the economy.
The Bush administration did what they could to conceal the truth. But the major thrusts of the report could not be watered down. It concludes that those who are already suffering most in this world, are going to suffer worst due to global warming, reports Phillips.
The final report is the clearest and most comprehensive scientific statement to date on the impact of global warming mainly caused by man-induced carbon dioxide pollution.
It predicts that:
up to 30 percent of species face an increased risk of extinction if global temperatures rise 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit above the average in the 1980s and 90s.
Areas that now suffer a shortage of rain, in particular the already parched areas of sub-Sahara Africa, will become even more dry, adding to the risks of hunger and disease, and making those areas less able to support populations.
The world will face heightened threats of flooding, severe storms and the erosion of coastlines. The low-lying areas of Asia — called the mega-deltas — will be most vulnerable.
"It is the poorest of the poor in the world who are going to be worst hit, least able to adapt," said Pachauri.
But the rich countries are not immune, notes Phillips. The report warns of increased risk of brushfires in California and of insect infestations and increased frequencies of heat waves in the American cities already prone to them.
And the U.S. has its own low lying areas in the Southeast whose vulnerability will increase.
Meanwhile, Britain, as president of the United Nations Security Council, has called an open meeting April 17 to debate what its ambassador, Emyr Jones Parry, calls "one of the big challenges for the world for the next century." It will focus on the impact of global warming on issues that can spark conflicts including border disputes and access to energy, water and food.
That will raise the level of international attention and include the idea that global warming presents threats to international security, with a view to action that could be taken by the United Nations to control human-created greenhouse gasses in the future," says CBS News foreign affairs analyst Pamela Falk.
Global warming is an issue that is already moving away from science and into politics, reports Phillips.
The IPCC report will be presented at a Group of Eight leaders summit in June in Germany, which the EU will use to pressure President Bush to sign on to international talks to cut emissions.
James Connaughton, chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, rejected a reporter's characterization Friday morning that the administration is sitting out the Kyoto process as a "gross mischaracterization of the U.S. role internationally," reports Maer. Connaughton said the U.S. is engaging developing countries on strategies to reduce greenhouse gasses.
The final document will be the product of a United Nations network of 2,000 scientists as authors and reviewers, along with representatives of more than 120 governments as last-minute editors.
It will be the second volume of a four-volume authoritative assessment of Earth's climate being released this year. The last such effort was in 2001.
The new global warming report issued Friday by the United Nations paints a near-apocalyptic vision of Earth's future: more than a billion people in need of water, extreme food shortages in Africa, a planetary landscape ravaged by floods and millions of species sentenced to extinction.
READ THIS
But despite the harshness of its vision, the report was quickly criticized by scientists who said its findings were watered down at the last minute by government bureaucrats seeking to deflect calls for action.
"The science got hijacked by the political bureaucrats at the late stage of the game," said John Walsh, a climate expert at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks, who helped write a chapter on the polar regions.
Even in its softened form, the report outlined a range of devastating effects that will strike all regions of the world and all levels of society. Those without resources to adapt to the changes will suffer the greatest impact, according to the study from the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
The report is the second issued this year by the United Nations, which marshaled more than 2,500 scientists to give their best predictions of the consequences of a few degrees increase in temperature.
The first report, released in February, characterized global warming as a runaway train that is irreversible, but that can be moderated by societal changes. That report said, with more than 90 percent confidence, that the warming is caused by humans, and its conclusions were widely accepted because of the years of accumulated scientific data supporting it.
In contrast, the second report was more controversial because it tackled the more uncertain issues of the precise effects of warming and the ability of humans to adapt to it.
The report, in a sense, is a more focused indictment of the world's biggest polluters - the industrialized nations - and a more specific identification of the victims.
The last-minute negotiations led to deleting timelines for future events and scaling back the degree of confidence in some projections. Both actions will ease the pressure on industrialized nations to reduce their emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that are gradually warming the planet.
Several scientists vowed afterward that they would never participate in the process again because of the political interference.
"Once is enough," said Walsh, who was not present during the negotiations in Brussels, but kept abreast of developments with e-mails from colleagues. "I was receiving hourly reports that grew increasingly frustrated."
The report paints a bleak picture of the future, noting that the early signs of warming already are here:
Spring is arriving earlier, with plants blooming weeks ahead of schedule.
In the mountains, the runoff begins earlier in the year, shrinking glaciers in the Alps, the Himalayas and the Andes.
Habitats for plants and animals, both on land and in the oceans, are shifting toward the poles.
Nineteen of the 20 hottest years on record have occurred since 1980, according to previous studies. The report said more frequent and more intense heat waves are "very likely" in the future.
In some places, warming might seem like a good thing, at first. For example, worldwide food production is expected to increase with the first few degrees of temperature rise. For a time, an expanded fertile zone in the higher latitudes could offset losses in the tropics. But at a certain point, as drought conditions spread, crops everywhere will suffer.
By mid-century, temperature rise and drying soil will replace tropical forests with savannas in Brazil's eastern Amazonia, the report predicts.
In North America, snowpack in the West will decline, causing more floods in the winter and reduced flows in the summer, increasing competition for water for agriculture and municipal use. California agriculture will be decimated by the loss of water for irrigation, experts have previously said. Water will come more often around the world in its least welcome forms: storms and floods.
Rising temperatures will reconfigure coastlines around the world, as the oceans rise and seawater surges over land. The tiny islands of the South Pacific and the Asian deltas will be overwhelmed by storm surges as sea levels rise.
In the Andes and the Himalayas, melting glaciers will unleash floods and rock avalanches. But within a few decades, as the glaciers and snowpack decline, streams will dwindle, cutting off the main water supply to more than one-sixth of the world's population.
Africa will suffer the most extreme effects, with a quarter of a billion people losing most of their water supplies, the report said. Food production will fall by half in many countries and governments will have to spend 10 percent of their budgets or more to adapt to climate changes, the report said.
At least 30 percent of the world's species will disappear if temperatures rise 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit above the average levels of the 1980s and 1990s, the report said.
"Don't be poor in a hot country, don't live in hurricane alley, watch out about being on the coasts or in the Arctic, and it's a bad idea to be on a high mountain," said Stephen Schneider of Stanford University, one of the scientists who contributed to the report.
The Bush administration quickly made it clear that it would not be stampeded by the report into taking part in the U.N.'s Kyoto Protocol, which seeks to limit emissions of carbon dioxide. The U.S. withdrew from the protocol in 2001, saying it was too expensive and did not impose enough controls on developing nations.
"Each nation sort of defines their regulatory objectives in different ways to achieve the greenhouse reduction outcome that they seek," said Jim Connaughton, chairman of the White House Council on Environmental Quality, during a teleconference Friday from Brussels.
Sharon Hays, associate director of the White House Office of Science and Technology, noted in the same teleconference that "not all projected impacts are negative." Initially, the warming will increase agricultural output in the mid-latitudes and in northern regions.
Other governments, such as China, Russia and Saudi Arabia, had already expressed their displeasure with parts of the report by demanding changes - some of them seemingly minor in the grand scheme of climate change.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a prepared statement that political agendas need to be left behind and quick action taken to cut emissions.
"Global warming is already under way, but it is not too late to slow it down and reduce its harmful effects," she said. "We must base our actions on the moral imperative and the scientific record, free of political interference."
Hope that clears the matter up regarding who is distorting the facts.
PSUDONYM you are a stranger to the truth and a traitor to reason, the world you want to exist, is not consistant with the science.
TLW
_________________
Terry L. Walker, AIA
Terry L. Walker, Architects
terry.walker20@verizon.net |
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csintexas
millennium club
Joined: 06 Feb 2006
Posts: 2174
Location: USA
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psudonym
Joined: 28 Oct 2007
Posts: 7
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| Posted: Mon Nov 05, 2007 10:25 pm Post subject: |
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TLW,
Your definition of science is a bit over-simplified but you are partially correct. This is the one of the major problems with the climate models that claim anthropogenic global warming (AGW). They cannot be tested on the globe. They cannot predict a single event or be tested. The climate models make huge assumptions that are not based on reality. There are numerous problems with the models. For example, there was a massive heat loss in the oceans a few years ago that is "not well understood" let alone even included in the models. see http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/people/lyman/Pdf/heat_2006.pdf
There are many other problems with the models and the science as Al Gore preached. The people you cite supporting this movie are backing their own work...so it's no wonder. Go to
http://www.junkscience.com/Greenhouse/ or junkscience.com
Why are you bringing up tobacco lawyers? This makes no sense.
You say,
"I am quite convinced that the great efforts to maintain the existing energy paradigm are rooted in politically inspired fantasy rather than science." Now we are getting somewhere.
You are convinced (believe) that no matter what is said by whomever, on the other side, they are politically motivated. Maybe that is one of the reasons why recent discoveries of Mars undergoing similar warming was dismissed by supporters of agw that it is only coincidence. Refer to article in National Geographic.
You say
"In short it is evil, the deliberate destruction of god's harmonious creation for proffit."
I thought we were talking about science not religion. Okay it's what you believe. Let's get back to science.
You say
"There is however, no debate that endures in the scientific community"
but the scientists say,
THE ENVIROTRUTH: "There is of course no consensus at all," according to Dr. Fred Singer, President of The Science & Environmental Policy Project and Distinguished Research Professor at George Mason University and Professor Emeritus of environmental science at the University of Virginia. "There isn't even a consensus on whether the atmosphere is currently warming -- never mind on whether humanity should be held responsible."
Most people don't realize that there are in fact two parts to the IPCC report - a large science section (the 'main report') which is a description of research activities in climate science, as well as a highly politicized "Summary for Policymakers". The summary is what is commonly quoted in the media and by those supporting Kyoto. They present it as the consensus of thousands of the world's foremost climate scientists. In fact, it is no such thing. It only represents a consensus of government representatives (many of whom are also their nations' Kyoto representatives), NGO's and business, rather than of scientists. The Summary for Policymakers has a strong tendency to disguise uncertainty and presents frightening scenarios for which there is no evidence.
Dr. Philip Stott, Professor Emeritus of Biogeography at the University of London (England), explains, "The whole feel of the IPCC report differs between its political summary and the scientific sections. It comes as a shock to read the following in the conclusions to the science part: "In sum, a strategy must recognize what is possible. In climate research and modeling, we should recognize that we are dealing with a coupled non-linear system, and therefore that the prediction of a specific future climate is not possible." - quite a contrast to the alarmism of the Summary for Policymakers.
Dr. Richard S. Lindzen, Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology, Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and one of the lead authors of the science sections of the IPCC report, has scathingly described the summary as "very much a children's exercise of what might possibly happen," prepared by a "peculiar group" with "no technical competence." Professor Lindzen further described the inept and unethical behaviour of the IPCC in preparing their reports in his May 2, 2001 testimony to the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee - the full transcript of that testimony can be viewed at http://web.archive.org/web/20060421065755/http://www.senate.gov/~epw/lin_0502.htm. On hearing about Canada's Minister of the Environment David Anderson's confidence in the dramatic conclusions of the IPCC summary report, Dr. Lindzen laughed, "There is a certain charm when politicians are so certain of the science when the scientists are not."
"The UN IPCC WG1 Summary for Policymakers of the Third Assessment Report is not an assessment of climate change science, even though it claims to be," sums up climate specialist, Dr. David Wojick. "Rather, it is an artfully constructed presentation of just the science that supports the fear of human induced climate change. In short, this is advocacy, not assessment." *
Even the science part of the IPCC report is suspect. "It is absolutely remarkable how inferior and one-sided this report is," said Dr. Nils Axel-Mörner, Professor of Paleogeophysics and Geodynamics at Stockholm University. "Where are all the real sea level specialists from our Commission and from IGCP? They have had little or nothing to say in this report. If science is treated in this way, it is bound to go wrong."
Dr. Tim Ball, environmental consultant and a climatology professor for 25 years at the University of Winnipeg explains that these problems have resulted in many of the scientists who were originally part of the IPCC process withdrawing. "What most people don't understand is that all IPCC 'predictions' are based on computer models that assume, with no reasonable justification, a doubling of CO2," says Dr. Ball. "Every single prediction they have made has been incorrect."
When Dr. Ball appeared before the Canadian Federal government's Standing Committee on the Environment he experienced the whip of political correctness when he tried to explain the problems with some of their beliefs about atmospheric science. "Galileo would be ashamed of you!" chastised Marlene Catterall, Liberal Member of Parliament for Ottawa West-Nepean. Ms. Catterall was apparently unaware that Galileo continually challenged orthodoxy and would have chaffed at today's politically correct science. Regardless, Parliamentarians should be seeking the advice of leading experts in the field, not trying to muzzle them.-from evirotruth.org
Nearly half of the scientists would not sign the IPCC summary and not for the reasons you give.
Also see friendsofscience.org where you can find the leading scientists who are more than a little skeptical. You can also find signed protests of at least 4,500 scientists who are against the Kyoto mandates
http://web.archive.org/web/20060529122738/www.envirotruth.org/myth_experts.cfm
The information about C02 capture assumes it is a pollutant and is causing global warming. This has not been established. Half of C02 occurs naturally and is an essential element yet you say it is like a nuclear waste. If this is the "truth" or "science" you are talking about, then yes, I am a stranger to it.
Wake up to the reality that the amount of C02 is measureable? Who are you addressing here? Who has said it is not? Maybe these are not your words.
You say,
Texas has more sunlight than COAL. They have more than we do. They have enough that they could produce power for the entire nation. Solar infrastructure cost will pay off in twenty years and go on producing for another 80 years with only 5% maintenance cost per year. It does this with No health care burden and no limit on the size of the power plant.
Please, what is your source?
The only thing that has been cleared up is your politics and your religion. I have not claimed that there is no debate or that there is a scientific consensus.
I would like to have more information, links, etc. on solar power. Thanks |
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csintexas
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| Posted: Tue Nov 06, 2007 8:03 am Post subject: |
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I agree, religious belief has no place in the science of this discussion. But (Are we behaving morally?) is a valid question.
I read through your first link on ocean temperature measurements. It doesn't say much other than there is some fluctuation in ocean temperature and our ability to measure it accurately is improving with modern technology and more sensors.
There has always been uncertainty in the exact rate of warming and the reports I have read take that into account. I don't see anything in that report that either proves or disproves man made global warming.
I think it would be a mistake to look at that report as proof that there is disagreement on man made global warming. If you look at the numbers you can see the the ocean temperature is increasing sharply even with the occasional cooling cycles.
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csintexas
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| Posted: Tue Nov 06, 2007 8:11 am Post subject: |
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As to your next reference.
From: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Steven_J._Milloy
Steven J. Milloy is a columnist for Fox News and a paid advocate for Phillip Morris, ExxonMobil and other corporations. From the 1990s until the end of 2005, he was an adjunct scholar at the libertarian think tank the Cato Institute.
Milloy runs the website Junkscience.com, which is dedicated to debunking what he alleges to be false claims regarding global warming, DDT, environmental radicalism and scare science among other topics.[1] His other website, CSR Watch.com, is focused around attacking the corporate social responsibility movement. He is also head of the Free Enterprise Action Fund, a mutual fund he runs with tobacco executive Tom Borelli, who happens to be listed as the secretary of the Advancement of Sound Science Center, an organisation Milloy operates from his home in Potomac, Maryland .
Milloy holds a B.A. in Natural Sciences from the Johns Hopkins University, a Master of Health Sciences in Biostatistics from the Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health, a Juris Doctorate from the University of Baltimore, and a Master of Laws from the Georgetown University Law Center.[2]
In January 2006, Paul D. Thacker reported in The New Republic that Milloy has received thousands of dollars in payments from the Phillip Morris company since the early nineties, and that NGOs controlled by Milloy have received large payments from ExxonMobil [3]. A spokesperson for Fox News stated, "Fox News was unaware of Milloy's connection with Philip Morris. Any affiliation he had should have been disclosed."
What qualifies this person to make assessments on the validity of the science?
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csintexas
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| Posted: Tue Nov 06, 2007 9:46 am Post subject: |
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I think birgco is right.
I don't think it is in the best interest of those advocating a cleaner environment to focus on global warming. Until science has a better demonstration of predicting weather there is always going to be an opportunity for doubt about the science of predicting weather.
I do think we can all agree that it is in our best interest to have as clean and healthy environment as we can.
Having a clean healthy environment will improve our quality of life.
Of course we don't want cancer causing agents. We don't want to stink up our own planet. We don't want to use up all of our natural resources so quickly. Doing these things would be stupid.
Not planing for the future would be stupid. What do we want for our future? We want a nice world for our children and their children. So it makes since to seriously take into account our current direction.
It is in our best interest to stop believing this myth that hyper resource consumption is a good thing. We can have a better life without it. By conserving resources and keeping our environment clean we can ensure future generations the best possible life.
It doesn't make since to continue this wasteful lifestyle which we have developed. We need to recycle things and not just dump them somewhere. We need to expel as few hazardous chemicals into the environment as we can.
Why would we want to burn all of our coal in the next 250 years? What effect is not having a natural reserve of oil remaining going to have on our national security? Oil is running out. There is no dispute about that. We are currently heavily dependent on it. It is in our best interest to not be dependent on something we don't posses in great quantities and which will greatly increase in cost as it becomes used up very quickly.
It is our consumerism that is building China into a greater super power.
We need to stop this whole super power thing anyway. Isn't it in our best interest to power down?
The shame is that we could be doing so much better than we currently are. We can have a better life and a better life for our children if we just do a better job of using resouces.
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csintexas
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| Posted: Tue Nov 06, 2007 10:27 am Post subject: |
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As for the building industry I think we could be doing much better. I am amazed by how little care we are taking for the quality of our environment. With current technology we can simply do much better than we are now.
I just had a client ask for 54 recess lights in one 3200 sq. ft. house. No thoughts whatsoever for energy efficiency or consumption as far as I could tell other than "lets consume as much as possible"
We use natural ventilation as much as possible. Recently (because my windows have been open) this couple and a few others have made comments like "natural ventilation is practical the few days when the weather is nice". In fact passive systems could probably be used for at least four months in a properly designed house around here.
Add to that active systems like PV and solar water heating which have the ability to greatly reduce coal and oil usage and solve problems with peak energy demand.
We all have so much stuff that it requires a large house to contain it. Is all this stuff really making us happy? Why can't we be happy with less? Why would it not be better if we burned less coal?
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djswan
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| Posted: Tue Nov 06, 2007 10:42 am Post subject: |
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Dig coal up. Burn it for energy now or save it for future use?
Anyone checking on those Volcanoes? The earth cooling itself could be a big problem for us. Yellowstone is about 30,000 years past due, according to history. Is the sky falling? Lets debate it, while the sky is falling.
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Kevin
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Joined: 13 Apr 2004
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Location: Eugene, Oregon
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| Posted: Tue Nov 06, 2007 11:36 am Post subject: new coal power plants? |
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Time to admit it won't work any more to treat the Earth's atmosphere as one big open sewer for gaseous emissions. There are too many of us doing it.
Great as it would be to rapidly stop current use of coal in electric generation, that would cause a large cut-back of power generation which would be very disruptive in the short. Probably not as disruptive in the long term as the CO2 pollution put out by the plants - as documented in detail by the Stern report and others - but some balance between short and long term to make a transition probably makes sense.
What doesn't make sense, it seems, is to continue building new coal-fired power plants. Building new coal plants today is just stealing from our future.
What do you think? Should we still be building new coal power plants today?
Is stopping the construction of new coal plants a resonable early step along the necessary path to gradually phase out all coal-powered generation over coming decades? |
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djswan
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Location: Montana, USA
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| Posted: Tue Nov 06, 2007 12:14 pm Post subject: |
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Keep a few of them, just in case, you never know what might happen. The technology might come in handy.
The N word. perhaps? is nuclear back in vogue? Only so much sun hits the planet.
Is that something erupting again on the news?
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