Comments on: Climate science sceptics have their Copenhagen in New York

By: Andrew P

Andrew P — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

Considering the arguments.
1. I agree that accounting for carbon emmissions is difficult. Thats why I think an ETS is a waste of time and we should tax carbon at source.
2. There is no dispute that we have no choice but to go for abatement, but if we don't go for reductions as well then in 50 years we will be in a place where no abatement is possible. How do you abate the failing of most of the worlds river systems?
3. Yes, renewable energy is more expensive than the dollar cost of coal. But its less expensive than the fully-costed price of coal e.g including the externality of the end of civilisation. So yes, energy prices must go up. Thats not a counterargument, it just a reality.
4. Old folk move to warm climates? They tend to flee hurricanes as fast as their little zimmer frames will carry them and generally swim badly.

By: stephen

stephen — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

Yeah Jeremiah I am. I’m not sure about how to tackle the issue, but on the weight of evidence showing a warming globe (Royal Academy, NASA, etc,etc etc ad infinitum vs’s the sceptics, a relatively small group of hired guns working for polluters) I lean towards the facts bsed evidence that we do have a problem.
Jeremiah if I was you, I’d sell my coal shares and invest in a clean sunrise industry that will provide a future.

By: MichaelT

MichaelT — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

Bernard has fallen into the common trap of failing to consider any of the arguments put forward by proponents of an unfashionable cause, resorting to ad hominen attacks instead.

The key of the matter is that sceptics maintain that the combination of solar irradiation and variations in the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (i.e. Pacific switching from overall cool mode to overall warm mode) explain almost all of the temperature rise in the 1900s. Very little need to add any other factor. See Joseph D'Aleo's paper on 'Icecap' ('US temperatures and climate factors since 1895') showing that there is a much better correlation between these two factors and temperature than there is between temperature and CO2 level.

Only in the world of journalism and politics can you get away with debunking your opponents in this fashion without thinking about the fundamental issues.

By: stephen

stephen — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

BTW Jeremiah, why do you single out wind subsidies (and bracket my name with them) when the whole economy is presently being subsudised ?!
Think also of Howard gifting $700,000,000.00 of tax payers money to coal to investigate unproven technology like sequestration at the same time as starving proven alternates of funding!? etc etc etc etc etc

By: MarkHC

MarkHC — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

Note: Renewables are only financially unviable until either:
1) We price the harm of the alternatives; or
2) Production reaches a critical mass.

Either of wich would ensure their sustained profitability for as long as our species survives.

By: stephen

stephen — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

Hey Bernard, You seem like a pretty smart, level headed fellow. Don’t you think the economics is a no brainer? Acing might cost money, not acting will cost us …. well you know. Doesn’t seem a vexed question to me.

By: Jeremiah

Jeremiah — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

Glad to see you are getting to grips with rational arguments Mr. Keane, even if that doesn’t inspire your bloggers. (Can Stephen be serious? For Australia, but also for the world as a whole, there are serious calculations and estimates of probabilities to be made before deciding to continue with the ridiculous subsidies to wind farms, for example).
BTW no doubt some of the suggestions at the Heartland Institue were nutty but a space-based “climate shield” might not be, at least in conception. Cf. for example, “The Geoengineering Option” in the latest issue of the respected journal “Foreign Affairs”. As is pointed out there we should be preparing the ground scientifically and legally for emergency measures to increase albedo in case carbon sequestration proves a failure and disaster looms.

By: jboy

jboy — Thu, 01 Jan 1970 10:00:00 +0000

re; the gfc and c02 emissions
governments need to concern themselves
more with parts per million in the air
and less with parts per million in bank accounts
(usually the bank accounts of big polluters)