Topic
Author Gwynn Dyer on techno-fixing the planet, why the Pentagon buys global warming, and more.
Earth as hot zone.
"I do not have enough faith in human nature that we're going to get there, on time, with no hiccups."
So says Gwynne Dyer, the author of Climate Wars, who wastes no time in revealing that things are really, really bad.
Scientists have been telling us this fact for decades, but somewhere along the line, it became totally okay to ignore them. With this era coming to an end, however, the military and scientific communities can finally agree in public that the climate is warming much faster than we ever expected, and we need to act as quickly as possibly -- preferably 10 years ago.
Our first clue that things are going pear-shaped is the fact that Dyer, a journalist and academic specializing in war and conflict, has even touched the issue. This is not a book about the environment; it is a book about the potential of conflict and nuclear war erupting because of the environment.
The huge price of delay
Dyer has combined a close reading of military and scientific scenarios, and created his own projections of what the world might look like in 2019, 2029, 2045, and so forth, depending on different courses of action we choose.
Some of the more severe scenarios involve squabbling and stalling on the part of industrialized governments during key times of crisis (like, say, right now), which in turn leads to mass starvation, desertification, and war in developing countries.
There are some hopeful scenarios as well, which depend on international cooperation and action in the next few years to make huge cuts in emissions before we hit the point of no return at a carbon level of 450 ppm (parts per million). We are now dangerously close to this level at about 380 ppm, and it's rising fast. Once we cross this line, it is projected that our actions will spark a feedback cycle in which the melting polar ice caps, once a major reflective surface for the sun, will cause the ocean to absorb a lot more heat. Combined with huge fields of methane being released from melting permafrost, the carbon train will pick up steam even without any human emissions.
The big techno-fix?
We can all agree on the need for action, but Dyer's strong advocacy of geo-engineering might ruffle a few feathers in the environmental community. Scientists have already been researching quick-fix solutions for years, and many believe these will buy us the time necessary to switch from oil to renewable resources. Some are fairly straightforward, like growing large fields of algae in sea-beds, which can be converted to fuel much more easily than the current generation of biofuels and will not use precious agricultural lands. Technologies that release sulphur high into the atmosphere, where it will have a projected cooling effect, are among the most controversial.
In an effort to spark quick action, Dyer maps out the effects of warming on the planet, both environmentally and politically.
"There's a sequence to it," he explained in a recent interview. "The first big impacts are on food. The second impacts are on human relations -- collapsed states, refugees fleeing war and starvation -- at this point it won't be possible to cooperate on an international level to cut emissions.
The third impact will be on sea levels, which will rise (but likely not until near the end of this century), and if things progress even further, you could see the oceans going completely anoxic."
It reads a bit like a sci-fi novel. A decimated human population huddles around the poles while the ocean starts to bubble with sulphur (this is also known as a Canfield ocean). But when I met with Dyer last month in Vancouver, he insisted his scenarios were not the extreme brain farts of a creative writer, but in fact carefully controlled and realistic possibilities. He has taken hostilities which already exist, such as the conflict between India and Pakistan, and extrapolated them into a hotter world.
Here's what else Dyer had to say...
On how to predict the fall of human civilization:
"Most of [the scenarios] were from military reports. There was a lot of awareness among scientists about the severity of climate change, but scientists don't do strategic scenarios. A lot of that scenario stuff, believe it or not, actually started with Shell Oil back in the '70s. They came up with relatively disciplined rules for these things -- we're not just writing science fiction here. What we want is credible, possible futures. The pentagon's very big on that now.
"The American military has been doing them for a long time -- they're not hard to get at. When Bush didn't want climate change discussed at all, the Pentagon went to the think tanks in Washington and said, 'We need you to do all the research that we've already done, but can't publish. You publish it, and we'll distribute it to our staff.'
"I was in Washington in February -- I met with a lot of senior career people, and there wasn't a denier among them. They had made their plans, and were waiting for the administration to change so they could get some action on these things."
On why you can change nature, but you can't change human nature:
"Are we going to be able to maintain our standard of living? I'll tell you what -- we can't solve this problem if it involves hairshirts. You're lucky if you can convince people to turn the heat down and wear a sweater. To really solve this, we have to go to a zero-emissions economy, and to do that, we have to replace fossil fuels, not reduce them. Otherwise, you're always playing percentages. You can get 40 per cent reductions in emissions while still maintaining our way of life, but you can't get 80 per cent. We need 100 per cent.
"People do not see this as a sufficiently large enough problem to make drastic changes in their own lives. They'll change the light bulbs, maybe insulate the house better. This might help give us more time before we hit two degrees of warming, but it won't solve the problem. We have to replace all the power generating sources in the end. Once you've done that, you can drive all you like.
"Eighty-five per cent of Americans now think that climate change is a problem. But how many of those people actually think it's a big enough problem that they would pay an extra $2000 a year in taxes? I think the numbers drop off a cliff at that point."
On the tar sands, and Harper's attempted deal with Obama:
"I was up in Fort MacMurray recently to give a speech about climate change. About half the audience was from oil companies. None of them were the least surprised by anything I said. They are watching this like a hawk. They know the Americans are moving towards banning the imported tar sands oil.
"The tar sands are probably dead anyway, but if Harper's gone, they're dead for sure. The day Obama got elected he came out with the offer of a joint Camadian-American emissions control treaty, with a small clause about not touching the tar sands.
"This is now going to move very fast over the next few years. The log jam has broken because the Americans are now on board. When they weren't, countries were bending over backwards to try to soften Kyoto to get them to sign on. Now we're stuck for the next 15 years with this watered down, badly mutilated treaty. A lot of wasted time. Now Obama's up to his ass in alligators, and he knows he has to drain the swamp. He'll be looking for low-cost initiatives that show America has its heart in the right place, and the tar sands are low-hanging fruit."
On geo-engineering, and why it will be necessary:
"There is now a real avalanche of data coming in, which is why the scientists are so scared. Things really are moving much faster than their model said. The one closest to us is the Arctic Sea ice going -- it could be all gone at the end of the melt season in five years time. Open water, all across the Arctic Ocean. This is really bad, because open water absorbs heat.
"What's so frustrating for scientists is that this is actually a relatively easy, soluble problem, particularly if we had started 10 years ago, and didn't have to resort to crash solutions. The alternative sources of energy are available. Solar, wind, even geothermal is coming along quite nicely. Replacing liquid fuels is trickier, because the current generation of biofuels don't cut it. They're doing trials with vats of algae, but we're still two or three years away from producing anything like 20,000 gallons a day on algae farms.
"I do not have enough faith in human nature that we're going to get there, on time, with no hiccups. We'll get there, but it'll be 15 years too late, and we can't afford to be late, so we're going to need to cheat. Geo-engineering is basically cheating. You're postponing the effects long enough that your actions can catch up with necessity."
On Canada's future in a violent sauna:
"There's certainly going to be more people coming into Canada. At some point we're going to have to make up our mind what we think about that. I really like a high immigration policy, but there's a limit to adaptability. We don't have a land border with any third world countries, and you're not going to face a wave of American refugees. But the pressures will grow, from the places that are suffering more, to the places that are suffering less."
On whether or not global warming will be the end of us:
"If this book doesn't scare people, they aren't paying attention. It scared me. But I was actually less pessimistic after writing it than I was at the start, because you can see a way through. You don't need to invent any magic technologies, or change the human heart. We can do this being who we are, living the way that we do.
"Look at what we did about the ozone layer, look at how we got through the last 50 years without a nuclear war. I think that's pretty impressive."
On whether we should at least stockpile guns and wheat:
"We won't need to do that in Canada. Frankly, I wouldn't do it anywhere. When there's a real shortage of resources, they shoot people who horde."
On firing up the spaceship, and getting out:
"Have you any idea the carbon cost of launching something?"
![[Tyee]](http://thetyee.cachefly.net/ui/img/ico_fishie.png){kind=small}
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jglave
4 years ago
Outstanding
I just finished this book, it's excellent. Gwynn stocks it with nightmarish -- but completely plausible -- scenarios, such as automated machine guns protecting a heavily fortified US-Mex border, and nuclear exchanges on the subcontinent.
The trouble with so much of the green movement is it skirts around the hard truths, or just covers them briefly because, let's face it, it won't help anyone to dwell on the bummer stuff when you've got easy solutions to sell.
Climate Wars isn't optimistic, or pessimistic.. it's just very frank and realistic. No window dressing. No glitter.
Elsewhere, Dyer asks the reader how, other than vast-scale and risky geo-engineering, we will be stop acidification of the oceans.
.
Yikes.
GRLCowan
4 years ago
Pulverized and dispersed olivine ...
is a vast-scale bit of atmospheric remediation, and can stop acidification of the oceans, but doesn't seem particularly risky.
--- G.R.L. Cowan(How fire can be domesticated)
http://www.eagle.ca/~gcowan/
mopled
4 years ago
Too bad about Dyer
Maybe he believes his scare stories, but they are part of a $300 million PR blitz to get people to go along with energy taxation before everyone wakes to the fact that the climate has indeed changed...it's colder. The warming stopped in 1998 and it started cooling in 2002.
The Pacific Decadal Oscillation flipped to its cool phase and the next 20-30 years will be very much like the 1950-1977 period.
Spend time reading
"Climate Science: Is It Currently Designed To Answer Questions?"
by Richard Lindzen,PH.D Atmospheric Physics Harvard,Sloan Prof. of Meteorology , MIT.
http://ecoworld.com/features/2008/10/30/climate-science-is-it-currently-designed-to-answer-questions/
BTW acidification of the ocean is pure bunkum. The PH has changed only 0.075% in 250 years from 8.179 in 1751 to 8.104 in 1994. Ocean PH varies with time of day, depth of water, how close to shore and temperature.
http://www.seafriends.org.nz/issues/global/acid.htm
G West
4 years ago
happy new year mopled
I was wondering where you were.
Trent
4 years ago
Lindzen
Mopled, your source is a shill for the petro industry.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Lindzen#Criticism_of_Lindzen
Knee-jerk contrarianism is only going to prolong the environmental suffering.
Illahie
4 years ago
Enough of Global Warming
When is this Global Warming hysteria going to end. It is now looking like the planet is on a cooling trend.
Right now we have the arctic ice being built up at the highest rate ever recorded.
http://www.dailytech.com/Sea+Ice+Growing+at+Fastest+Pace+on+Record/article13385.htm
The Greenland ice sheet is growing larger
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/310/5750/1013
The Antarctic ice sheet is growing larger
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/20/science/20ICE.html?_r=1
Zebulon
4 years ago
Global Warming
Illahie:
None of those three articles you cited proves your proposition that the planet is "on a cooling trend." You are simply sowing disinformation.
Illahie
4 years ago
Zebulon and disinformation
If Zebulon were to look closely, he might find that information was submitted, not disinformation.
Glaciers in Norway are growing
http://www.dailytech.com/Glaciers+in+Norway+Growing+Again/article13540.htm
A glacier on Mt. Shasta that is growing
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitney_Glacier
Mt. Logan is growing
http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=cda7b596-d5e8-4a50-bf5d-66a42c45ab0c&k=47765
Trent
4 years ago
Illahie, You re-titled the
Illahie,
You re-titled the article as:
"The Antarctic ice sheet is growing larger"
...when in fact the title is:
"Warming Is Blamed for Antarctica's Weight Gain"
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/20/science/20ICE.html?_r=2
That's not helping your case.
Illahie
4 years ago
Trent on Antartica
Hi Trent:
It is true that the title of the article blames global warming. The ice sheet is still growing at 65 billion tons a year, and the southern oceans are cooling. Maybe that is a symptom of global warming, but I don't think so.
A glacier in Alaska that is growing
http://www.sitnews.us/0607news/062707/062707_ak_science.html
Sea Ice at all time high
http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=3066
Ice is growing between Canada and Greenland at fastest pace in 15 years
http://sermitsiaq.gl/klima/article30834.ece?lang=EN
Illahie
4 years ago
The Antarctic ice growth should be 45 not 65
The Antarctic ice growth should be 45 not 65 Billion tones a year, sorry
anarcho
4 years ago
Didn't take long for the
Didn't take long for the climate change deniers to troll along did it?
G West
4 years ago
No worries anarcho, as Dyer says:
"I was in Washington in February -- I met with a lot of senior career people, and there wasn't a denier among them. They had made their plans, and were waiting for the administration to change so they could get some action on these things."
And then there's this:
http://news.mongabay.com/2008/0319-hance_arctic.html
Personally, I've been reading Dyer for at least 25 years and his 'record' is a lot better than a few deniers.
Happy New Year by the way.
doggone
4 years ago
Dyer straight
Have yet to read the book but I have attended one of the author's lectures and seen/heard interesting interviews he has given.
I'd say he is thoughtful, thorough, well informed and competent at getting his message across. Since I do not spend my time looking into all topics I tend to judge the source and give weight to the information presented by those I trust.
If Dyer, well researched and practiced at his art, is worried the I am too.
Some of us accepted a long while ago that things were not well positioned for a sustainable future and have attempted to think, talk and LISTEN and READ other's thoughts on these matters.
I do not yet agree with any form of "technical" approach to ameliorating this present crisis but I will let it percolate for a while.
dorothy
4 years ago
greetings
("You're lucky if you can convince people to turn the heat down and wear a sweater")
from the land of never turning up the heat, but just donning the sweater right away. It's simply stupid money to keep a sauna going and trot around in loungewear!
The whole business of denying and confirming and denying again is getting real tiresome for the average working Jane. just hand us the keys to our own chastity belts and other limiting devices, and let us manage procreation without interference from the other club. We'll be out of the woods so fast it'll unbelievable.
I don't know why the automated shooting at the Mex, or any, border should be shocking. Just listen to the notion that "There's certainly going to be more people coming into Canada", as if this was a law of nature. Whatever happened to calling the shots (pun intended) on our own turf? What else is there to do, isn't that what any country in its right mind would do, when people just walk in uninvited?
"When there's a real shortage of resources, they shoot people who horde"
Not if you shoot 'them', whoever they are, first. And it would be people who hoard.
Guns and grain, I don't know. Ammo and lentils would be a better fix. But let's not even go there. The procreation thing comes first. We should keep the focus on that. It ties in with the mythology of the ever-expanding economy, which is ultimately what has put us in this mess.
mijnheer
4 years ago
Recommended reading
If this book doesn't seriously scare you, nothing will:
http://www.amazon.com/Six-Degrees-Future-Hotter-Planet/dp/142620213X
Read the book, not just this summary:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2007/apr/23/scienceandnature.climatechange
To put it all in perspective, read Evolution's Edge, by Graeme Taylor:
http://www.thevancouverobserver.com/cgi-bin/show_articles.cgi?ID=839&TOPIC=0
zalm
4 years ago
Illahie
You're playing fast and loose with the facts. None of the Greenland science says the ice is increasing - it says that the high altitude pack is increasing and the low altitude pack is decreasing, which is in line with mathematical models that suggest temperature extremes are enlarged during warming models. Thus you get colder periods of cold, and warmer periods of warm, with an overall trend to warm.
Is the trend to warming? Seven years out of more than 100 isn't enough to justify an about-face. We've taken more than thirty years to find enough evidence that the world is warming - you owe us at least half that to at least start talking about the opposite. Wait a few more years, please. After all, the consequences if you're right are minimal to non-existent.
Same goes for you too, mopled. We've had this argument before, and you're entirely too fast off the mark to try to turn the world on its head. If you're wrong, it costs you nothing but respect, but it costs small island nations their sovereignty and land base. You don't have that permission to play with their futures.
zalm
4 years ago
Dyer
With respect, the tar sands aren't dead. That's a Frankenstein that's going to take more than a low price for oil to kill it. We're now a petrodollar state, and the bogus economics (shades of Social Credit!) that makes that economy go round and round will not let a project that large fail, not when so many corporate dollars are involved, so much prestige to be gained, and so many taxpayers to be gouged to pay for the infrastructure needed to support it.
Oil will be back up to $70 later in the year, and heading for $100 in a year or two after that. It has little to do with supply, and a lot to do with excess cash sloshing around the world looking with unmitigated greed on the next speculative markets to make a killing on. Just like the Canadian dollar last year.
G West
4 years ago
Tar Sands
There's an interesting piece about the Tar Sands in the New York Times.
Don't know if you saw it or not zalm. Here's the link:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/07/business/07oilsands.html?_r=1
The future of the tar sands is going to be at least partly a function of the price of oil and the approach the Obama government takes toward the environment. The $70/bbl figure is probably about right - Austen puts it this way:
With oil prices around $49 a barrel, profitability is fast eroding at oil sands projects and may already be vanishing at some operations. Producers have widely differing cost structures and varying definitions of profitability. But Andrew J. Leach, a professor of environmental economics at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, estimates that long-established plants can operate with prices as low as $30 a barrel. But he said newer operations need $60 to $70 a barrel for acceptable returns, and no one will proceed with proposed projects until prices return to the $80 to $90 range.
There is an interesting 'terminological' battle going on though.
Notice how the Times article - like everyone in Pee Wee's group - uses the term 'oil sands'.
Illahie
4 years ago
Zalm's comments
Hi zalm:
Good Points.
Actually, Greenlands ice sheets are increasing an overall average of 5.4 cm in thickness per year, when both the high altitude and low altitude ice packs are considered.
This climate stuff gets coloured because Global Warming "Science" is a multimillion dollar industry. There is not a dime to be made from global cooling. This results in a distortion in the reporting of climate news.
For instance it was widely reported that in the Arctic ice pack reached a record minimum in 2007. It was not well reported that at the end of the 2008 ice melting season that the ice had increased by 30 percent over 2007 levels.
We do not see many articles either on the glaciers in New Zealand which are growing.
Global cooling is far more dangerous than global warming. I certainly do not want to see a global cooling event occur.
anarcho
4 years ago
A familiar tactic
"Global Warming "Science" is a multimillion dollar industry.'
And the oil companies who fund climate change denial are are a multi-billion dollar industry.
This is a familiar tactic; ie "poor little agribusiness" picked on by "big bad multi million dollar Greenpeace", "poor little tobacco companies" picked on by the "vast anti-smoking lobby" or "poor little logging companies" picked on by "nasty rich celebrity environmentalists."
Yeah, like David fighting Goliath and being made out as the bully!
Illahie
4 years ago
A Modest Proposal
It will com as no surprise to the regular readers of this website, that it hosts some of the best journalistic talent to be found anywhere.
I think that nearly everyone will agree that the environment and our climate is very important to the people who inhabit this planet.
There seems to be two very different views on what is happening with our planet and how we interact with it. Is there man made climate change going on, are climate change deniers just shills for the oil industry?
Many people think that carbon dioxide emissions is killing our planet. If true, we need to know about this stuff. We need to know why carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas. How this stuff interacts with the atmosphere. How can a gas which is measured in parts per million kill our planet. What are the historical levels, are current levels high or low in relation to historical levels? How does it rate in relation to other atmospheric gases? How does the math work? Does the math work? Why are greenhouse gases greenhouse gases? Is it possible to stave off an ice age by pumping massive amounts of carbon dioxide into the air? At what levels does this stuff kill us? Are we going to use up all the oxygen in the atmosphere by burning up all those fossil fuels?
I personally think that an article on the evolution of C3 and C4 type plants would make for a thigh slapping good read. I am sure that many tyee readers have climate type questions that they would like answered.
Thetyee, your mission if you choose to accept it is to look into carbon dioxide, and tell us the truth.
Frank
4 years ago
Collapse
by Jared Diamond was a good read.
Somewhere near the part where Easter Islanders were debating whether trees were more important than giant heads there was a lesson for us.
Too bad we seem to have come to the conclusion that its the giant heads and their economic spin-offs that were most important.
After all, those tourists don't go to Easter Island to look at trees.
ME2
4 years ago
CO2
I agree with Illahie, and with Mopled, that to date there is NO generally accepted scientific model demonstrating that GW is the result of increased atmospheric CO2. Absolutely NONE.
And even then, it is beyond a fool's errand to try to reduce CO2 production, given the utility of hydrocarbons for energy uses of various kinds, since no viable alternatives are available.
If an attack on "Big Oil" is envisaged, trying to make it more expensive through various means is sheer stupidity, since there is already existing technology which can convert coal to diesel fuel and gasoline at well below $50 a barrel.
http://www.moneyweek.com/investments/commodities/could-coal-replace-oil.aspx
Obviously, alternate energy has to be made cheaper than that.
And just for fun, am I the only one who has noticed that the "Peak Oil" scare and all the rest just happened to coincide with prices nearing $150 a barrel? Could Suzuki et al be shills for the Oilcos?
I second Illahie's request that the TYEE investigate the CO2 / GW issue with a view towards finding just where the hard science is in the current morass of claim and counter-claim.
G West
4 years ago
Wrong ME2
With respect, Peak Oil theory has a much older history than you suggest - it is based upon the work of an American geophysicist called M. King Hubbert; I think it was in 1955 or thereabouts that he suggested a model of the oil production curve based upon perameters of assumed ultimate recovery volumes.
As for the conjunction of your so-called 'scare' and $150 oil, that isn't borne out by the facts either. I think you'll find that no less an oil expert than T Boone Pickens said oil production had peaked in 2005 - long before $150/bbl oil.
The Association for the Study of Peak Oil and Gas - for whom Pickens made that statement was founded in 2000.
You can link to it here:
http://www.peakoil.net/
Illahie
4 years ago
G West
Hi G West:
Do you want THETYEE to look into how carbon dioxide is killing our planet?
Illahie
4 years ago
What about you anarcho?
Do you want THETYEE to look into how carbon dioxide is killing our planet?
Illahie
4 years ago
zalm
Hi zalm:
You stated that I was playing fast and loose with the facts. Do you want THETYEE to look into how carbon dioxide is killing our planet?
anarcho
4 years ago
Go argue with the scientists Illahie!
Why should the Tyee spend its time doing what a host of scientists have done already? CO2 is not "poisoning our planet" it is a green house gas - and is helping to raise the temperature of the atmosphere. Go argue with the climate scientists, in whom I have more faith than a bunch of oil company prostitutes and right wing ideologues.
All of this climate change denying is nothing more than a delaying tactic and an attempt to sow doubt in people's minds about something which is solid science. It is related to the attacks on evolution and uses a similar tactic.
anarcho
4 years ago
The real reason for denial
Climate change denial shows the sociopathic nature of much of contemporary capitalism. The deniers are willing to gamble with the lives of hundreds of millions of people rather than see any limitation to their profits. And it really does boil down to greed. A much smaller carbon foot print means producing products that last rather than junk that has to be replaced every year, more local production rather than shipping products thousands of miles, far less reliance on automobiles and an end to the fantasy of endless growth. All of this means less super profits for the greed creeps, hence their line of attack is to deny that the problem of human-induced global warming is happening.
Frank
4 years ago
Peeing on the food
I think its a great idea that we destroy the only thing in the universe we know that can support us.
Because right to the end the "economy" will do great what with all economic activity generated via war, famine and other plagues.
Acidic oceans? Sounds like an opportunity.
Jobs are far more important after all than having an environment that supports life.
Illahie
4 years ago
It sounds like anarcho does not want THETYEE
to research carbon dioxide. I wonder if THETYEE did produce an article on carbon dioxide, would anarcho would read it.
Frank
4 years ago
Illahie
The real question is, would you? Or would the Tyee become another "gatekeeper"?
anarcho
4 years ago
No need for an article!
There is no need for the Tyee to write such an article. It has been done elsewhere, many times. There is a wealth of material available in books, reports, videos. Google it, if you are so concerned. Better yet here is the Global Warming FAQ.
http://earth.geology.yale.edu/~sherwood/index.cgi?page-selection=5
Oh, silly me, sorry, its put out by those ignorant, Suzuki-paid, millionaire academics of the Dept. of Geology and Geophysics at a little known university called Yale.
G West
4 years ago
Illahie
Nope!
Already been done - the important thing now is to stop dragging your feet and 'do' something about it beyond nonsense rube goldberg taxes like the Campbell tax...
Just like Peak Oil - it's already been done.
There is an historical analogy.
Do you remember Galileo and the Church?
Illahie
4 years ago
G West, anarcho
Thank you for your reply G West.
anarcho, your link is about Global Warming, not Carbon Dioxide. There is lots of information out there about Global Warming, but seemingly very little about Carbon Dioxide.
Don't you want to know about what the planet was like 500 million years ago when Carbon Dioxide levels were estimated to be 20 times todays levels.
How about when Carbon Dioxide levels were so low that plants were struggling to fix carbon and C4 plants evolved.
http://www.palaeobiology.org.uk/projects_05.htm
Do you not want to know where Carbon Dioxide rates, in relation to other gases such as water vapour, in greenhouse effect.
anarcho
4 years ago
Quit playing games!
If you look you will see that CO2 is a major part of the problem of global warming. Other aspects of CO2 are simply irrelevant to the discussion of whether human activity aids global warming. You are engaging in a red herring type of argument.
Furthermore during the Cambrian Period C02 levels were very high, and so was the temperature, See http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/Carboniferous_climate.html
Illahie
4 years ago
Anarcho - You do care about carbon dioxide
You will notice that carbon dioxide levels plumeted after the Azolla event 49 million years ago.
Stump
4 years ago
Too Bad about Dyer
Mopled says:
"Maybe he believes his scare stories, but they are part of a $300 million PR blitz to get people to go along with energy taxation before everyone wakes to the fact that the climate has indeed changed...it's colder."
Hmmm, the man has a pretty long and distinguished history of calling it like it is. I remember his top-notch series "War" as an unflinching look at the realities of modern combat. Mopled's assertion that all of sudden Mr. Dyer has come down with a bad case of global warming gullibility due to a vast conspiracy of scientists and environmentalists seems far-fetched at best.
Individuals clinging to comforting misinformation rather than facing scary facts... and trying to get everyone else on the bandwagon so their irrationality doesn't shine quite so brightly however, doesn't surprise me in the least
ME2
4 years ago
Dyer ain't God, he's just a human like us
Garth, anyone who has followed this peak oil thing, as I have for at least ten years, is familiar with Hubbard, (for one) who developed his theory in his study of Saudi oilfields. However, one thing keeps changing the peak oil predictions, and that is new technology, which allows for the discovery of new oilfields and new methods for recovery of previously uneconomic fields.
When forecasting doom, you Warmists can see decades ahead, while preferentially relying upon decades old, out-of-date information.
Regardless of when the concept was first broached, you'd have had to have been asleep to have missed the scare tactics - which Suzuki and Co played right in to - which raised the worries that with China and India industrialising, very soon there would not be enough oil to go around. And GUESS WHAT Garth? Surprise of surprises, Oil prices actually went up!!!!! Golly gee, that had nothing to do with Peak Oil, eh??
And of course it had nothing to do with Pickens' prediction in 2005, for if it did, it would have done so the very next day - or so you intimate. We're not all so stupid as to take everything you write at face value, Garth.
And I notice how all you Warmists cleverly (you thought) avoided answering Illahies very polite request that you offer some proof for your CO2 scare stories, but none have been forhcoming. Instead we've been greeted with even more Chicken Little hyperbole.
G West
4 years ago
Hmmm? ME2
Then you didn't 'write' this:
"And just for fun, am I the only one who has noticed that the "Peak Oil" scare and all the rest just happened to coincide with prices nearing $150 a barrel? Could Suzuki et al be shills for the Oilcos?"
Which was what I was responding to.
You may not like having factual errors pointed out, I think the readers appreciate it even it you don't.
I think you owe me an apology. You made the connection between $150 oil and Peak Oil Theory, not me.
Illahie
4 years ago
Irony
Isn't someone going to point out the irony associated with anarcho's last post. It's killing me.
Frank
4 years ago
Hoax
The same groups that claim all's well with the climate say the same thing about the fish, the whales, the owls, the aquifiers, "modified" foods and everything else where there's big problems.
If their credibility on other issues improves then so will their credibility on CO2.
anarcho
4 years ago
Let it kill you...
"Isn't someone going to point out the irony associated with anarcho's last post. It's killing me."
Let it kill you. Once less corporate apologist in the world.
Obviously, there were other factors than CO2 in the past causing climate change. But if you look at the graph given in the web site I provided, you will see that other than a couple of anomalies there is a tendency for temperature to change as CO2 content changes. But what happened millions of years ago is not as important as what is happening now, which is co2 levels are rising and so is temperature. If there was some countervailing tendency - as there was 50 million years ago and temperature was not rising, scientists would not be concerned. Anyway, there is no point in arguing with you. All the arguments are laid out in http://earth.geology.yale.edu/~sherwood/index.cgi?page-selection=5 which I posted earlier. Go argue with them. They are climate scientists, I am not, and you aren't either.
ME2
4 years ago
Admit the OilCos scooped you, GWest
Your response above verges upon deliberate dishonesty, Garth, since nowhere did I even hint that the theory of Peak Oil and high oil prices arose at exactly the same time, and you know it. Moreover, whether or not they did, the result would be the same, and you know that too.
You should have been a lawyer, or maybe an ecclesiastic, Garth,(or maybe you are), given your ability to switch anyone's words around from their obviously intended meaning, to whatever suits your own purpose.
And so I'll repeat my charge: The stressing by you Gore / Suzuki-ites of the Peak Oil / oil scarcity scenario resulted in a massive profit windfall for the OilCos.
Such unwanted results always befall those who base their strategies upon unthinking ideology.
G West
4 years ago
I disagree ME2 - I only know what you wrote
And I copied your words exactly.
Peak Oil theory has been around for decades and wasn't the creation of any of your villains. Furthermore, in the instant case, $150/bbl oil had little or nothing to do with it.
I hold no candle for the Oil companies, I try to ignore Al Gore and I'm not quite sure 'what' to make of David Suzuki.
He and I had a nice chat a couple years ago when his daughter and one of my sons convocated at the same University...
I don't have any 'ideology' on this file at all - I think I've already written that I think the science is decisive and denial is futile and wrong headed - but, even if the science were to be proved incorrect at some point in the future, the correct pragmatic course of action at this time is to err on the side of caution.
I don't switch people's words and I certainly didn't in this case.
Illahie
4 years ago
It has been pretty quiet on this web page
It has been pretty quiet on this web page for the last few days, but there has been lots happening behind the scenes.
anarcho has figured out why the text of his carbon dioxide vs earth temperature chart is so hard to read. He had been holding the document upside down. He now realizes that the earth is in peril because we are running out of CO2.
He is now fundrasing so that the IPCC scientists can develop a C5 type plant that can eat coal, combine it with oxygen and emit CO2. The IPCC scientists are up for the challenge. After 10 years and 1.3 trillion dollars, they come up with a BIC lighter.
G West read the chart correctly, and realises that we are in danger of extinction because we are now about to enter an ice age. He is now a shill for the oil industry, praising them for saving the planet from extinction
This prompts Gwynne Dyer to rewrite his book about Canadian boat people trying to take refuge in Mexico.
ME2 is puzzled by all the efforts to save the earth from an ice age, because he knows that CO2 is a horribly lousy green house gas.
Frank is pleased that the efforts to stop the ice age has at leased increased the productivity of the earths plant life so that greenhouse producers no longer have to inject CO2 into their greenhouses, which lowers the cost of food production.
mopled
4 years ago
The usual gatekeeper nonsense
The Arctic is recovering. Good news for all you ice fetishists out there, but as the temperatures drop and CO2 stays high, it is increasingly obvious that the scam may be grinding to a halt, hence the hysterical insistance that we're going to burn up..sometime or other.
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/TEMPSvsCO2.jpg
Wikiped. can not be relied on for accurate anything, let alone a politically hot topic like AGW. Lindzen, a PhD in Atmospheric Physics,was one of the first to point out how nonsensical the hypothesis is and was one of the first to be smeared. Gore has spent at least 5x more on PR in the last year alone than Exxon spent in grants and consultation fees in 20 years and there is still another $200 million to come. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/03/30/gore-launches-300-millio_n_94155.html
Pulling the Exxon smear, an ad hominem, is a sign of no facts to back up one's arguments.
We've had 8 straight years of downtrend in temperature and not one climate model predicted it.
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/UAHTROPICS.jpg
It is time to awaken from the trance induced by watching the hypnotic induction at the beginning of "An Inconvenient Truth." (A visual of a sunny day floating on a river which you are asked to see, hear and feel is standard hypnotic trance induction technique.)
It is also time to drop the loaded term
"Denier." It is a give-away the user is trying to hide something by intimidating skeptical enquiry.
anarcho
4 years ago
No one here is a climate scientist!
Funny how the global warming deniers carefully avoid dealing with the Yale climate scientists. For the second time - don't argue with us, we are not climate scientists - they are. Go spin your fantasies to them. For the third time see:http://earth.geology.yale.edu/~sherwood/index.cgi?page-selection=5
Illahie
4 years ago
anarcho
If you are not qualified, or knowledgeable, why are you posting comments
Illahie
4 years ago
Frank is not the least of my worries
Sorry Frank. I have repeated to myself at least l00 times, I will not post in haste, I will not post in haste. I will use a spell checker. I will add a ? to the end of my previous comment.
Sorry
There I go again, I did no spell check this note either. Dang.
Illahie
4 years ago
Sarah Buchanan
Hi Sarah:
You did a great job on this article. I think that you and THETYEE are on the verge of an even greater article, perhaps a series of articles that can vault THETYEE to legendary status.
It is clear that many people are passionate about the topic of global warming, as they should be, this planet is a neat place.
The real story to be told is not about Global Warming, it is about how the people on this planet became so focused on Global Warming, without any evidence or mechanism, which would cause Global Warming.
Politicians, scientists, and people at large have assumed without really thinking about it, that our existence, our burning of fossil fuels would have a deleterious effect on our planet. We as a society, then started looking for the evidence to support this belief. We did not find much, so we started looking harder and harder. This has resulted in the climatic circus that we see before us today.
If you look at anarcho's paper over the last 600 million years or so, you will see that the the atmospheric carbon dioxide levels really are very low. So much so that today, our plants are struggling to absorb the carbon dioxide that they need to grow.
http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/Carboniferous_climate.html
There seems to be very few people that have looked at the molecule carbon dioxide and ask the question, by what mechanism could this molecule warm the planet? When computer based climate modeling came along, the modelers did not have time to work out the physics of carbon dioxide, so they applied a arbitrary forcing value to make carbon dioxide warming fit the models they were developing.
They are still using artificial forcing because the physics of carbon dioxide does not support the forcing values.
Now that Global Warming is a multi-million dollar industry, those people in the industry have little incentive to reverse course.
Carbon dioxide is the real story, the story that was missed, the story that needs to be told. This is a big story.
Good luck.
G West
4 years ago
Sorry Illahie
It's a nice fairy tale.
But that's about all.
As for the Tyee's coverage of the issue, you haven't spent much time here I guess. The reason so few of us bother with deniers and the same old arguments much anymore is because we've heard it all before.
Have a look at these:
http://thetyee.ca/Blogs/TheHook/Environment/2008/09/25/UBCMBioenergy/
http://thetyee.ca/Views/2007/02/14/GlobalWarmingPitch/
http://thetyee.ca/News/2007/02/20/GlobalWarming/
http://thetyee.ca/Views/2007/12/04/TarSands/
http://thetyee.ca/Series/2006/08/10/RoughWeather/
http://thetyee.ca/Views/2008/09/09/GlobalWarmChill/
http://thetyee.ca/News/2007/09/27/GWarming/
http://thetyee.ca/Blogs/TheHook/Environment/2008/12/22/DuctTapeGlaciers/
http://thetyee.ca/News/2008/06/04/NDPTakesHeat/
http://thetyee.ca/News/2008/06/04/NDPTakesHeat/
http://thetyee.ca/News/2006/11/07/Immersed/
http://thetyee.ca/News/2006/10/20/ClimateDread/
http://thetyee.ca/Mediacheck/2007/10/19/GoreVerdict/
http://thetyee.ca/Views/2007/02/05/Locusts/
http://thetyee.ca/Views/2006/10/04/Kyoto/
And, I'm sure if you keep working outwards from this modest list you'll find why most regulars here just roll their eyes when someone suggests Tyee should be doing 'more' on the subject. I haven't even attempted to canvass all the coverage on the subject - just selected a few items more or less at random from my files.
It isn't the people at Tyee who are sitting on their hands and pretending everything is hunky dorey my friend.
Cheers.
G West
4 years ago
For example
Here's one I missed in the list above...about people who are actually 'paid' to spread disinformation:
http://thetyee.ca/Mediacheck/2006/05/02/PaidtoDenyGlobalWarming/
Illahie
4 years ago
Thank you for your comments G West
If you come across a paper that ties together the physical properties of carbon dioxide, with any significant greenhouse effect, that can be calculated or measured, I would be interested in reading it.
mopled
4 years ago
Not only is there no proof CO2
warms the planet...there is proof that it's level in the atmosphere is an EFFECT of warming
Lowell Stott, Axel Timmermann, Robert Thunell: "Southern Hemisphere and Deep-Sea Warming Led Deglacial Atmospheric CO₂ Rise and Tropical Warming"
They study isotopes in sediment cores. The main result is that they can reconstruct the following chronology:
* 19,000-17,000 years ago: deep sea temperatures increased by 2 Celsius degrees or so
* 1,000 years later: CO₂ increases
Not only the CO₂ lags by 1,000 years or so but the sea surface temperatures in the tropics lag, too. The deep ocean warmed much earlier than the surface. The authors offer hints that the warm water came there from the South where the primary changes - perhaps "increasing austral spring insolation" - occurred, followed by albedo feedback.
http://motls.blogspot.com/2007/09/end-of-last-ice-age-co2-innocent.html
See also
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v399/n6735/abs/399429a0.html
http://motls.blogspot.com/2006/07/carbon-dioxide-and-temperatures-ice.html
http://motls.blogspot.com/2007/04/co2-lags-temperature-how-alarmists.html
Stephen Schwartz: Heat capacity, time constant, and sensitivity of Earth's climate system (full text)http://www.ecd.bnl.gov/steve/pubs/HeatCapacity.pdf
The author is from Brookhaven National Laboratory, the same one that successfully tests string-theoretical holography through the RHIC experiment. His calculated result for the climate sensitivity is 1.1 Celsius degree, plus minus half a degree: three times smaller than the IPCC figure and consistent with the typical calculations of the Reference Frame.
http://motls.blogspot.com/2007/08/stephen-schwartz-brookhaven-climate.html
The scam is coming apart and as complimentary as Illahie is about the tyee, my perception of the role it takes in this debate is that of advocacy and not journalism.
Illahie
4 years ago
Hi mopled
Your comments about the tyee, advocacy and journalism are interesting.
Fortunately we can measure these things. We have just given the tyee the keys to the biggest environmental story of the century.
What they do with it will be a measure of their integrity.
They should not take too long in looking into the matter though. If the arctic ice is really growing at the rate that it seems to be growing, this will become a big issue this summer
anarcho
4 years ago
Tit for Tat, Illahie!
"If you are not qualified, or knowledgeable, why are you posting comments."
Then why are you posting? You aren't a climate scientist either. Why are you plaguing us with you flat earth drivel? All I am saying is go check with the climate scientists. Go argue with them. For the fourth time See:
http://earth.geology.yale.edu/~sherwood/index.cgi?page-selection=5
mopled
4 years ago
Are you serious anarcho?
What makes you think that blog is reliable when it relies on wikipedia,new scientist and realclimate? The graph is cherry picked data based on Michael Mann's Hockey Stick discredited by no less than Wegman et al
http://www.climateaudit.org/pdf/others/07142006_Wegman_Report.pdf
We are much closer to a new ice age than we are to run-away warming.
http://www.iceagenow.com/Pacemaker.htm
The recent warming on Earth was also replicated on other planets in the Solar System, some with, some without CO2. How does the concept of "man-made global warming" fit that information?
Triton, a moon of Neptune
http://www.scienceagogo.com/news/19980526052143data_trunc_sys.shtml
Jupiter
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/060504_red_jr.html
Mars
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/02/070228-mars-warming.html
Pluto
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/pluto_warming_021009.html
“I am a skeptic…Global warming has become a new religion.” - Nobel Prize Winner for Physics, Ivar Giaever.
“Since I am no longer affiliated with any organization nor receiving any funding, I can speak quite frankly….As a scientist I remain skeptical...The main basis of the claim that man’s release of greenhouse gases is the cause of the warming is based almost entirely upon climate models. We all know the frailty of models concerning the air-surface system.” - Atmospheric Scientist Dr. Joanne Simpson, the first woman in the world to receive a PhD in meteorology, and formerly of NASA, who has authored more than 190 studies and has been called “among the most preeminent scientists of the last 100 years.”
Warming fears are the “worst scientific scandal in the history…When people come to know what the truth is, they will feel deceived by science and scientists.” - UN IPCC Japanese Scientist Dr. Kiminori Itoh, an award-winning PhD environmental physical chemist.
I suggest you take a look at the expert opinion linked here.
http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Blogs&ContentRecord_id=2674e64f-802a-23ad-490b-bd9faf4dcdb7