Nice point Tzeporah

INCOMPETENCE???

haven't these extremist

haven't these extremist zealots had their fifteen minutes of fame yet? next flavour of the month please.

You're kidding yourself.

Adding the disclaimer won't make it so.

Desperate to save wood??

Thank you, "The Brain" for showing how ideology displaces rational thought when it comes to most environmentalist's arguments about forests and the use of wood.

The biggest advantage of wood as a building material is that it is a renewable resource. ALL of the building materials you name in your article are non-renewable and require much energy to produce; steel and aluminum require large amounts of energy. How do you justify the use of energy intensive, non-renewable resources over wood.

And gkam, you need a basic lesson in wood science. Once the carbon is in the wood, it stays there until the wood is burned or it rots. Cutting trees does not, in itself, release carbon already sequestered in a tree into the atmosphere.

And yes, I do think cutting down trees is a noble endeavour.

No lesson needed

Thanks for the suggestion, O Great Killer of Trees. I understand very well how carbon is sequestered and released in aerobic and anaerobic (and photosynthetic) reactions. If you made the assumption that the carbon is released during tree-killing, it was YOUR mistake.

But your argument against old-growth trees smacks of greed-driven convenience.

Noble endeavor? There were lots of societies that thought killing and destruction were noble endeavors. Today, we know better, and shake our heads at such ignorance.

Cont.

What the average voter should know though, is who benefits overall. Which shareholders... CEO's... politicians... for the damaged environments that all life on Earth must now bear and in my view, this Harper government is looking as crooked or worse, than the Mulroney government itself in the way it's opening doors to privatize and deregulate our Canadian economic sectors for a corporate lobbyist's cut.

At some point, the question, the fair question will have to be asked and here it is, concerning Canada's environmental stance on CO2 emissions.

Does the tarsands need to be developed to keep this nations economy healthy?

I argue that tarsands development is not necessary. I argue that the North American auto manufacturers have been purposely building gas guzzlers for decades due to corporate oil lobbyism, I argue that the tarsands have been largely untaxed both in royalties and otherwise due to foreign corps declaring their income taxes outside of Canada and a complete blind eye with royalties charged on a federal level (cause there isn't any), never mind the province of Alta itself... and I argue that corporate lobbyists that get elected, never mind the opportunists, is what is killing our nations world wide now.

So who is GWB senior and junior if not corporate lobbiests? Newt Gingrich. Dick Chenney. James Baker. John Howard. Tony Blair. Elmer Mackay. O'Connor. David Emerson. Stephen Harper. Brian Mulroney. Who are they? Or more importantly... who were they before and after they entered politics and public life, if not for the fact that they were all corporate lobbiests?

And thats whats got me so PO'd. We still end up electing them! And I'm baffled as to why any ordinary voter would knowingly vote for a so called former corporate lobbiest! Christ, they have the book written on how to steal from the average tax payer through government officials... why do we entrust our nations, our resources and our environments with people who clearly look out for their own self interests based on an ugly paradigm that says money and the fleeting pride it buys is more important than all else?

Is it because we didn't know, or just... didn't want to know. The responsibility of cleaning up the mess, maybe... more important things to do besides vote or get involved... mabye the average person just... gets what they deserve.

Oh, I think most are kidding ourselves

Go and google earth anywhere in BC... remind yourself that the pics you see of the cutblocks in oh... pretty much any accessible back yard to most logging towns in BC are dated by at least 5 to 8 years... and ask yourself how much of that "renewable resource" you keep talking about, is left.

As renewable as the word "renewable" sounds, it does take a century plus for tree's to become harvestable. Renewable doesn't mean an endless supply. We've been guilty of overcutting in BC and there isn't much point arguing against this very clear fact. The easy, valuable wood is for the most part, gone. Whats left isn't great, and if the pine beetle has its way, we won't have much of a forest over the next decade to manage, especially if they go after other species. And guess what. Thats climate change! Say, Harper just freed up 87 whopping million to help our nation adjust to climate change! I guess we'll all be ok...

Snert:
Considering the fact that there is nothing, I repeat, nothing that is forcing home builders to build houses out of wood other than a consumer who refuses to look at the alternatives simply because they are convinced there are no "alternatives", reveals a major disconnect between what is good for the pocket book, and what is good for the environment and ultimately, in the end, what is good for both. Clearly, I see no reason why consumers need to build new houses out of wood. In fact, in time, we might not have a choice.

Deforestation is a world wide problem that is accelerating. Increases in PCB's, polluted fresh waters, dying coral reefs world wide, dragged ocean floors, disappearing marine life, increased atmospheric pollutants, damaged ozone, major increases of CO2 and methane gases with no end in sight, no government population controls in virtually every nation... very little acknowledgement by big business to become responsible enough to clean up their acts, populations continuing to grow world wide, no government initiatives by the largest industrialized nations like the U.S., China and India to streamline their consumption leading even moreso to global warming... all for a morally bankrupt buck, naturally.

About the only ones who aren't kidding themselves out there are those who are activist with their shared environments and its easy enough to spot who is, who isn't and most importantly, why. And just for the record for those who aren't activist, I view some folks as naive, some folks as ignorant, and the rest as morally bankrupt and its not all that hard to tell who's who.

Regardless

...it seems to me that spewing ever-increasing emissions from hydrocarbons into the atmosphere, much less suffer the environmental destruction occasioned by the Tar Sands, is not a good idea. The usual flat earth society types have seized on the defeatist 'nothing we can do, anyway' argument as an excuse to cynically re-package the status quo. There is most certainly something we can do to reduce hydrocarbon use, andlessen rising asthma rates as well as many other consequences of air and water pollution.

On a related note, I see that Czech president Vaclav Havel (MODERATOR'S NOTE: IT'S VACLAV KLAUS, NOT HAVEL)has recently written an anti-environmentalist diatribe called "Blue Planet, Green Chains', or some such rubbish. He warns of an emerging environmentalist tyranny, but conveniently ignores that modern environmental movements and thel laws they demanded arose in the democracies of the US, Canada, and the original six Common Market countries, with widespread public support.

I guess he thinks that we are all stupid.

mopled

Besides posting on each climate blog the same information over and over, no matter how irrelevant, now you're making personal attacks. You have lost all credibility and now you attack others for working toward a better future??? Is reality another one of your denialist conspiracy's or have you just lost all sense of decency? [OFFENSIVE COMMENT REMOVED. -MODERATOR.]

The brain

That works for both sides of the argument. The proportions may vary but one still has to watch for the negatives. As always any time there are major changes to be made money will change hands.

I believe the truth lies somewhere in the middle but that it matters not as events will probably unfold out of our control. Best bet is to figure out how to survive without giving advantage to the rest of the planet.

Take a look at the World Clock on this page.

Where is the decency in a scam?

Whether Ms Berman knows it or not, that is what she's pushing.

Water vapor is 95% of the Greenhouse effect.

We get back to the impossiblity of the premise that a trace gas which is the basis of all life and only present at .038% can do anything about temperature. It's plant food.

If Ms Berman wants forests, CO2 enrichment will get them growing faster, not that humans really could do that much no matter how much coal and oil we burn....we only make 2-5% of the total now.

If I repeat myself, it is because obfuscating gatekeepers keep trying to make us all forget the significance of how little CO2 there is in the atmosphere to begin with and how tiny is the portion we contribute.

Financed by the Big Green Machine

From the Forest Ethics 2002 Annual Report
Bullitt Foundation
David & Lucille Packard Foundation
Florence Fund
Global Forest Watch (Surdna)
Lazar Foundation
Mead Foundation
Merck Family Fund
Moriah Fund
New Belgium Brewing Co.
Overbrook Foundation
Patagonia
Prentice Foundation
Richard & Rhoda Goldman Fund
Rockefeller Brothers Fund
San Diego Foundation
Tides Canada (Silva Foundation)
Tides Foundation Canada
Town Creek Foundation
Turner Foundation
W. Alton Jones Foundation
Weeden Foundation
WestWind Foundation
Wilburforce Foundation

SUPPORT AND REVENUE
Grants 1,066,834.00
Contributions 45,925.35
Contract Income 153,000.00
Other 40,342.10
Total Support and Revenue 1,308,601.45

Turner, Tides, Alton Jones, Packard and Rockefeller Bros Fund.....all the biggies.
http://www.ecofascism.com/article12.html

Do tell!

Explain again the importance of not making this huge mistake on reducing energy consumption please mopled. We wouldn't want to divert trillions away from the richest corporations, nor would we want to stop the pollution from extraction, manufacturing, global transportation, argiculture all directly related to oil/gas and energy. Don't forget to use some numbers this time, as we all need to be corrected on our false assumptions...

An exerpt from CANC, from the Pembina Institute.

You repeat yourself, for reasons unknown to us, but my guess is the "obfuscating gatekeepers" are the voices in your own closed mind.

Tip of the ice berg...

http://www.worldcarfree.net/resources/stats.php

It boggles the mind that a person with a brain can't do the math, regardless of political stripes...

We pay for useless CO2 reduction

The corporations will take their cut from the costs of carbon trading and carbon taxes. The big guys never lose.

The pretense is that energy corporations are against all this when in fact through their foundation funding they are prime pushers.

That energy companies have ripped off public treasuries isn't news...

Did you realize that the oil that comes out of the tar sands is taxed as crude, but is shipped to the States where it miraculously becomes diesel fuel only by virtue of having crossed the border.

Reducing energy consumption is quite laudable for many reasons. I look forward to dumping my 22 year old heap to the time when we either get better mpgs or battery improvments allow longer distances on electric cars.

As to closed minds...those that refuse to look at the evidence for other factors causing the cyclical warming(and who even deny that it is cyclical) are the ones with closed minds. Unfortunately they also try to prevent others from examining it by smearing the messengers.

There is much new in climate science which has been published since July 2006, which was the cut-off date for examination by the IPCC, showing many other factors involved in Earth's climate.

The simplistic model of CO2 has been discredited, but the juggernaut moves on relentlesly. A few cold years during this coming sunspot cycle #24 may wake up the public.

[OFFENSIVE COMMENT - SELF REMOVED]

[CONTINUED OFFENSIVE COMMENTS SELF REMOVED] More of the same..... I think most decent folk now understand that paid lobbyists, especially for the energy sector are on par with those lobbying for fish farms on our coast. Traditionally these puppets are the preliminary events before the main bout of "beheadings." Many see revolution as the only option left... Watch yer top knot!

For the open-minded

A new paper
http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/4735/home
International Journal of Climatology

Research Article
A comparison of tropical temperature trends with model predictions
David H. Douglass 1 *, John R. Christy 2, Benjamin D. Pearson 1, S. Fred Singer 3 4
1Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY 14627, USA
2Department of Atmospheric Science and Earth System Science Center, University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, AL 35899, USA
3Science and Environmental Policy Project, Arlington, VA 22202, USA
4University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA 22903, USA
email: David H. Douglass (douglass@pas.rochester.edu)

Abstract
We examine tropospheric temperature trends of 67 runs from 22 Climate of the 20th Century model simulations and try to reconcile them with the best available updated observations (in the tropics during the satellite era). Model results and observed temperature trends are in disagreement in most of the tropical troposphere, being separated by more than twice the uncertainty of the model mean. In layers near 5 km, the modelled trend is 100 to 300% higher than observed, and, above 8 km, modelled and observed trends have opposite signs. These conclusions contrast strongly with those of recent publications based on essentially the same data. Copyright © 2007 Royal Meteorological Society
Received: 31 May 2007; Accepted: 11 October 2007 9 (my emphasis.)

Discussions of it:
http://motls.blogspot.com/2007/12/douglass-christy-pearson-singer.html
"The insights strongly indicate that the true mechanisms driving the changes of temperature are not understood and the overall effect of greenhouses gases is being overestimated - between 2 times and 4 times - by all existing models. Note that with this reduction, IPCC's sensitivity between 2 and 4.5 °C gets reduced to the standard 1 °C climate sensitivity which means that the additional greenhouse-induced warming by 2090 will be less than 0.5 °C."
and
http://science-sepp.blogspot.com/2007/12/press-release-dec-10-2007.html

There is no scientific basis for climate hysteria.

Old Wine in new bottles

You gotta love old Freddy Singer - he just keeps on poppin' up:

http://www.desmogblog.com/s-fred-singer-one-whopper-on-top-of-another

Ad hominem?

Countering with a smear of one of the authors
would seem to be all in the way of refutation of a paper published in the International Journal of Climatology that our guardian of the false paradigm can muster.

Isn't that interesting!

Pants on fire...

..if it could just speak English... maybe we'd understand what it is trying to say...

Amen Charlie

Non Organic ENGO's

Many ENGO's are bastions of self preservation when it comes to salaries!

Would it not make ecological sense to allow succession and have new leaders rather than secure comfy ones?

I suppose not many are familiar with the goings on in some environmental organizations.

What happened? I would think the internet and web cams means that ENGO's can network and dialogue remotely without having to fly on an airplane, stay at a resort (how many bottles of water were consumed/recycled at the 'event'?

Of course ENGOs have value, trying to push so-called political and business leaders in a sustainable direction!

Here is a thought for those eco logic deniers:

ENGO's take a year off from getting involved (save your budget!) in anything environmental-no press releases, demos, protests, educational events-for one year.

Do you think people will notice the absence?

Do you think people will want the ENGO's back?

I think so, but perhaps with another person leading the charge! Give someone else a chance Tzeporah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Or is Forest Ethics your own little fiefdom and no one else may lead?

Right On Alda!!!

Thanks Alda, your comments are spot on:

"Those of us still in the fight can only devote so much of our lifeblood's energy towards something our fellow Canadians - out of laziness, stupidity, and apathy - aren't ready for yet. I sense that even Suzuki, usually quite optimistic and yes, cheerfully angry, has reached the point of total despair, tearing out his hair, vis-a-vis his statements this week, "Failure to act is an intergenerational crime" and "I am overwhelmed with sadness that we are going backward"..."

My bald spot is getting bigger!!

Even the Pope says cool it!

The Pope condemns the climate change prophets

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=501316&in_page_id=1811&ito=1490

"Pope Benedict XVI has launched a surprise attack on climate change prophets of doom, warning them that any solutions to global warming must be based on firm evidence and not on dubious ideology.

The leader of more than a billion Roman Catholics suggested that fears over man-made emissions melting the ice caps and causing a wave of unprecedented disasters were nothing more than scare-mongering."

Thanks,

Thanks, kjc

http://www.harperindex.ca/index.cfm

This link and site seems to tell it plain enough. I'm really hoping the world realizes we have a minority government on our hands before whatever reputation we had for having a good foreign policy is destroyed by Harpers obvious love for corporate U.S.A.

And ME2, Percy, mopled... you can all kiss my ass. (chuckles)

Oh, Brainy One

Here's a bit of reading for you:
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/DOUGLASPAPER.pdf

ABSTRACT: We examine tropospheric temperature trends of 67 runs from 22 ‘Climate of the 20th Century’ model
simulations and try to reconcile them with the best available updated observations (in the tropics during the satellite era).
Model results and observed temperature trends are in disagreement in most of the tropical troposphere, being separated by
more than twice the uncertainty of the model mean. In layers near 5 km, the modelled trend is 100 to 300% higher than
observed, and, above 8 km, modelled and observed trends have opposite signs. These conclusions contrast strongly with
those of recent publications based on essentially the same data. Copyright . 2007 Royal Meteorological Society"

Notice who the publisher is?
The Royal Meteorological Society.
The scam is being exposed.

More evidence

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/science/article3037134.ece

Great input Lynn

I hadn't quite understood the NGO role of depoliticising resistance before.

As for NASA noticing noctilucent clouds and blaming it on "Global Warming"....really.

You don't suppose the use of Aluminum and Bariun oxides in chemtrails might also be a likely source of reflection? The article does refer to "dust" being at the core of the ice crystals.

I've noticed the heavy applications against the setting sun for a long time and wondered why. I suppose others are noticing too and this is the cover story.

Of course the tracking program has only been in existance since April 07, so it ill behoves either me or NASA to speculate on what it means....they haven't been collecting data that long.

Follow the Money

That's right Mopled:

"We'd never seen a picture of the whole polar region before . . ."

And yet these new images "may" prove the global warming theory is real. The way the NWO has been pushing it in the MSM who can really believe it?

That stuff from Arundahti Roy is awesome, everything she say's about the NGOs is true. They don't represent anybody except their own self-serving selves. They had the money to pay local activists who worked have worked for survival wages but they chose to hire Brits and fashion students with no personal experience or expertise in the BC forest industry whatsoever and then pay them $3500mth ($7000mth if you could get your boyfriend hired) to conduct "markets" campaigns out an office in Vancouver. Vacations in Thailand and all home for Christmas (anywhere but BC.) and all.

Right now "reconciliation" is the formula that is being used to privatize BC's public lands and resources that were just recently declared for the local Band Council's "exclusive use." The implications of that recent court ruling on the Tsilqotin case are monumental and you can bet those greedy bastards are going to make a grab for it. Victoria's beaches, Squamish's swimming holes. There is nowhere that is not beyond seizing and developing now.

There is already a gate across the new improved road into Lucille Lake with a BC Hydro No Tresspassing sign on it. Plus wouldn't you know?
Taxpayer funded curbed turn lanes with flashing lights and cameras on them! What kind of an exclusive little enclave do suppose they've got planned there?

We need to mount a constitutional challenge, pronto. Or how about a "legally binding referendum?"

End all logging Teporah?

Thank you for the analysis, Lynne For all these years I’ve believed that the Foundations were intended as sort of payback to society, and basically at odds with the goals and methods by which their funds were originally accumulated. I now see the flaw in that reasoning, for even though the funders and their grantees may believe that, the ideology the Foundations embrace is essentially the same as the one which created their money, and so their efforts result only in (at best) bandaiding the system, and offer no hope of fundamental change.

One has only to look at the directorships of these foundations, all of them people who’ve climbed the Corporate ladder by ingratiating themselves with the system, and it should come as no surprise to find that on the lowest rungs of the granting system, their clones come to the fore, just as KJC[b] says :

“You are right ME2, now its just corporate enviros sitting down with corporate government and corporate Indians slicing the ever-decreasing pie”

Or, as [b]Lynn[/b says :

“In the long run NGOs are accountable to their funders, not to the people they work among.”

Back in the late 1970s – early 80s, the fight was with the forestcos regarding forest practices, and was brought before the public eye by Paul George and his Western Canada Wilderness Committee with his hundreds of thousands of broadsheets delivered all over BC and Western Canada with the help of many small engos, and by Colleen McCrory who networked and made countless appearances on the media – with NO help from the big Foundations- all in support of the South Moresby Wilderness campaign. The forest industry was clearly on the run regarding its methods in those days.

In the early to mid 80s the emphasis switched from critique of forest practices to outright opposition to logging, and so to a tradeoff by full preservation of large unlogged areas

In 85 the Haida staged their protest at Lyell Island, and from then on FN rights, including logging, in newly preserved areas were automatically assumed, and the public has been convinced that FNs would be better stewards of the forests than we. Hence the compromises in the Clayoquot and the GBR

more end logging?

My bitch has been that as a result of all this outright opposition to logging, the environmental movement hasn’t gathered a clue on how a forest works and so we see no concerted opposition to insults like variable retention, heli-logging and so on, all intended to keep in place the supreme insult of all, the short rotation. So, even while the grants have been increasing in size and number, over the last twenty years millions of acres have been trashed as the forest industry inevitably progresses to its own inevitable perdition

The Brundtland Report made it clear that a sustainable economy is best served by sustainable industry in the rural regions. In their typical vitriolic treatment of any perceived “enemy”, enviros have painted the logger as a villain of the worst sort, showing unconcern if their communities and their investments in them are lost. No forgiveness there if loggers have had false leaders, or have reacted poorly to enviro baiting. But not so for FN communities eh?

In his 1976 Royal Commission on Forestry Report, Peter Pearse suggested that a similar investigation into silviculture be held. Although three investigations into tenure have been held (issues dear to the Capitalists heart), nothing – absolutely nothing – has been done to question the silvicultural model, or rather the long series of them, that industry concocts purely to foster its short-term economic goals.

I can recall Paul George calling time after time for such a Commission, and so I doubt the idea is new to todays enviro hierarchy. Since – so they say – there is perhaps 40% merch forest left, I would venture to say it is far from too late to be calling for a Royal Comission on Forestry. But then, that’s not so trendy as climate change, eh Tzeporah? Oh yes, I forgot…..nobody’s giving out grants for that, are they?

For Mopled

Its obvious, Mopled, that some things need to be explained to you that can't be easily found online.

Does damage to the ozone contribute to global warming? In short, most absolutely. We know that CFC's have taken their toll on the Ozone and since CFC's have a long halflife and there is a megaton of it ready to leak into the atmosphere and contribute the problem, it will only get worse. And what does 03 do exactly? 03 screens out the shorter light wavelengths/radiation coming from the sun and the universe from infrared, to gamma.

In short, a damaged ozone leads to global warming. So where are these ozone holes and thin layers? In the coldest parts of the trophosphere, our artic caps.

We haven't monitored ozone for long, mabye 3 generations, but these holes are growing over the caps and last year was the largest ozone hole on record over the artic. And what does it mean? It means more radiation is coming through and more radiation means more collisions with whatever it hits and whatever it collides with, heat is given off as a result.

We have a good deal more C02 and methane gases in our atmosphere than we've had in the past. Its something like 180% more than what this planet has ever experienced over the last 900,000 years according to EPICA ice assays. So we have two things occurring simtaneously that have never happened before. We have more higher C02 levels than we've ever had before, and less ozone than we've ever had before, for likely the last million years or more and most certainly, they've never occurred together. Not like this.

So when the planet warms up by just one degree, the caps warm up by 12 degree's and why? More radiation coming down, and more C02 and methane for the radiation to collide with. And the results won't be pretty for humanity or the rest of life on this planet. You feel me? Cause we caused it. We damaged the ozone, and we doubled the C02 content. Why you refuse to acknowledge the role humanity has played in global warming and climate change beyond orbital variations, quite frankly, baffles me.

Maybe its pride? Ego? An investment into a false belief for so long that its become a part of you and you aren't sure what you would be if it was taken away, I don't know. But one thing I clearly do know. You are wrong concerning man's non contributing factor of climate change. Not because I said it, or someone else is saying it, but because the planet itself is saying it.

Trust me fully when I say this... you do not want to be a man made global warming denier 20 years from now, lest you risk frequently getting socked in the eye. At present, its happening under your watch, my watch, and the watch of us all.

Lorne McCuaig
Revelstoke, BC

Consequences

...besides the sock in the eye (or boot in the head) there is little chance these deniers will stop and think for themselves. Too busy with the cut and paste rebuttal from the latest conspiracy story.

Don't forget the military's role in climate war and how mopled believes this is our biggest threat!! Yes, just ask him. Has anyone noticed a distinct possibility that these denialists come from a strict christian belief that it's man's duty to go forth and conquer? It would explain their zealot like attitude. Without the ability to reason it could also be a form of mental illness.

I have to agree with Alda, the stupidity is just mind boggling, and I also fear that it's time to give up the fight. It's pointless even trying to reason with these people. Once elected, politicians now implement their own vision, and the illusion of government by the people for the people is a distant memory. The total lack of respect for the voting public is nothing short of criminal and a complete sham. Then the flocks of mopeled like sheep bleet on about anything and everything confusing the issues further. The average voter doesn't have a chance and apathy becomes chronic. Well done mopled. Even before the world has decided to reduce or limit energy use in any meaningful way, you and yours have a clear and decisive victory. You seem proud as a game rooster... Unfortunately we'll have to listen to them continue to crow as I'm sure the Tyee is not able to address the infestation of paid lobbyists whose sole purpose is to cause FUD.

The issue is black & white. Stand up for the future now or for ever hold your peace...

Quite right, clubofrome

http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/climatechange/unreport-2007.html

Deny and do nothing is the card our elected corporate lobbyists have been playing for now.

http://www.cbc.ca/story/world/national/2007/12/13/bali-climate-change.html

What worries me out of the doom and gloom forecasts are things that aren't mentioned such as the changes to ocean currents. Atlantic ocean currents have slowed by close to 30% over the last 30 years due to the fresh water runoff effecting the salinity of the ocean. The ocean is also acidifying due to human pollution and that has dire consequences for climate change.

The only answers we have at the moment in terms of what to do are to change the way humanity consumes and manufactures what resources we have left, and putting ceilings on human populations. In both respects, governments are unwilling to solve these problems as higher consumption leads to a healthier economy and its the economy that politicians are most beholden too... until the environment becomes so damaged all life becomes at risk, starting most often, with the highest life forms on the food chain, namely us. Its so unfortunate that the majority of CEO's seem only to care about the money. Its greed and ignorance that is wrecking this planet, pure and simple.

The problem with the premise

that man-made CO2 is causing "Global Warming" is:
The warming isn't "global"...the Southern Hemisphere has cooled.

There isn't enough CO2 to do the job.

The whole Solar System warmed at the same time Earth did.

The IPCC threw out the Stephan-Boltzman Law
That's like doing geometry without P.

Read this again:
http://www.thejakartapost.com/yesterdaydetail.asp?fileid=20071205.!15

Dishonest political tampering with the science on global warming
Christopher Monckton, Denpasar, Bali

"Two detailed investigations by Committees of the House confirm that the IPCC has deliberately, persistently and prodigiously exaggerated not only the effect of greenhouse gases on temperature but also the environmental consequences of warmer weather.

My contribution to the 2007 report illustrates the scientific problem. The report's first table of figures - inserted by the IPCC's bureaucrats after the scientists had finalized the draft, and without their consent - listed four contributions to sea-level rise. The bureaucrats had multiplied the effect of melting ice from the Greenland and West Antarctic Ice Sheets by 10.

The result of this dishonest political tampering with the science was that the sum of the four items in the offending table was more than twice the IPCC's published total. Until I wrote to point out the error, no one had noticed. The IPCC, on receiving my letter, quietly corrected, moved and relabeled the erroneous table, posting the new version on the internet and earning me my Nobel prize."

"At the very heart of the IPCC's calculations lurks an error more serious than any of these. The IPCC says: "The CO2 radiative forcing increased by 20 percent during the last 10 years (1995-2005)." Radiative forcing quantifies increases in radiant energy in the atmosphere, and hence in temperature. The atmospheric concentration of CO2 in 1995 was 360 parts per million. In 2005 it was just 5percent higher, at 378 ppm. But each additional molecule of CO2 in the air causes a smaller radiant-energy increase than its predecessor. So the true increase in radiative forcing was 1 percent, not 20 percent. The IPCC has exaggerated the CO2 effect 20-fold.

Why so large and crucial an exaggeration? Answer: the IPCC has repealed the fundamental physical the Stefan-Boltzmann equation - that converts radiant energy to temperature. Without this equation, no meaningful calculation of the effect of radiance on temperature can be done. Yet the 1,600 pages of the IPCC's 2007 report do not mention it once.

The IPCC knows of the equation, of course. But it is inconvenient. It imposes a strict (and very low) limit on how much greenhouse gases can increase temperature. At the Earth's surface, you can add as much greenhouse gas as you like (the "surface forcing"), and the temperature will scarcely respond."

I'd say that if the hysteria generated and IPCC "science" is what you base your erroneous conclusions on, you have some catching up to do.

Southern hemisphere "cooling"

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=18

In the absence of data - make it up.

What's that?

When one can't refute something bring in an irrelevancy? But I'll go along with it.
Here is more evidence that a major contributor to warming is the earth itself.

Magma May Be Melting Greenland Ice
http://www.livescience.com/environment/071213-greenland-magma.html

The I notice your Realclimate that Bastion of Truth and Beauty is just a bit out of date..

http://icecap.us/index.php/go/joes-blog/a_new_record_for_antartic_total_ice_extent/
A New Record for Antarctic Total Ice Extent?

While the news focus has been on the lowest ice extent since satellite monitoring began in 1979 for the Arctic, the Southern Hemisphere (Antarctica) has quietly set a new record for most ice extent since 1979.

This can be seen on this graphic from this University of Illinois site The Cryosphere Today, which updated snow and ice extent for both hemispheres daily. The Southern Hemispheric areal coverage is the highest in the satellite record, just beating out 1995, 2001, 2005 and 2006. Since 1979, the trend has been up for the total Antarctic ice extent.

Dire Warning Hype

Dear The Brain,
CO2 residence is at most 5 years, not 100.
All the dire warnings in the world can't change the facts about CO2, or the history of periodic Arctic warming.

Abstract

The three evidences of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), that the apparent contemporary atmospheric CO2 increase is anthropogenic, is discussed and rejected: CO2 measurements from ice cores; CO2 measurements in air; and carbon isotope data in conjunction with carbon cycle modelling.

It is shown why the ice core method and its results must be rejected; and that current air CO2 measurements are not validated and their results subjectively "edited". Further it is shown that carbon cycle modelling based on non-equilibrium models, remote from observed reality and chemical laws, made to fit non-representative data through the use of non-linear ocean evasion "buffer" correction factors constructed from a pre-conceived idea, constitute a circular argument and with no scientific validity.

Both radioactive and stable carbon isotopes show that the real atmospheric CO2 residence time (lifetime) is only about 5 years, and that the amount of fossil-fuel CO2 in the atmosphere is maximum 4%. Any CO2 level rise beyond this can only come from a much larger, but natural, carbon reservoir with much higher 13-C/12-C isotope ratio than that of the fossil fuel pool, namely from the ocean, and/or the lithosphere, and/or the Earth's interior.

The apparent annual atmospheric CO2 level increase, postulated to be anthropogenic, would constitute only some 0.2% of the total annual amount of CO2 exchanged naturally between the atmosphere and the ocean plus other natural sources and sinks. It is more probable that such a small ripple in the annual natural flow of CO2 would be caused by natural fluctuations of geophysical processes.

13-C/12-C isotope mass balance calculations show that IPCC's atmospheric residence time of 50-200 years make the atmosphere too light (50% of its current CO2 mass) to fit its measured 13-C/12-C isotope ratio. This proves why IPCC's wrong model creates its artificial 50% "missing sink". IPCC's 50% inexplicable "missing sink" of about 3 giga-tonnes carbon annually should have led all governments to reject IPCC's model. When such rejection has not yet occurred, it beautifully shows the result of the "scare-them-to-death" influence principle.

IPCC's "Greenhouse Effect Global Warming" dogma rests on invalid presumptions and a rejectable non-realistic carbon cycle modelling which simply refutes reality, like the existence of carbonated beer or soda "pop" as we know it.

http://folk.uio.no/tomvs/esef/ESEF3VO2.htm

Mr Cut & Paste

I find it highly unlikely that you have even the slightest understanding of what it is you copy and post here. While others debate using their own thoughts and interpretations, (and time as well) you only come off as a paid shill, and not a very good one at that. If you were even the slightest bit concerned about the human condition we might see you on other threads of social interest, but this is not the case. I know I speak for many when I say "get lost, sonny."

Can't resist...

A proof is a proof. When it is proven to be a proof. Then you have a proof that is to say it is proven, then you have a good proof!

Mr X says...

Another proof! What you say is true Mr. X!We are ecologically concerned about the state of our natural world because we really don't have a very good idea about what actually goes on out there. In a biological sense. But we're supposed to take it from you, a man of vision and experience, beyond everything modern science has achieved, that you Mr X, have it all figured out. Is that about right Mr X?

unmovable provables

What the hell does go on out there anyhow?
If a tree falls in the forest..does anybody hear?

So clubofrome you are claiming to be environmentally conscious...as opposed to environmentally unconscious ..or what!? Hell I`m confused here.

Doctor...

Don't ask me I'm afraid of the forest... ever since the Wizard of Oz. Apple throwing trees, flying monkies! You can have it.

I claim to be ecologically concerned. You know, when I'm not watching television...

the flying monkies

really did me in! The chanting cossack type guys with the big boots and overcoats and weird spear/axe things were no picnic either.
But yeah..the apple throwing trees were too much. Those long twisted branchy fingers and they were making faces and strange noises all the time. Very foreboding. This could have been the birth kind of ..of ecological concern with a lot of environmentally conscious claimants and wannabes.
Actually the Wiz...the green image of the head...kind of looked you know..just throw on some designer glasses and presto! ..like our Green Leader Gordo.. I AM GREEN GORDO THE GREAT !
Down the yellowbrick road with Quatchie, Sumie and ..whats the 3rd one iggy?..pooky?
Whatever..and Carol with her little red Guccis and ever present effervescent smile and perfect teeth.
... Wicked Witch of the West..hmmm..not CJ ..shes more of an apple throwing tree..
Joy McPhail is kind of cackly...but she`d be a really great flying monkey.
B.C. Mary would of course be the good Witch of the East.
Oh make it Karl Heinz Schreiber as wicked witch for now.

For mopled

Yeah... when I put that in my comment, I realized the error of my ways with the atmospheric half life of C02. Its 80 years. Not 100. And most certainly not 5.

As for periodic artic warming, it has to do with the precession of earths orbit. The problem is... its warming far faster than it should and the reason why is the reason I already gave. Its ozone destruction allowing a full 30% more radiation to hit the artic caps than ever before. This excess radiation, combined with higher levels of greenhouse gases account for what's happening in the north. And to deny that its happening all together to continue a blatant ego stroke is to exhalt yourself at everyone elses expense and I clearly have very little taste or patience for it, myself personally.

As for the rest of your own pontifications, I'm in full agreement with clubofrome. You simply do not know what you are saying. Myself personally, I think its your ego run amuck. I believe at this point, that you are, intellectually speaking, high on yourself.

Seen it before... this superiority/inferiority complex that a large number of us suffer from and by. Please, for the sake of our internet environment, get over it, move on, and try not to spend the rest of your life proving everyone else wrong with a sole mere attempt to stroke your own vanity.

Mental masterbation is an ugly thing to watch or read.

Lorne Mcuaig
Revelstoke, BC

Deniers are NOT scientists

ABSTRACT: We examine tropospheric temperature trends of 67 runs from 22 ‘Climate of the 20th Century’ model
simulations

So glad you gave us that link, Moppled. It's just another scam from Christie and Singer and the rest of the SEPP gang using their standard methodology, which involves going over someone else's observations instead of doing their own, cherrypicking the data they like, reassembling it into a new report and broadcasting it with the opposite conclusion. Then over the next year as others duplicate their work and discover the scam, Singer & Christie and Ball and Michaels and the rest run for cover as reputable scientists expose every flaw in their "research".

After all, that's the definition of "peer-reviewed". The editor of the journal of the RMS is surely embarrassed to have to print this bumpf, but if they've jumped through all the hoops, he can't deny them the opportunity to be published. But the storm is just beginning - you just watch.

This is old hat. Singer and Christie and the SEPP gang have done it every year for more than thirty years. They've not only cherry-picked research data for their articles, they've forged it, they've brow-beaten other scientists like the aged Roger Revelle into signing their names to articles that they had little or nothing to do with, they've assembled petitions with forged names that included celebrities and cartoon characters, and they're exclusively for sale to two of the biggest polluters in the world today - Big Oil and Big Tobacco. And they haven't done a speck of original research themselves in more than 15 years.

So I was glad to see you had posted a link to the Segalstad article (I kind of wish you'd add the contributor's names to all your cut'n'paste so we can more easily identify the articles) because there are some real scientists who have some genuine concern about the causes and effects of anthropogenic climate change. I'd have been much happier if Segalstad had omitted the whole section on philosophy and Kant and Nietsche and what-not as all it did was add an element of conspiracy to what might otherwise prove to be a valid paper.

Thanks Brain

Thank you for Taking on MrX, Brain. These forestco shills have not changed their tune for 30 years now.

I've often wondered if these donkeys were still replanting with pine monocultures. I've been told they were but didn't believe they could be that stupid. How disheartening to learn from you that they are.

I have only one quibble with your claim that replanting the forest, even with mixed species, is sustainable.

Ecologically speaking, the only truly sustainable forest is one that has undergone a natural restocking, initiating the natural succession which has evolved to produce forest health.

However, doing so is not economically sustainable, given human time-frames. Trying to mimic with multi-species planting is the best we can do, but becomes economically unsustainable (at least consistent with current economic yields) with the planned short rotations.

Among the conifers, the only exception to this is Lodgepoe pine, which can produce merch grade lumber in a short rotation - which is why the forestcos prefer it.

With any kind of luck, these jerkoffs will soon all be broke, and will ply their nefarious trade elsewhere, though I pity the next recipients of their "expertise".

Good morning, ME2!

Mr X seems to be on the surveying checking side of things for logging companies if I had to guess and it does condition one's point of view in terms of ones beliefs (outside of an ego run amuck, lol)... but the reality of it is simple. The forest industry has made huge blunders in reforestation and logging all throughout BC's history. There simply isn't that much to be proud of. We've overcut, in some places, dramatically and shamefully, and we've completely ignored the need to cut with the prevention of forest fires in mind. Its been profit orientated all the way and this not only accelerated the forest fire season of 2003, it'll do it again as global warming continues.

And while reforestation works, the tree cycles as you point out so well, deal with far more than conifers and thats all we plant.

Did I ask you to kiss my ass three days ago? Yup... regrettably I did. I happily recant and hastily offer my deepest apologies!

You are in my good graces ME2, have an awesome day, and may you go forth, multiply and prosper with Gods most excellent blessings. :-) Catch you on the next one, ME2 ;-)

Nice one, Zalm

Like a sledgehammer to a chinese toy, if I do say so myself. :-)

Cheap shots and little technical knowledge

"The Brain"'s self-righteous rant really offers nothing in the way of rebuttal to the points made my last posting other than his experience carrying out laboring jobs in the forest. If he really does have that much experience, then he really wasn't paying very much attention to the various components of the ecosystems he worked in.

To address one of his points, there are numerous technical reports out there, of which I have completed a few, that provide analyses of the diversity of species in whole forest districts by cutblock. Monocultures may occur in some areas in which only one species occurs naturally to start with, such as areas ecologically suited to lodgepole pine, but monocultures even in 30 or 40 or 50-year-old plantations are rare.

Your folksy little anecdotes don't really cut it when it comes to trying to prove your argument.

And your cheap shots about my being just a "shill" of the forest companies is not only completely untrue but a rather transparent attempt to discredit someone who doesn't happen to agree with your particularly narrow and ideologically driven viewpoint. It also does nothing to encourage me to engage in any sort of rational debate with you, so I won't.

Zalm, what a Gelbspanian rant

And what a weird twisting of a standard practice, that of doing a review of the extant literature. It displays either ignorance of standard practice or a deliberate obfuscating smear.

Your cherry picking from an article that is itself an exercise in cherry picking was funny, considering they quote Naomi Oreskes
Her search of the literature was examined by another scientist who came up with very different findings.
This from Benny Peiser http://www.staff.livjm.ac.uk/spsbpeis/Scienceletter.htm
"I analysed all abstracts listed on the ISI databank for 1993 to 2003 using the same keywords ("global climate change") as the Oreskes study. Of the 1247 documents listed, only 1117 included abstracts (130 listed only titles, author(s)' details and keywords). The 1117 abstracts analysed were divided into the same six categories used by Oreskes (#1-6), plus two categories which I added (# 7, 8):

1. explicit endorsement of the consensus position
2. evaluation of impacts
3. mitigation proposals
4. methods
5. paleoclimate analysis
6. rejection of the consensus position.
7. natural factors of global climate change
8. unrelated to the question of recent global climate change.

RESULTS

The results of my analysis contradict Oreskes' findings and essentially falsify her study:

Of all 1117 abstracts, only 13 (or 1%) explicitly endorse the 'consensus view'.

322 abstracts (or 29%) implicitly accept the 'consensus view' but mainly focus on impact assessments of envisaged global climate change.

Less than 10% of the abstracts (89) focus on "mitigation".

67 abstracts mainly focus on methodological questions.

87 abstracts deal exclusively with paleo-climatological research unrelated to recent climate change.

34 abstracts reject or doubt the view that human activities are the main drivers of the "the observed warming over the last 50 years".

44 abstracts focus on natural factors of global climate change.

470 (or 42%) abstracts include the keywords "global climate change" but do not include any direct or indirect link or reference to human activities, CO2 or greenhouse gas emissions, let alone anthropogenic forcing of recent climate change."

As to your charge of forgery, you might best look to James Hansen and Michael Mann for that. Neither of them will admit to having been found out by McIntyre and McKittrick. The article predates Hansen's outing on the warmest years.

Your attempt to smear Christie is laughable, since he is untouchable by the phony "money from fossil fuels" test.
Taking a John Stewart "not so much" type understatement out of context to make him seem like a nincompoop, was really pretty silly, but the article is just more of the same bilge one would normally find at grist or realclimate...I would not be surprised to find Fenton Communications had a hand in it. Ready-made copy from PR/advertising agencies has been a media staple for a long time.

x4estworker

Kiss my ass.

McIntyre and McKittrick

Back to economists again. Just can't find any real scientists tonight mopled

OH Well! Things are tough all over.

Brain

Thank you for your kind words, Brain. I have two comments regarding them.

The first is that had the environmental lobby taken some time to assess the opinion and the expertise of many like yourself some 25 years ago, instead of going with a "preservation ueber alles", we might have been able to have had our cake and eaten it too, in both preserving Old Growth forests and inmounting a successful attack on the destructive forest practices which still continue today.

The second comment is that I understood the reason for your attack on Mopled and myself, for I too have been somewhat offput by some of the sources he's quoted.

Despite that, I remain very distrustful re the Warmists CO2/Global Warming agenda. I have two main reasons for this opinion (and as with all of us here, it is opinion only, since as non-experts we have to cherry-pick the opinions of others).

My first reason is that the GW/CO2 campaign has all the earmarks of the typical scare tactics that band-wagon jumpers-on are prone to. For one, it is an obvious segue from the massive anti-oil campaign enviros had already mounted, and uses the same methodology of demonising the oil industry and its supporters, while grossly magnifying the slightest negative facts they can find.

It has all the stink of other popular, inquisitorial public campaigns such as the anti-marijuana and the second-hand smoke campaigns, both of which rely entirely upon trumped-up quasi-religious evidence.

My second reason derives out of the previous debate in which all the climatologists proffered by both sides strongly hedged their bets, noting that we need more as yet unavailable information before any accurate predictions can be made.

The modelling upon which many base their evidence is not unlike other forms of meta-studies in which the outcome is highly dependant upon the information entered. This type of data is useful for assessing possibilities of outcomes, but not suitable for use as "hard" evidence.

It may be that in the end the Warmists will be correct, but in my opinion it is still anybody's guess.

havent we been through this before?

x4estworker.... First of all if you believe that "There are about 26 million hectares of forest land in B.C. available for logging." you are obviously missinformed as approximately 30% of this if in an immature state which will not be harvestable for at least 80 years only if there is 100% success rate in silviculture, and this does not include what we have lost recently and are continuing to lose to the pine beattle on a daily basis as the result of improperly managed and very unhealthy forests. besides if there is that much area to log why are you threatened by forest conservation which is not only supported by engos but rpf's, planners, biologists, botonists, hydrologists and other professionals accross the province, country and globe?

"In a younger fast-growing forest, the process of photosynthesis in each tree
takes place at a much higher rate than occurs in slow growing old-growth trees."
this is absolutely a ridiculous rehtorical arguement used by forestry companies and there cronies. there is simply not enough biomass in a younger forest, no matter how fast it grows, to offset the destruction of the processes of mature and old growth forest. there is also a much higher diversity in old growth forests where other species besides trees help in these processes.

"There is a very complex ecological classification system used throughout B.C........ That system has been in place for at least 30 years." This fact sums up why are forests are such a mess and your level of knowledge on forestry in BC.....ITS 30 YEARS OLD!
The base information used in Forestry planning in the province of BC is outdated.
The BEC system is widely known for being extremeley flawed in regards to species representation, forest densities, and the divesity found within these classification systems.

Finally, I cant figure where you have been doing silviculture in this province, but anyone who has worked in the field knows that it is primarily lodgepole pine that is planted because of its early maturity and vigour as a seedling. Much of the natural regeneration you talk about is extremely limited and what does grow is usually considered a pest or invasive species to the plantation and many times is removed.

Maybe its time we all did listen to the facts, scientific reports of knowledgable individuals and organizations. After all, it was 30 years ago that ENGOS brought global warming and climate change issues to the tables, and what do you know, they were right!

For MrX

Oh, yes... I learned nothing in 18 years in reforestation. Reforestation tree survival depending largely on microsite locations for each species type means nothing. Overall knowledge of the changes and trends in industry over the last 20 years means nothing. The crop failures, the survival rates I've seen, the erosion, the overcutting, and too, the successes, it all means nothing.

In all honesty, its only point you can address. and you are still wrong. With pine blocks, most blocks in the past were planted with one species. Pine. I've planted tonnes of blocks with spruce only in the early years and why? Logging companies wanted to make money. They pretty much decided what they wanted to plant or when, until about 15 years ago, only because they were to through regulations.

And money... thats the problem. Even now, your "studies" which are nothing more than survey species counts (posting a link is too difficult, I guess) ignores tree cycles that follow pine or any other species that's been harvested. Do you seriously believe that with changing environments including soil conditions, that a spruce stump deserves another spruce planted there, or cedar where there is cedar or pine where there is pine, fir where there is fir, hemi where there is hemi and so on for centuries to come? Wet areas demand cedar and spruce, true. Dry areas demand fir and pine, true. But they also demand decidious trees to nutrify soils and do logging industries plant birch where there were birch trees? Aspen where there were aspens? Maple where there was maple? Cottonwoods where there was cottonwoods? Alder where there was alder? NO. They don't. And the reason why decidous trees aren't planted anywhere at all is simple. profit.

Cont.

Now I'm not saying that decidious trees should be planted where decidious trees where previously logged. In fact, I believe we should be considering the opposite. If the soil and environment can support conifer growth to maturity, lets go for it! But if soil and evironmental conditions can't support conifer growth, then decidious trees should be considered, except for one thing. Logging companies don't plant decidious trees at all! Period! They are out for the money. Logging companies ignore tree cycles all together because it doesn't suit their profit paradigm.

Christ, what do you think decidious knockdown contracts are for? And we take them all out, by the way. Every single one and why? For the conifer's, thats why. Its about the money, not necessarily whats best for the environment over the long term.

Trust me when I say it, reforestation is done with the mind for future profit. Its not for the sake of the environment from the corporate view. Logging companies have been forced to reforest to government stnadards by regulations, not by choice. Its not like logging companies self regulated themselves to the standards we have today. Christ, we haven't even remotely begun to look at what decidious trees do to prepare the forest floors for the future tree cycles to come. Its all about the money.

In other words, its conifers that logging industries are intent on establishing, solely for profit and there will be consequences to growing crops in this way, just as there are consequences to growing mono crop grains continually in dryland farming. There is such a thing as mining out the nutrients of soils and that's what we are doing in the forest industry now. Its just going to take a little longer in BC to see the results as we've seen with depleted top soils with agricultural farm land. 2, 3, 4 forest crop rotations maybe... I don't know. I'm a mere labourer according to yourself, after all. I know nothing.

And your cheap shots about my being just a "shill" of the forest companies is not only completely untrue but a rather transparent attempt to discredit someone who doesn't happen to agree with your particularly narrow and ideologically driven viewpoint. It also does nothing to encourage me to engage in any sort of rational debate with you, so I won't.

You're entire comment has had nothing of value other than to run me down as you did in your first post. You've done ground breaking studies? Revelating species cout surveys? Astounding. Thanks for sharing with us all you've learned yourself. In other words, you can't rationally engage in a debate because you haven't got what it takes. You don't have the answers or the will to provide them, other than to spout off about how you once were... and its crystal clear to me as to why.

ME2

I've just got this nasty habit of heavily criticizing others who run people or other groups down with generalizations or quick judgements... like this comment:

They had plenty of help from First Nations too, which just like the forestcos, are looking for revenue. Contrary to what some posters here want to believe, as a group FN leaderships are environmentalists only when it makes good PR for them, and never when it represents a cost to them.

The answer to the present logging debacle has been well-known for some twenty years now, in the form of long rotations of at least 250 years. The Coast Technical Team advanced that idea to the CBR committee, but it was rejected. Because of the secrecy, we'll never be given an answer as to why, except that it didn't satisfy the greedy.

Because elititists such as Tzeporah have hijacked the environmental movement, using political correctness techniques to muzzle all opinion and reasoning contrary to theirs, the general public no longer pays much attention to their unreason - chicken little alarms notwithstanding.

As I've written elsewhere on Tyee threads, the use of these techniques is epidemic within the Left in general, and that's pretty sad. - ME2

Is the writer of this story an environmental control freak that hijacked the environmental movement? I don't know. I know she's in Bali and she obviously cares about the environment. I know neither of us have likely put in as much efforts as she has for the cause. And too, I know that high profile players are lightening rods for attack, and any mistakes made are often overblown by media and onlookers alike. In other words, we have to put ourselves in their shoes to see their perspective and even then, its hard to cast judgement.