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March 31, 2008
Roger Pielke Sr Reiterates His Perspective on the Role of Humans in Climate Change
There continues to be misunderstandings on my viewpoint on the role of humans within the climate system. This weblog is written to make sure it is clear, and can be used whenever someone asks the question as to where does Pielke Sr. stand on this issue.
As I have written in the Main Conclusions of Climate Science
“Humans are significantly altering the global climate, but in a variety of diverse ways beyond the radiative effect of carbon dioxide. The IPCC assessments have been too conservative in recognizing the importance of these human climate forcings as they alter regional and global climate.”
and that
“Attempts to significantly influence regional and local-scale climate based on controlling CO2 emissions alone is an inadequate policy for this purpose.”
These conclusions are different from those who claim that the global average radiative effect of carbon dioxide is by far the major human climate forcing, as well as from those who conclude that natural climate variations dominate climate change and that the human climate forcings are inconsequential.
My viewpoint is also well articulated in
National Research Council, 2005: Radiative forcing of climate change: Expanding the concept and addressing uncertainties. Committee on Radiative Forcing Effects on Climate Change, Climate Research Committee, Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, Division on Earth and Life Studies, The National Academies Press, Washington, D.C., 208 pp
and you are encouraged to read the Executive Summary of that report [a report which whas been ignored by the media despite its broad base of authorship and its extensive review before it was published].
The reason that that those who focus on the global average radiative forcing of carbon dioxide are missing the bulk of human climate forcings include the following:
1. Atmosphere and ocean circulations respond to regional forcings not a global average (e.g. see and see)
2. The other human climate forcings include
the diverse influence of human-caused aerosols on regional (and global) radiative heating (e.g. see).
the effect of aerosols on cloud and precipitation processes (e.g. see)
the influence of aerosol deposition on climate (e.g. see and see)
the effect of land cover/ land use on climate (e.g. see and see)
the biogeochemical effect of added atmosopheric CO2 has a greater effect on the climate system than the radiative effect of added CO2 (e.g. see).
Natural climate variations and change, have also been underestimated (and are only poorly understood) based on examination of the historical and paleo-climate record (e.g. see and see).
Human climate forcings have a more significant role in altering the weather than does a global average increase in the radiative effect of an increase in the atmospheric concentration of CO2. This does not mean that we should not work to limit the increase of this gas in the atmosphere, but it is not the dominate climate forcing that affects society and the environment.
Policies that focus on CO2 by itself are ignoring definitive research results (such as reported in the 2005 National Research Council report) that humans have a much broader influence on the climate system than was communicated in the 2007 IPCC report. To neglect these other climate forcings represents a failure by policymakers (and the media) to utilize this scientifically robust information.
The neglect of including the diversity of human climate forcings indicates that the real objective of those promoting the radiative effect of the addition of atmospheric CO2 as the dominate human climate forcing is to promote energy and lifestyle changes. Their actual goal is not to develop effective climate policies.
Posted by Paul at 11:19 PM | Comments (17) | TrackBack
Report: GM Crops Will Benefit Economy
Genetically-modified oilseed and wheat crops could provide significant benefits to the economy, a new report says.
The Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics (ABARE) estimates an uptake of GM crops could add $912 million to the economy by 2018.
The Sydney Morning Herald: 'GM crops will benefit economy: ABARE'
The ABARE report summary is here.
Posted by Paul at 04:25 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
March 30, 2008
Emission Impossible
Governments around the world are working towards a commitment to deep cuts in CO2 emissions by 2050, or earlier, in the apparent belief that cuts are achievable, affordable, politically acceptable, and will have a measurable influence on climate change. Few would argue against the desirability of developing new, secure energy sources in order to reduce and eventually eliminate our dependence on so called fossil fuels. However, there seems to be no clear strategy for achieving CO2 emissions cuts of up to 80 per cent.
I do not intend to discuss the science of climate change in this article, which pulls together some of my previous posts. Instead I will try to demonstrate the huge problems that make current government climate policies 'emission impossible.'
First, below I have listed the top 25 world CO2 emitters as of 2004 ( A full list is available by following the link):
Ranking of the world's countries by 2004 total CO2 emissions from fossil-fuel burning, cement production, and gas flaring. Emissions (CO2_TOT) are expressed in thousand metric tons of carbon (not CO2). Source: Gregg Marland, Tom Boden, and Bob Andres. Oak Ridge National Laboratory:
RANK/NATION/CO2_TOT
1/UNITED STATES OF AMERICA/1650020
2/CHINA(MAINLAND)/1366554
3/RUSSIAN FEDERATION/415951
4/INDIA/366301
5/JAPAN/343117
6/GERMANY/220596
7/CANADA/174401
8/UNITED KINGDOM/160179
9/REPUBLIC OF KOREA /127007
10/ITALY(INCLUDING SAN MARINO)/122726
11/MEXICO/119473
12/SOUTH AFRICA/119203
13/ISLAMIC REPUBLIC OF IRAN/118259
14/INDONESIA/103170
15/FRANCE(INCLUDING MONACO)/101927
16/BRAZIL/90499
17/SPAIN/90145
18/UKRAINE/90020
19/AUSTRALIA/89125
20/SAUDI ARABIA/84116
21/POLAND /83801
22/THAILAND/73121
23/TAIWAN/65807
24/TURKEY/61677
25/KAZAKHSTAN/54627
China's rapidly growing emissions are obviously an obstacle to achieving any meaningful global CO2 emissions reductions, as demonstrated below:
Forecasting the Path of China’s CO2 Emissions Using Province Level Information
Our results suggest that the anticipated path of China’s Carbon Dioxide (CO2) emissions has dramatically increased over the last five years. The magnitude of the projected increase in Chinese emissions out to 2015 is several times larger than reductions embodied in the Kyoto Protocol. Our estimates are based on a unique provincial level panel data set from the Chinese Environmental Protection Agency. This dataset contains considerably more information relevant to the path of likely Chinese greenhouse gas emissions than national level time series models currently in use. Model selection criteria clearly reject the popular static environmental Kuznets curve specification in favor of a class of dynamic models with spatial dependence.
Maximilian Auffhammer¤
University of California, Berkeley
Richard T. Carson
University of California, San Diego
2007
China Tops World in CO2 Emissions
By AUDRA ANG, The Associated Press
Wednesday, June 20, 2007; 10:53 PM
BEIJING -- China has overtaken the United States as the world's top producer of carbon dioxide emissions - the biggest man-made contributor to global warming - based on the latest widely accepted energy consumption data, a Dutch research group says.
According to a report released Tuesday by the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, China overtook the U.S. in emissions of CO2 by about 7.5 percent in 2006. While China was 2 percent below the United States in 2005, voracious coal consumption and increased cement production caused the numbers to rise rapidly, the group said.
Just two countries, Somalia and Haiti, are currently living a lifestyle compatible with an 80% reduction in per capita CO2 emissions:
(See Prometheus: 'China's growing emissions')
Gwyn Prins and Steve Rayner tried to warn against further Kyoto style policies prior to the Bali Conference in an article published in the journal Nature:
by Gwyn Prins and Steve Rayner, Nature Vol 449 25 October 2007
The Kyoto Protocol is a symbolically important expression of governments’ concern about climate change. But as an instrument for achieving emissions reductions, it has failed. It has produced no demonstrable reductions in emissions or even in anticipated emissions growth. And it pays no more than token attention to the needs of societies to adapt to existing climate change.
The impending United Nations Climate Change Conference being held in Bali in December — to decide international policy after 2012 — needs to radically rethink climate policy.
Prins and Rayner also released a fuller pdf version of their analysis, pointing out that, in their opinion, there is no 'silver bullet' answer and a 'silver buckshot' approach should be used instead, plus adaptation is being neglected in favour of mitigation:
The Wrong Trousers: Radically Rethinking Climate Policy
Gwyn Prins: Professor and Director of the Mackinder Centre for the Study of Long Wave Events at the London School of Economics.
Steve Rayner: Professor and Director of the James Martin Institute for Science and Civilization at the University of Oxford.
Time to Swap Trousers?
Now is the moment to swap trousers. If the Bali Conference can become the occasion when the principles of an oblique and clumsy approach supplant the obsolescent approach which gave us the Kyoto Protocol that has dominated climate policy so fruitlessly for the past fifteen years, we believe that there are then strong grounds for hope. That hope is of two sorts. The first is hope that the Prometheus of humanity’s ingenuity and intellectual energy can be swiftly unbound from the rock of Kyoto to begin to break the link between the fossil-fuel energy nexus and world-wide wealth creation, which alone can restore harmony between the twin goals of climate security and human development. The second hope is that we may avoid the otherwise looming possibility of a collapse of public support for any forms of action on climate policy when the current spinning of the failure of Kyoto as success fractures irrevocably before the eyes of the concerned public. So this essay has been a conscious contribution to a controlled collapse of expectation, since the other alternative is to let events take their course, as bankers did in the Great Crash of 1929. Passivity before such a prospect is neither courageous nor wise.
The Right Trousers?
....climate change is not a discrete problem amenable to any single shot solution, be it Kyoto or any other. Climate change is the result of a particular development path and its globally interlaced supply system of fossil energy. No single intervention can change such a complex nexus (...the attempt to do so has produced unintended and unwelcome effects). There is no simple silver bullet.
Prins & Rayner suggest Seven Basic Principles:
1. Use 'silver buckshot.' This would mean adopting a wide variety of climate policies—silver buckshot—and non-climate policies with climate effects. Impossible to predict in advance which of these approaches might stimulate the necessary fundamental change.
2. Abandon universalism; focus on the 20 countries that account for 80% of the world’s emissions
3. Devise trading schemes from the bottom up; allowing governments unrestricted powers to allocate allowances instead of auctioning a limited supply, leads to a collapse in the price
4. Deal with problems at the lowest possible levels of decision-making; at local rather than national level
5.Invest in technology R&D; new energy technologies - put investment on a ‘war footing’
6.Increase spending on adaptation;
7.Understand that successful climate policy does not necessarily focus instrumentally on the climate.
However, according to computer modelled 'consensus science,' the situation is even worse and even an 80 per cent reduction in CO2 emissions is nowhere near enough:
Stabilizing climate requires near-zero emissions
H. Damon Matthews
Department of Geography, Planning and Environment, Concordia University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Ken Caldeira
Department of Global Ecology, Carnegie Institution of Washington, Stanford, California, USA
Abstract
Current international climate mitigation efforts aim to stabilize levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. However, human-induced climate warming will continue for many centuries, even after atmospheric CO2 levels are stabilized. In this paper, we assess the CO2 emissions requirements for global temperature stabilization within the next several centuries, using an Earth system model of intermediate complexity. We show first that a single pulse of carbon released into the atmosphere increases globally averaged surface temperature by an amount that remains approximately constant for several centuries, even in the absence of additional emissions. We then show that to hold climate constant at a given global temperature requires near-zero future carbon emissions. Our results suggest that future anthropogenic emissions would need to be eliminated in order to stabilize global-mean temperatures. As a consequence, any future anthropogenic emissions will commit the climate system to warming that is essentially irreversible on centennial timescales.
GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS, VOL. 35, L04705, doi:10.1029/2007GL032388, 2008
Received 17 October 2007; accepted 11 January 2008; published 27 February 2008.
Keywords: carbon dioxide emissions; climate change; climate stabilization.
"In the absence of human intervention to actively remove CO2 from the atmosphere [e.g., Keith et al., 2006], each unit of CO2 emissions must be viewed as leading to quantifiable and essentially permanent climate change on centennial timescales. We emphasize that a stable global climate is not synonymous with stable radiative forcing, but rather requires decreasing greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere. We have shown here that stable global temperatures within the next several centuries can be achieved if CO2 emissions are reduced to nearly zero. This means that avoiding future human-induced climate warming may require policies that seek not only to decrease CO2 emissions, but to eliminate them entirely."
Meeting follows meeting, as a global emission reduction deal is sought. Governments don't seem to have noticed yet that, according to Matthews and Caldiera, anything less than near-zero emissions deal very soon would be pointless. Air-capture rather than emissions reductions could be the only solution to the computer modelled phantom mence of CO2 driven climate change. Emission impossible indeed.
Posted by Paul at 08:50 AM | Comments (9) | TrackBack
Happy Birthday Cheeta
"It is 76 years since Cheeta the chimp was plucked from the African jungle to become a Hollywood star in the Tarzan movies. Yet incredibly, he is still going strong.
"The oldest known living chimpanzee enjoys a leisurely retirement in California, where he enjoys painting, piano and strolling in the sunshine...
Read more here: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/showbiz/showbiznews.html?in_article_id=548332&in_page_id=1773
Posted by jennifer at 08:47 AM | Comments (6) | TrackBack
March 29, 2008
Carbon Offsets to Expand National Parks or Selling Ice to Eskimos
In the cross-hairs of Queensland Government Acquisition?
“The Queensland Government will channel more than $10 million a year into a new ‘Eco Fund' to expand the state's National Parks.”
So said the Hon. Premier, Anna Bligh and Minister for Sustainability, Climate Change and Innovation, the Hon. Andrew McNamara, in a joint statement last Friday.
“… we’re going to expand our National Parks by 50% … reaching a target of 12 million hectares by 2020 …”
Developers and other entities will pay for this doubling of protected area, by offsetting their environmental impacts and greenhouse emissions. The Eco Fund will provide a facility for these offset payments to be retained within Queensland and re-invested into conservation land acquisition, giving the illusion of ecological neutrality or better.
However, there are some glaring problems with the concept. First of all, protected area management is very inefficient and a major contributor to emissions in its own right, particularly when burning.
In 1999, it was revealed that in the six years preceding the ‘LGAQ Public inquiry into the Management of National Parks’ Queensland’s protected area estate had doubled whilst its budgetary allocation had increased by only 9% . The inquiry found that QPWS was neither staffed nor resourced to manage its reserves, which were being increasingly overrun with feral weeds and animals. Doubling the estate, yet again, would surely double these identified inefficiencies.
The LGAQ Inquiry also revealed the convention that lands acquired for addition to protected area estate, invariably had existing conservation values. In effect, the only real change was the name on the land title. Whilst there was usually an acquisition cost, it could hardly be described as a carbon offset, when nothing had been done to change the ecological nature of the environment.
By contrast, if productive land were to be acquired and re-vegetated for inclusion into the protected area, then the public would be able to see the ecological gain and know that it had paid for the change of land-use, including compensation and loss of income-earning capacity.
Then there are the recreational and tourism entitlements of the public-at-large, with all known and associated impacts and emissions. The Queensland government currently opposes cost-recovery through user-fees on National Parks, so all costs associated with management and impact mitigation are met by the taxpayer. This further disadvantages conservation management on private lands, through the exclusionary provisions of subsidisation on a tenure-exclusive basis.
Posted by neil at 09:35 PM | Comments (25) | TrackBack
March 28, 2008
The Global Warming Challenge: Scott Armstrong Calling Al Gore
Professor Scott Armstrong of the Wharton School of Business at the Univ. of Pennsyvania, also associated with the Heartland Institute, is internationally known for his pioneering work on forecasting methods. Recently, he challenged former Vice-President Al Gore regarding Global Climate Modeling - and today sent off another letter:
March 28, 2008
Honorable Albert Gore
2100 West End Avenue,
Suite 620
Nashville, TN 37203
Fax 615 327-1323
Dear Mr. Gore,
The extended deadline for the Global Warming Challenge has passed and, despite the fact that I have responded to all of your concerns to date regarding the challenge, you have not been willing to engage in a scientific test of your forecasts of dangerous global warming.
Despite our literature searches and our appeals both on the Internet and in our published paper on climate change, my colleague and I have been unable to find a single scientific forecast to support global warming. If you are aware of such a study, I appeal to you directly to reveal it to the scientific community so that it can be subject to peer review and so the public can see the scientific basis for your claims.
In addition we need to continue scientific studies. Thus, I pose this question:
“When and under what conditions would you be willing to engage in a scientific test of your global warming forecasts?”
I look forward to your responses. By your own words, the global warming issue remains an important one for the future of the world. Given the enormous expenditures on this issue, I hope that as a concerned and influential citizen, you will take an active role in encouraging the application of science to this issue.
Sincerely,
J. Scott Armstrong
---------------
A history of the Global Warning Challenge is provided at http://theclimatebet.com. It includes all correspondence between Scott Armstrong and Al Gore. The site will post all papers that purport to provide scientific forecasts of global warming. The papers must provide full disclosure on how the forecasts were made, as full disclosure is one of the basic principles of science.
Posted by jennifer at 03:16 PM | Comments (70) | TrackBack
Won't Meet Emissions Targets, Unless
With present policies Australia has no chance of reducing our C02 emissions by anywhere near 80 per cent by the year 2050. Before I explain why, I should say that I am a greenhouse sceptic taking the view that it is very unlikely that CO2 is having a major effect on changing climate. However, due to the extreme consequences of a potential large rise in temperature, I believe it is prudent to take reasonable and sensible measures to reduce C02 emissions.
Australia has got its head in the sand on two major issues that make the task of meeting our commitments virtually impossible. These are (a) we have a rapidly growing population and (b) we have no technology at hand today to achieve the targets except nuclear power which the government refuses to consider.
Read the complete article by Peter Ridd here http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=7158&page=1
Posted by jennifer at 01:16 PM | Comments (26) | TrackBack
Typo in 2002 Australian Report Responsible for Plastic Bag Mythology
The plastic bag is the latest useful item to fall victim to a factually challenged campaign aimed at achieving a world-wide ban in the false name of being 'green' or 'saving the planet.' Australia has to take much of the blame for this, due to a 2002 report misinterpreting the original 1987 Canadian Study in Newfoundland claiming that 100,000 marine mammals and birds were killed by 'plastic debris.' In a 2002 report commissioned by the Australian Government into the environmental effects of plastic bags, 'plastic debris' became 'plastic bags.' The report became known as the Nolan-ITU report. In 2006 the report was updated. The same sentence was repeated but 'bags' was changed back to 'debris' with an explanatory note stating that the original article actually referred to 'fishing nets.' The damage to the reputation of the plastic bag was already done.
Read the excellent 8th March Times article, 'Series of blunders turned the plastic bag into global villain' online
or see a pdf version here.
The carrier bag industry is attempting to fight back and swim against the tide using the Carrier Bag Consortium website:
The following myth-busters are copied from 'Useful Soundbites for the Media:'
SPEAK THE SCIENCE
BIN THE SPIN
1: OFFICIAL VIEWS
• A levy on plastic bags in Ireland only made matters worse… people underestimate how many plastic bags are used to put out recycling or are substituted for plastic bin bags. “We have got to remember that taxes and levies can have perverse effects – such as making people use more plastic not less” … Liz Goodwin, Chief Executive WRAP (Government’s Waste Resources Action Programme) The Daily Telegraph 28 Sept 2007
• “This (voluntary) agreement is working - with retailers offering shoppers reusable bags-for-life. We don’t think a ban or levy is the right way to go. In Ireland, people just bought more bin liners to replace free carrier bags, so the volume of waste stayed the same.” … DEFRA, The Guardian, 3 October 2007
• “But until supermarkets reduce the energy used in their stores, minimise food miles and treat farmers better, saving a few plastic bags is just window dressing.”…Tony Juniper, Friends of the Earth, Daily Mail, 28 January 2008
• “There have been unforeseen consequences in the Irish Experience … increase in the use of paper bags which are actually worse for the environment …” … Ben Bradshaw, UK Environment Minister, 4 August 2006
• “A number of unintended consequences appear likely to be connected with the proposed levy … the net environmental impact is an issue of considerable dispute … the Committee therefore recommends that Parliament does not agree to … the Bill” … Unanimous Conclusion (including the Green party) of the Scottish Parliament, Environment and Rural Development Committee, after two years of investigations, 2006
• “0.2% of the average household dustbin is plastic carrier bags … hence a tax on plastic carrier bags alone would be unlikely to have any significant impact on volumes of waste” (Plastic Bag Tax Assessment, HM Treasury, December 2002)
• Because so many plastic bags are re-used for domestic waste disposal, the following increase in bin liners and refuse sacks occurred after the tax in Ireland:
o Tesco – 77% increase in pedal bin liner sales
o SuperQuinn – 84% increase in nappy disposable bag sales
o SuperValue/Centra – 75% increase in swing bin liner sales
Evidence to Scottish Parliament, Environment and Rural Development Committee Hearings 2005
• The use of plastic bags in Ireland (including substitute bin liners) analysed through HM Customs figures shows the amount of plastic bags imported into Ireland has actually gone up after their bag tax from 29,846 tonnes in 2001 to 31,649 tonnes in 2006… HM Customs statistics (analysed by Mike Kidwell Associates/PAFA 2007)
• “They represent a fraction of 1%* of waste going to landfill. Retailers of all types are well on the way to reducing the environmental impacts of bags by 25%. They are doing that with the cooperation of customers by rewarding re-use, giving away sturdier bags-for-life, enabling and encouraging recycling and reducing the amount of plastic in bags” Kevin Hawkins, Director General, British Retail Consortium, 13 July 2007
• *The fraction of landfill represented by plastic shopping bags is 0.05%. This is based on domestic waste being 17% of landfill and plastic bags being 0.2% of the average dustbin. Packaging and Films Association 2007.
• 59% of people re-use ALL their lightweight plastic bags and a FURTHER 16% say they re-use MOST of them. … WRAP Survey 2005
2: THE SCIENCE
• The manufacture of plastic bags uses one third of the energy, results in half the pollution and one eighth of the raw material requirement of paper bag production (Winnipeg University Studies)
• Paper bags weigh 6 times more than plastic on our roads and are 10 times the volume in storage. Switching to paper as result of plastic bag bans or taxes will put an extra 32,000 lorries on London’s roads. Extrapolated by CBC from Simpac Ltd Studies presented to Scottish Parliament ERDC Hearings, 2006
• The average round trip to the supermarket is 12 miles, the petrol equivalent of 210 plastic bags (typically one year’s usage of bags per person in the UK) … Dr Gerard McCrum, Oxford, The Daily Telegraph 24 July 2007
• “(plastic bags) contribution to climate change is miniscule. The average Brit uses 134 bags a year, resulting in just (2.6) kilos of the typical 11 tonnes of carbon dioxide he or she will emit in a year. That is one five thousandth of their overall climate impact.” George Marshall, The Guardian, Thursday September 13 2007
• In Scotland alone, taxing plastic carrier bags would have created an EXTRA 13,500 tonnes of (largely paper) waste going to landfill. (This would mean an EXTRA 150,000 tonnes of waste created in the UK) Extrapolated from Scottish Executive Impact Assessment Studies 2005
• Taxing plastic bags will send more paper to landfill where it will degrade to give off greenhouse gases in direct contravention of the EU Landfill Directive. Plastic remains inert and will not give off CO2 or Methane in landfill. Packaging and Films Association 2002.
• Plastic has a higher calorific value than any other element of waste. The energy released in clean-burn municipal incineration by a single carrier bag keeps a 60 watt light bulb burning for one hour. APME/Plastics Europe 2006
• No other shopping container can carry 2,500 times its own weight and stay strong when wet. CBC 2001
• A typical plastic carrier bag uses 70% less plastic today than 20 years ago. No other industry has a better track record in material reduction. Packaging and Films Association 2003
• Plastic bags do not waste oil, they are derived mainly from oil refining by-products (naptha, ethylene, etc) which would otherwise be flared off. So plastic bags are an excellent use of otherwise waste products. All plastic packaging of all types uses no more than 2% of total oil extraction compared with 29% for transport and 35% for heating/industry. Plastics Europe 2007
3: THE RETAIL EFFECT
• The Irish tax has cost small to medium retailers an estimated €24.3m (after the first year of operation) mostly as a result of theft plus additional theft of €10m in “push out” thefts (where unbagged and unpaid for goods are wheeled through the doors due to absence of carrier bags as evidence of purchase) (Note: This is more than the income “generated for the good of the environment” and includes the theft of trolleys and baskets) … RGDTA - Irish Grocers Association and Irish Trade Journal “Shelf Life” estimates 2003,
• A 10p tax per carrier bag represents a tax level of 1400% on cost price. If applied equally across popular goods, a can of Coke would cost £8 and a packet of crisps £5. Simpac Ltd Study for CBC 2005
Posted by Paul at 02:32 AM | Comments (159) | TrackBack
Birdies Bye Bye: Joint Press Release by Prof David Bellamy and Mark Duchamp
We have received the following message from Israel :
"Following a press release last week it seems that several of the leading industrial companies in Israel are going to enter the wind business. These are deeply connected to leading politicians.
Our ministry of environment is quite hopeless. The future seems bleak."
From Gibraltar, from Sicily, from the US, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Mexico, and now from Israel, day by day more bad news come in from the main bird migration flyways of the world. For windfarm developers think nothing of erecting their wind turbines in migration bottlenecks. Wind speed and maximisation of profit is their main concern.
Birds are killed by the large blades, whose tips revolve at speeds exceeding 100 mph while deceiving the victims by an appearance of slowness. In Sweden, one wind turbine is reported to have killed 895 birds in one year - ref : California Energy Commission, A Roadmap for PIER Research on Avian Collisions with Wind Turbines in California, Dec. 2002, quoting Benner et al. (1993).
They also get killed by their powerlines, which are built next to each windfarm to carry puny amounts of this very expensive, intermittent electricity to the grid en route to your homes. According to the report "Protecting Birds from Powerlines", high tension lines may kill over 500 birds per km per year in migration zones – ref : Convention on the Conservation of European Wildlife and Natural Habitats - Birdlife International (2003). Smaller windfarms may not require high tension lines, but overhead cables are still needed to connect to the distribution network, and they too maim and kill birds that collide in the fog, or at night, or while fleeing some danger.
In short : if someone wanted to set about exterminating the world's migrating birds, placing windfarms in migration hotspots would be looked upon as best practice.
We are not doing any better in the UK. For instance, the "Bird Sensitivity Map to Provide Locational Guidance for Onshore Wind Farms in Scotland" designates practically the whole of the Western Isles as highly sensitive ; except for two areas, one of them being the site where a windfarm project is seeking approval (Pairc).
Yet the Pairc environmental statement predicts the possible death of 66 -165 golden eagles as a result of collisions with the giant blades. No other project in Scotland declares that it may kill so many eagles ; and the subject of migrating birds is poorly addressed.
The applicant for the Pairc windfarm is Scottish and Southern Energy.
The same map marks the whole of the Shetlands as highly sensitive, except for a few tiny yellow spots - presumably where Scottish & Southern Energy plans to erect more wind turbines. How on earth will migrating birds be able to avoid the giant rotors when adverse winds push them towards one of these "yellow spots" ? or when they fly or make landfall at night ?
Yet a bird society is actually supporting a large windfarm project on Shetland. Don't they know the island is a crucially important staging post for migrating birds ?
Until these and many other pertinent questions are answered by the ornithological fraternity we ask that all those who cherish Britain's heritage of migratory and other birds ask their favourite bird society why windfarms are allowed in migration corridors, e.g. in the Hebrides or in the Shetlands ? Also ask your electricity suppliers how much of the electricity supplied to your homes comes from wind. Details from BWEA's web site indicate that windfarms only supply 1.5% of Britain's electricity. Then ask yourselves if the slaughter of our birds is really necessary, and join the thousands who are already campaigning against the erection of these wind monsters across Britain.
Co-signed on March 26th 2008 by :
Professor David Bellamy,
and Mark Duchamp.
Posted by Paul at 02:21 AM | Comments (22) | TrackBack
March 27, 2008
Articles on Australia's Carbon Canutism
THE Rudd Government is prepared to stare down a demand to compensate power producers for the effects of the carbon trading scheme foreshadowed in its review of climate change policy.
Power producers say that without structural assistance the value of their assets will fall sharply and investors will be reluctant to commit to new plants, causing power shortages.
The Australian, 'No to carbon payout claims'
SINCE May 2002, when interest rates again started to rise, home loans in Australia have grown to about a trillion dollars today. Business borrowing has now passed $700 billion.
Were interest rates 3 per cent lower today, as they were in 2002, the national annual interest bill would be about $50 billion less. And although there may now be signs of changing buyer behaviours, such sustained lifts in interest costs have had little observable impact upon the appetites of households and businesses for debt, so far.
In the same period, petrol costs have increased by about 10 cents a litre per year. Were petrol prices the same today as in 2002, the national fuel bill would be $25 billion lower each year. Yet we are buying more cars, travelling further and using more petrol than ever before even as petrol prices continue to lift.
The Australian, 'Helping neighbours is key to cuts'
STRIKING greenhouse gas reduction deals with big developing countries, particularly our trading partners, might be a better method of dealing with climate change than pursuing a plan focused on imposing increasing costs on domestic energy users.
Writing in the opinion page of The Australian today, leading corporate figure Ziggy Switkowski questions whether relying solely on a gradual build-up of energy costs is the most effective strategy for achieving reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.
Dr Switkowski's entry into the debate comes as the Rudd Government formulates Canberra's response to climate change, with its adviser Ross Garnaut arguing that the planned carbon-trading scheme should not compensate coal-fired power stations.
The Australian, Greenhouse deals 'beat carbon trading'
Reminder: New Paper from the Virtual World: Stabilizing Climate Requires Near-Zero Emissions
Posted by Paul at 04:04 AM | Comments (29) | TrackBack
Biodiesel from Trees in Queensland
Farmers in North Queensland are doing their bit to be environmentally friendly by investing in a tree that produces diesel.
Mike Jubow, a former cane farmer and now a nursery wholesaler, says diesel-producing trees are a long-term investment.
"If I'm lucky enough to live that long enough - I'm 64 now - it is going to take about 15 to 20 years before they are big enough to harvest the oil so that I can use them in a vehicle," he said.
Read the entire ABC News article, 'Qld farmers invest in diesel-producing trees'
There's also a similar article in The Syndney Morning Herald, 'Farmer planning diesel tree biofuel'
Posted by Paul at 03:54 AM | Comments (24) | TrackBack
March 26, 2008
Ice Shelf Collapses with Crikey's Credibility
There is an Australian e-journal that is popular with many government-types called crikey.com.au. Today the lead story began,
"A chunk of ice seven times the size of Manhattan (as big as the Isle of Man if you prefer a more Anglo-centric news source) is hanging by a thread to the main, still-frozen body of the western Antarctic. Satellite images are showing the rapid disintegration of a 41km x 2.5km ice chunk, a part of the Wilkins Ice Shelf that has been there for hundreds, maybe 1,500 years. It is happening, the scientific consensus seems to be, because the seas are getting warmer. It's that greenhouse thing.
So, what to do? Blame China? No, we need to take individual responsibility. Wait on the Garnaut report? No, too little too late. We must act now ... of course! Let's turn some lights off on Saturday. For an hour. That'll fix it. Meanwhile, click on the image below to watch a video of what Earth Hour is up against." [end of quote]
Anyway, that's about as clever as it gets even from the so-called alternative media and the story is much the same in The Australian.
Then of course there are the blogs, including some which actually provide data and background information to put the collapse of the icesheet in some context:
"In reality it and all the former shelves that collapsed are small and most near the Antarctic peninsula which sticks well out from Antarctica into the currents and winds of the South Atlantic and lies in a tectonically active region with surface and subsurface active volcanic activity. The vast continent has actually cooled since 1979...
"The full Wilkins 6,000 square mile ice shelf is just 0.39% of the current ice sheet (just 0.1% of the extent last September). Only a small portion of it between 1/10th-1/20th of Wilkins has separated so far, like an icicle falling off a snow and ice covered house. And this winter is coming on quickly. In fact the ice is returning so fast, it is running an amazing 60% ahead (4.0 vs 2.5 million square km extent) of last year when it set a new record. The ice extent is already approaching the second highest level for extent since the measurements began by satellite in 1979 and just a few days into the Southern Hemisphere winter and 6 months ahead of the peak. Wilkins like all the others that temporarily broke up will refreeze soon. We are very likely going to exceed last year’s record. Yet the world is left with the false impression Antarctica’s ice sheet is also starting to disappear."
Read the complete blog post and check out meteorologist Joseph D’Aleo graphs at http://icecap.us/index.php/go/political-climate.
Then there is more information from Anthony Watt's:
Map of volcanoes in Antarctica
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2008/01/antarcticvolcanoes2.jpg
This image is from NASA, and shows areas with greatest warming in Antarctica are near the peninsula and pacific ring of fire groups of volcanoes:
http://veimages.gsfc.nasa.gov//17529/antarctic_temps.AVH1982-2004.jpg
here is the original article
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Newsroom/NewImages/images.php3?img_id=17257
But now look at what Wikipedia has done to it:
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Antarctic_temps.AVH1982-2004.jpg
They say " they image is misleading...visit the discussion page"...okey dokey, http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image_talk:Antarctic_temps.AVH1982-2004.jpg
and on that page they say "use alternative image" (GISS maps) instead which is this:
And it STILL shows a big red area over the ataractic peninsula where volcanism is the strongest.
[end of quote from Anthony].
Thank goodness for the internet.
Posted by jennifer at 04:17 PM | Comments (211) | TrackBack
The IPCC: On The Run At Last by Bob Carter
UN climate body in panic mode as satellite temperatures turn down and a hard winter lashes both hemispheres
A soprano thrillingly hits her top-A, sighs with relief at achieving the desired effect, and moves on. But not the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) whose climate alarmism started to crescendo in 2001 in the Third Assessment Report (3AR) with the statement that “most of the observed warming over the last 50 years is likely (>66% probable) to have been due to the increase in greenhouse gas concentrations”.
Recently, in their Fourth Assessment Report (4AR), and faced with their failure to convince the public that the sky is falling, the IPCC delivers even more preposterous advice in ever shriller tones, saying that “Most of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely (>90% probable) due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations”. The wobble around top-A is clearly discernible.
The press, most of whom have firmly identified with the alarmist cause, continues to appease the Green gods by faithfully running IPCC’s now unrealistic scientific propaganda, thereby stoking public alarm; the science is a done deal, they say, and the time has come to stop talking. According to UK journalist, Geoffrey Lean, all that is lacking to solve the global warming “crisis” is political will from governments.
Well, thank the Lord for that lack. For the IPCC’s 2007 final Summary for Policymakers shows that the climate alarmists are at last on the run. Their evidence for dangerous, human-caused global warming, always slim, now lies exposed in tatters for all to see.
In contrast, the alternative, persuasive and non-alarmist view of climate change is well summarized in two recently issued and readily available documents. The first is a letter to the Secretary General of the United Nations, which was released at the UN’s Bali conference last December, supported by the signatures of 103 eminent professional persons. The second is the Manhattan Declaration on Climate Change, the release of which coincided with the launch of the International Climate Science Coalition at a major climate rationalist conference in New York in early March.
The evidence for dangerous global warming adduced by the IPCC has never been strong on empirical science. Endless circumstantial scare campaigns have been run about melting glaciers, more droughts and storms and floods, sea-level rise and polar bears, but all founder on one inescapable problem – as does Mr. Al Gore’s over-hyped science fiction film. And that is that we live on a naturally variable planet. Change is what planet Earth does on all scales, and so far not one of the alleged effects of human-caused global warming has been shown to lie outside normal planetary variation. Sea-level rising? Sure, it happens. And the appropriate response is adaptation, as the Dutch have known for centuries.
Stuck with the absence of empirical evidence for dangerous warming or abnormal change, in 2001 the IPCC turned to graphmanship, giving prominence in its 3AR to the so-called “hockey-stick” record of temperature over the last 1000 years. The hockey-stick graphic, which appeared to show dramatic increases of temperature during the 20th century compared with earlier times, has now been exposed as statistical chicanery and, thankfully, is nowhere to be seen in the 4AR.
No hockey-stick and no empirical evidence, what is a man to do? Well, obviously, turn to virtual reality rather than real reality: PlayStation 4 here we come.
The IPCC’s expensive and complex computer models can be programmed to produce any desired result, and it is therefore not surprising that they uniformly predict warming since 1990. Meanwhile, the real-world global average temperature has stubbornly refused to obey this stricture. It exhibits no significant increase since 1998, and the preliminary 2007 year-end temperature confirms the continuation of a temperature plateau since 1998 to which is now appended a cooling trend over the last 3 years.
Is global cooling next?
“Best fit” of yearly average temperature
Lower atmosphere global temperature differences (0C) from 1979 – 1998 average
“Global warming theory indicates that temperature rise due to increasing carbon dioxide emissions should be most prominent at heights of 5-10 km in the lower atmosphere; instead, more warming is occurring at the surface. For the lower atmosphere, the satellite data indicate that, since the 1998 El Nino when temperatures spiked 10C due to a rise in water vapour emissions (the principal “greenhouse gas”), global temperatures dropped sharply, then stabilized and now show signs of continuing down - is global cooling next? (data courtesy of Professors John Christy and Roy Spencer, University of Alabama , Huntsville ; a best-fitted spline curve represents longer term temperature trends).”
Read the entire Canada Free Press article here.
Dr. Bob Carter is a Research Professor at James Cook University, Queensland, Australia, who studies ancient environments and climate, and whose website is at http://members.iinet.net.au/~glrmc/new_page_1.htm
Posted by Paul at 03:24 AM | Comments (103) | TrackBack
March 25, 2008
Whaling in the North Part II 2008 and Listen to a Humpback
1) The Icelandic Minke Whaler’s Association states on its website “A conceivable agreement within the IWC?”
A rough translation:
“There has been an intersessional IWC meeting in London in March. According to the Icelandic IWC Commissioner, Stefan Asmundsson, there are no proposals that the IWC will start to regulate commercial whaling, even if such hints/ rumours have circulated in the Icelandic media.
However, there is a will within the IWC for a change, as it is obvious that the current system doesn’t work in a satisfactory way.
The IWC was funded to manage whale hunting, through the Committee. There have been disagreements in the Scientific Committee, for example on humpback whaling, that has been banned since the 60’s.
The SC has however been united in many issues , for example re the minke whale stock around Iceland. The stock is robust and can be managed for whale hunting. The question is how large should the quota be.
The IWC must reach a compromise. It must start working in accordance with the original Convention it was based on. Otherwise the whaling nations must withdraw from the IWC and depend on its own scientists.
Listen to a humpback whale
2) The Norwegians are currently in the Southern Oceans conducting research on krill on the survey
ship “ the G.O Sars”. The Norwegians are one of the big actors in this field, with factory ships in the Southern Oceans.
To study the krill, platforms, sonar, hydrofons were launched. One of these platforms were visited by a curious humpback whale.
The humpbacks were very curious and approached the survey ship. It seemed according to the crew that
The Southern Hemisphere humpbacks did dare to come closer to the vessel than humpbacks in northern seas.
The SH humpbacks are as well bigger than the NH ones, and can reach 18 meter.
Listen to the humpback through the hydrofon ( scroll down to “ LYDKLIPP : KLICK FOR Å HORE! “ and click on the text! Amazing sounds that Libby might interpret?
Humpbacks dominate
3) As has been mentioned above, the survey or research ship , G.O Sars, is currently in the Southern Oceans, between Cape Town and the Antarctica.
They have observed lots of humpback whales, about 103 animals. The pods are about 2-4 whales, usually adults together with calves. The humpbacks are usually observed near the ice, where they consume krill. They can easily eat 500 kg in a short while / “ in a gulp”. Krill is the primary food during the summer season.
The humpbacks are also very curious about the research ship. The ship has observed sperm whales, minkes, humpbacks and Fins, according to the ships diary, states Norwegian fisheries paper, Fiskeribladet.
Cheers,
Ann Novek
Sweden
Posted by Paul at 11:39 PM | Comments (16) | TrackBack
Coral Re-growth on the Great Barrier Reef: A Note from Bob Halstead
In July 2002 I was helping teach an underwater photography course for students at James Cook University. Day trips to the outer barrier were organised from Port Douglas. On the reef I mostly saw dead coral smothered with rafts of brown algae, and struggled to find any living invertebrates for the students to photograph. It was depressing.
However, in October 2007 I made a live-aboard cruise up the reef, and a day trip out of Cairns, which cheered me up enormously. All along the outer reef there were dramatic signs of coral regeneration. There were reefs covered with small plate corals of various species, and other corals, which looked, from my experience in Papua New Guinea, to be of the order of 1-3 years growth. Here are some of the photographs I took.
http://www.halsteaddiving.com/
http://www.halsteaddiving.com/
http://www.halsteaddiving.com/
http://www.halsteaddiving.com/
http://www.halsteaddiving.com/
http://www.halsteaddiving.com/
Bob Halstead
http://www.halsteaddiving.com/
Posted by jennifer at 08:17 PM | Comments (6) | TrackBack
Letter to The Editor: Ban Night-Time Sport
I have agreed to publish 'Letters to The Editor' that fail to make the mainstream newspapers. The following contribution from Art Raiche appears to have been overlooked by both the Sydney Morning Herald and The Australian:
Dear Sir,
Australia's CO2 output is insignificant compared with that of the rest of the world. We could shut down all our industry, ban the burning of all fossil fuels and reduce ourselves to lives as hunter-gatherers and it would not make one whit of difference to climate change either here or anywhere else in the world.
Why should we initiate measures that will see jobs exported to countries that have no intention of putting serious emission controls in place? It is often said that we are amongst the highest producers of CO2 per capita. That may be but why should Australians be punished because we haven't let our population get out of control?
Earth hour is being touted as a wonderful symbolic gesture. It is a gesture that may make the self-flagellants feel good but the earth's climate system is not affected by symbolic gestures. If we were serious about such measures, we would ban night-time sport. The "environmental message" rock concerts would be less hypocritical were they to ban electronic instruments and amplification and ban admission to those who came by private cars.
There has been life on earth for more that three billion years. Homo sapiens has existed less than a quarter of a million years. We do not need to "save the planet" because it will be here long after we become extinct. We do not need to hasten our extinction as a prosperous nation because of mass hysteria generated by a misunderstanding of the earth's climate system.
Art Raiche
[address supplied but withheld]
Posted by jennifer at 06:58 PM | Comments (4) | TrackBack
Sign Up to Endorse Declaration Against Man-Made Climate Fears!
One of the most important outcomes of The 2008 International Conference on Climate Change in New York City conference was the production of the Manhattan Declaration on Climate Change, a copy of which you can read below. The coordinators of the Declaration are opening endorsement up to individuals who support the declaration but were not physically at the event. These ‘remote endorsers’ of the declaration will be added to separate lists identified either as a “climate expert” or simply as an interested “citizen of the world”.
Please contact Tom Harris at the International Climate Science Coalition at
tom.harris@climatescienceinternational.net, if you would like to add your name to the list. There are 167 endorsers to this point, 94 of whom were at the conference and 63 experts who signed on later. For supporters of the declaration who are not climate experts, ICSC have created a third category, “Citizens of the World” which, once the number of endorsers gets large enough, they will publish to their Web page at http://www.climatescienceinternational.org/.
Manhattan Declaration on Climate Change
We, the scientists and researchers in climate and related fields, economists, policymakers, and business leaders, assembled at Times Square, New York City, participating in the 2008 International Conference on Climate Change,
Resolving that scientific questions should be evaluated solely by the scientific method;
Affirming that global climate has always changed and always will, independent of the actions of humans, and that carbon dioxide (CO2) is not a pollutant but rather a necessity for all life;
Recognising that the causes and extent of recently-observed climatic change are the subject of intense debates in the climate science community and that oft-repeated assertions of a supposed ‘consensus’ among climate experts are false;
Affirming that attempts by governments to legislate costly regulations on industry and individual citizens to encourage CO2 emission reduction will slow development while having no appreciable impact on the future trajectory of global climate change. Such policies will markedly diminish future prosperity and so reduce the ability of societies to adapt to inevitable climate change, thereby increasing, not decreasing human suffering;
Noting that warmer weather is generally less harmful to life on Earth than colder:
Hereby declare:
That current plans to restrict anthropogenic CO2 emissions are a dangerous misallocation of intellectual capital and resources that should be dedicated to solving humanity’s real and serious problems.
That there is no convincing evidence that CO2 emissions from modern industrial activity has in the past, is now, or will in the future cause catastrophic climate change.
That attempts by governments to inflict taxes and costly regulations on industry and individual citizens with the aim of reducing emissions of CO2 will pointlessly curtail the prosperity of the West and progress of developing nations without affecting climate.
That adaptation as needed is massively more cost-effective than any attempted mitigation, and that a focus on such mitigation will divert the attention and resources of governments away from addressing the real problems of their peoples.
That human-caused climate change is not a global crisis.
Now, therefore, we recommend –
That world leaders reject the views expressed by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change as well as popular, but misguided works such as “An Inconvenient Truth”.
That all taxes, regulations, and other interventions intended to reduce emissions of CO2 be abandoned forthwith.
If you would like to publicly endorse Heartland Institutes declaration on climate change please email tom.harris@climatescienceinternational.net
Posted by Paul at 06:27 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
Climate Facts to Warm To (Part 2)
I did a radio interview commenting on global temperatures and weather patterns last Monday which was picked up by The Australian, then the blogosphere and now Fox News.
Some people have asked me for clarification on a few points including what the head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has said by way of the ‘temperature plateau this century’ and also have asked for more information on my qualifications.
Let’s start by re-looking at the available temperature data, as at least one blogger, Ken Parish, seems to not understand this data.
1. Are temperatures really cooling?
Over very long time periods (thousands of years) the earth experiences cycles of warming and cooling – indeed climate is always changing. The earth is currently in what is known as an interglacial warm period with temperatures warming, and sea levels rising by about 100 metres, during the last 16,000 years.
But there have been ups and downs. For example, there was cooling for several hundred years after the medieval warm period through to about 1900. Then there was warming until about 1945 followed by cooling through until 1975-76. The United Nation’s IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) predicted in 1990 that there would be continuous warming well into this century driven by rising levels of carbon dioxide. But in fact there has been cooling again over the last decade.
Just two years ago, the Hadley Centre in the United Kingdom predicted that 2007 would be a record warm year – exceeding 1998 – but it turned out to be rather cool.
from http://www.weatherquestions.com/Roy-Spencer-on-global-warming.htm
So to summarize, as I said in the radio interview: if you take 1998 as your point of reference there has been cooling, if you take 2002 as your point of reference there has been a temperature plateau. I also said in the interview that temperatures may start to rise again, or the earth could be about to enter another period of prolonged cooling – we could even be at the end of the current interglacial warm period.
2. What did the Head of the IPCC say?
According to an interview in January 2008 by Reuters:
“Rajendra Pachauri, the head of the U.N. Panel that shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize with former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, said he would look into the apparent temperature plateau so far this century.
"One would really have to see on the basis of some analysis what this really represents," he told Reuters, adding "are there natural factors compensating?" for increases in greenhouse gases from human activities.
“He added that skeptics about a human role in climate change delighted in hints that temperatures might not be rising. "There are some people who would want to find every single excuse to say that this is all hogwash," he said.
“[Amir] Delju, [senior scientific coordinator of the World Meteorological Organization's (WMO) climate program,] said temperatures would have to be flat for several more years before a lack of new record years became significant.” [end of quote from Reuters]
3. Who is Jennifer Marohasy?
I have a Batchelor of Science and a PhD from the University of Queensland – my thesis was in insect ecology. I worked as a field biologist for many years and then in the late 1980s started critiquing environmental campaigns while I was environment manager for Canegrowers – I was concerned, in particular, that the World Wild Fund for Nature (WWF) was falsely suggesting science supported various unproven allegations relating to farming and the Great Barrier Reef. I then worked on Murray River water issues, again comparing allegations from environmentalists with the official statistics. I was forced to take an interest in global warming when Professor Tim Flannery made various public statements suggesting that the drought which gripped southern Australia for much of this century was unlikely to ever break because of carbon dioxide emissions. The issue of climate change now dominates much of the discussion at this weblog.
I have applied my training in the scientific method to understanding this issue. In particular I am only interested in the data – not what may or may not motivate commentary. Furthermore I am much more interested in observational data, rather than modelled output.
There are some people who may feel I am unqualified to comment in the area of climatology because my thesis topic was in ecology, however, much of my work for many years has simply been about understanding raw data/numbers and communicating this information in an honest and meaningful way – a PhD in a science discipline is a good formal training for this. I now describe myself as a biologist and a writer. Perhaps I could be best described as a science writer - but I have no formal training as a journalist, my training is as a scientist.
Posted by jennifer at 02:06 PM | Comments (66) | TrackBack
March 24, 2008
Comprehending Footprints
No, this is not a photograph of my two left feet … I will only claim the shod one at the left. Australia’s heaviest native land animal, the adult female Southern Cassowary Casuarius casuarius johnsonii, left the imprint of the other. As can be seen against my size-10 clodhopper, this is a bird that would fill a room.
On the issue of footprints, tracking is an invaluable skill taught to traditional indigenous children throughout time. It is a form of literacy, although the script is somewhat unenduring. Nevertheless, as it is with tracking, translating faded writing is entirely possible if the essence of the letters and their sequencing allows reader anticipation to conform to the growing meaning of the prose.
Much is reported about rates of illiteracy in indigenous communities, but the tracks presented in the assessment are of an overly unfamiliar passing and in an abstract form. Would non-indigenous Australia be regarded as equivalently illiterate in its performance of an indigenous test of tracking comprehension?
Many years ago, I crossed the path of an indigenous elder at the outskirts of a Warlpiri settlement in the Tanami desert. His concentration was on the ground before him as he walked along. I asked what he was looking for and he replied Killarwi, his son. He was tracking him. The truly astonishing part was that the track was awash with footprints; around two-hundred and twenty kids passing eight times per day at least five days per week. And yet the elder was able to read the passage of his son’s amongst all others. As an outdoor educator, this was a skill that I would very much like to acquire.
More recently, I was denied a commercial activity permit to enter Daintree NP from my adjoining property. The deposition of the Principal Policy adviser of the region included reference to a phone conversation with a Dr. John WINTER. He wrote:
“Dr. WINTER indicated to me that 4 expeditioners spent five days on the summit of Thornton peak (sic). These expeditioners formed paths simply by walking through the ferns. D. WINTER (sic) indicated that on a return visit about 8 months later there was no signs of any recovery to the vegetation from the damage done by trampling of the expeditioners.”
For such an important matter, I regarded the testimony very poorly. Who was to say that the impact was exclusively the expeditioners, or that in the intervening period no other had stepped foot on this portion of the landscape? And what of the thousands of feral pigs running rife throughout the Daintree and the other, more legitimate inhabitants?
Much is spoken these days of the ‘footprint’ of particular impacts, but I must say, the reading of tracks to give comprehension is a skill that is sadly lacking in contemporary curricula. Whilst governments provide recurrent funding for English literacy to be taught in indigenous communities, there is no counter-part for the employment of indigenous trackers in non-indigenous institutions.
Posted by neil at 11:53 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
Happy Easter from Snow Bunny in the UK
Some parts of the UK are having a white Easter. The last time I remember significant snow at Easter was in 1981, which was followed by the hardest winter of my lifetime in 1981/82.
See more pictures sent in by members of the public to the BBC website here.
The picture above is of Mr Alan Clark's son Murray and friend, in Alford, Aberdeenshire.
More Easter snow stories from the BBC:
Motorists warned as snow arrives
Weather shuts Easter attractions
Wild weather for Easter weekend
North battered by gales and snow
Posted by Paul at 12:39 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
March 23, 2008
Climate Facts to Warm To
There is a nice piece in The Australian this weekend by Christopher Pearson. He writes:
"Catastrophic predictions of global warming usually conjure with the notion of a tipping point, a point of no return.
Last Monday - on ABC Radio National, of all places - there was a tipping point of a different kind in the debate on climate change. It was a remarkable interview involving the co-host of Counterpoint, Michael Duffy and Jennifer Marohasy, a biologist and senior fellow of Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs. Anyone in public life who takes a position on the greenhouse gas hypothesis will ignore it at their peril.
Duffy asked Marohasy: "Is the Earth stillwarming?"
She replied: "No, actually, there has been cooling, if you take 1998 as your point of reference. If you take 2002 as your point of reference, then temperatures have plateaued. This is certainly not what you'd expect if carbon dioxide is driving temperature because carbon dioxide levels have been increasing but temperatures have actually been coming down over the last 10 years."
Duffy: "Is this a matter of any controversy?"
Marohasy: "Actually, no. The head of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) has actually acknowledged it. He talks about the apparent plateau in temperatures so far this century. So he recognises that in this century, over the past eight years, temperatures have plateaued ... This is not what you'd expect, as I said, because if carbon dioxide is driving temperature then you'd expect that, given carbon dioxide levels have been continuing to increase, temperatures should be going up ... So (it's) very unexpected, not something that's being discussed. It should be being discussed, though, because it's very significant."
Duffy: "It's not only that it's not discussed. We never hear it, do we? Whenever there's any sort of weather event that can be linked into the global warming orthodoxy, it's put on the front page. But a fact like that, which is that global warming stopped a decade ago, is virtually never reported, which is extraordinary."
Duffy then turned to the question of how the proponents of the greenhouse gas hypothesis deal with data that doesn't support their case. "People like Kevin Rudd and Ross Garnaut are speaking as though the Earth is still warming at an alarming rate, but what is the argument from the other side? What would people associated with the IPCC say to explain the (temperature) dip?"
Marohasy: "Well, the head of the IPCC has suggested natural factors are compensating for the increasing carbon dioxide levels and I guess, to some extent, that's what sceptics have been saying for some time: that, yes, carbon dioxide will give you some warming but there are a whole lot of other factors that may compensate or that may augment the warming from elevated levels of carbon dioxide.
"There's been a lot of talk about the impact of the sun and that maybe we're going to go through or are entering a period of less intense solar activity and this could be contributing to the current cooling."
Duffy: "Can you tell us about NASA's Aqua satellite, because I understand some of the data we're now getting is quite important in our understanding of how climate works?"
Marohasy: "That's right. The satellite was only launched in 2002 and it enabled the collection of data, not just on temperature but also on cloud formation and water vapour. What all the climate models suggest is that, when you've got warming from additional carbon dioxide, this will result in increased water vapour, so you're going to get a positive feedback. That's what the models have been indicating. What this great data from the NASA Aqua satellite ... (is) actually showing is just the opposite, that with a little bit of warming, weather processes are compensating, so they're actually limiting the greenhouse effect and you're getting a negative rather than a positive feedback."
Duffy: "The climate is actually, in one way anyway, more robust than was assumed in the climate models?"
Marohasy: "That's right ... These findings actually aren't being disputed by the meteorological community. They're having trouble digesting the findings, they're acknowledging the findings, they're acknowledging that the data from NASA's Aqua satellite is not how the models predict, and I think they're about to recognise that the models really do need to be overhauled and that when they are overhauled they will probably show greatly reduced future warming projected as a consequence of carbon dioxide."
Duffy: "From what you're saying, it sounds like the implications of this could beconsiderable ..."
Marohasy: "That's right, very much so. The policy implications are enormous. The meteorological community at the moment is really just coming to terms with the output from this NASA Aqua satellite and (climate scientist) Roy Spencer's interpretation of them. His work is published, his work is accepted, but I think people are still in shock at this point."
If Marohasy is anywhere near right about the impending collapse of the global warming paradigm, life will suddenly become a whole lot more interesting.
A great many founts of authority, from the Royal Society to the UN, most heads of government along with countless captains of industry, learned professors, commentators and journalists will be profoundly embarrassed. Let us hope it is a prolonged and chastening experience.
With catastrophe off the agenda, for most people the fog of millennial gloom will lift, at least until attention turns to the prospect of the next ice age. Among the better educated, the sceptical cast of mind that is the basis of empiricism will once again be back in fashion. The delusion that by recycling and catching public transport we can help save the planet will quickly come to be seen for the childish nonsense it was all along.
The poorest Indians and Chinese will be left in peace to work their way towards prosperity, without being badgered about the size of their carbon footprint, a concept that for most of us will soon be one with Nineveh and Tyre, clean forgotten in six months.
The scores of town planners in Australia building empires out of regulating what can and can't be built on low-lying shorelines will have to come to terms with the fact inundation no longer impends and find something more plausible to do. The same is true of the bureaucrats planning to accommodate "climate refugees".
Penny Wong's climate mega-portfolio will suddenly be as ephemeral as the ministries for the year 2000 that state governments used to entrust to junior ministers. Malcolm Turnbull will have to reinvent himself at vast speed as a climate change sceptic and the Prime Minister will have to kiss goodbye what he likes to call the great moral issue and policy challenge of our times.
It will all be vastly entertaining to watch.
THE Age published an essay with an environmental theme by Ian McEwan on March 8 and its stablemate, The Sydney Morning Herald, also carried a slightly longer version of the same piece.
The Australian's Cut & Paste column two days later reproduced a telling paragraph from the Herald's version, which suggested that McEwan was a climate change sceptic and which The Age had excised. He was expanding on the proposition that "we need not only reliable data but their expression in the rigorous use of statistics".
What The Age decided to spare its readers was the following: "Well-meaning intellectual movements, from communism to post-structuralism, have a poor history of absorbing inconvenient fact or challenges to fundamental precepts. We should not ignore or suppress good indicators on the environment, though they have become extremely rare now. It is tempting to the layman to embrace with enthusiasm the latest bleak scenario because it fits the darkness of our soul, the prevailing cultural pessimism. The imagination, as Wallace Stevens once said, is always at the end of an era. But we should be asking, or expecting others to ask, for the provenance of the data, the assumptions fed into the computer model, the response of the peer review community, and so on. Pessimism is intellectually delicious, even thrilling, but the matter before us is too serious for mere self-pleasuring. It would be self-defeating if the environmental movement degenerated into a religion of gloomy faith. (Faith, ungrounded certainty, is no virtue.)"
The missing sentences do not appear anywhere else in The Age's version of the essay. The attribution reads: "Copyright Ian McEwan 2008" and there is no acknowledgment of editing by The Age.
Why did the paper decide to offer its readers McEwan lite? Was he, I wonder, consulted on the matter? And isn't there a nice irony that The Age chose to delete the line about ideologues not being very good at "absorbing inconvenient fact"?
[End of article]
It has made a bit of a splash in the blogshere:
Global Warming: Man Made or Just Another Weather Cycle?
Someone really needs to call Al Gore about this--and maybe the Nobel Peace Prize selection committee. From The Australian:
http://redstateeclectic.typepad.com/redstate_commentary/2008/03/global-warming.html
Many of the following blog links were found here:
http://tailrank.com/5510155/Climate-facts-to-warm-to
Untitled
instapundit.com
ENJOYING SPRINGTIME IN MINNESOTA: It's sunny and warm here. UPDATE: But if you believe this, I could be chilly in the future: "No, actually, there has been cooling, if you take 1998 as your point of reference. If you take 2002 as your point of reference, then temperatures have plateaued. This is certainly not what you'd expect if carbon dioxide is driving temperature because carbon dioxide levels have been increasing but temperatures have actually been coming down over the last 10 years."
http://instapundit.com/archives2/016796.php
Negative Feedback Limits Global Warming
deanesmay.com
Great little essay via Glenn : Marohasy: "That's right. The satellite was only launched in 2002 and it enabled the collection of data, not just on temperature but also on cloud formation and water vapour. What all the climate models suggest is that, when you've got warming from additional carbon dioxide, this will result in increased water vapour, so you're going to get a positive feedback. That's what the models have been indicating. What this great data from the NASA Aqua satellite … (is) actually showing is just the opposite, that with a little bit of warming, weather processes are compensating, so they're actually limiting the greenhouse effect and you're getting a negative rather than a positive feedback.
http://www.deanesmay.com/2008/03/22/negative-feedback-limits-global-warming/
Global Warming Ended Ten Years Ago
newsbusters.org
Despite the more hysterical predictions we've heard of late, the evidence continues to mount that if the earth was warming, it stopped quite some time ago .
http://jammiewearingfool.blogspot.com/2008/03/inconvenient-truth-global-warming-ended.html
"Climate facts to warm to"
soundpolitics.com
Global warming is usually Stefan's beat, but this article is worth a read because it does so much to spell out the rational case for skeptics. Not necessarily of the notion that the Earth has recently experienced a period of warming, but skepticism of the notion that man is to blame, it's all because of carbon dioxide, and the only rational course is too hamstring the economy through onerous public policies to address that narrow paradigm. To summarize the article, relying in significant part on information not disputed by the liberally acclaimed IPCC:
http://soundpolitics.com/archives/010417.html
Has the climate stopped warming?
tigerhawk.blogspot.com
Regular readers know that while I accept that greenhouse gases can, at the margin, warm the Earth's climate, I am also skeptical that intensive regulation of greenhouse gases is necessary to avoid global catastrophe. Against that backdrop, I am justly accused of preferentially linking to articles and stories that suggest that cataclysm is neither visible nor predictable. So: the latest story that wonders whether the planet's climate has stopped warming and possible explanations therefor.
http://tigerhawk.blogspot.com/2008/03/has-climate-stopped-warming.html
Climate facts to warm to
uncommondescent.com
Read more Climate facts to warm to
Global Scamming
lewrockwell.com
Global warming, such as it was, stopped ten years ago. (Thanks to Heidi Wyss.)
No More Global Warming
strata-sphere.com
Just a reminder as we all wait for Spring to actually 'sprung' that from the high average temperature of 1998 to ten years later the Earth's climate has cooled or plateaued. And don't take my word for it (though there is no reason why you shouldn't). Here is some interesting news on Global Warming (or the lack therein) Last Monday - on ABC Radio National, of all places - there was a tipping point of a different kind in the debate on climate change. It was a remarkable interview involving the co-host of Counterpoint, Michael Duffy and Jennifer Marohasy, a biologist and senior fellow of Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs.
Untitled
antigreen.blogspot.com
Source
Collapse of the global warming paradigm
blog.freeny.org
"A great many founts of authority, from the Royal Society to the UN, most heads of government along with countless captains of industry, learned professors, commentators and journalists will be profoundly embarrassed. Let us hope it is a prolonged and chastening experience." Read Climate facts to warm to
http://blog.freeny.org/?p=3103
Untitled
australian-politics.blogspot.com
Source
Blue Crab Boulevard
bluecrabboulevard.com Found 5 hours ago
Because the earth is not, in fact, warming, despite increased carbon emissions . Last Monday - on ABC Radio National, of all places - there was a tipping point of a different kind in the debate on climate change. It was a remarkable interview involving the co-host of Counterpoint, Michael Duffy and Jennifer Marohasy, a biologist and senior fellow of Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs.
http://bluecrabboulevard.com/2008/03/22/global-warming-er-never-mind/
Inconvenient Truth: Global Warming Ended Ten Years Ago
jammiewearingfool.blogspot.com
Despite the more hysterical predictions we've heard of late, the evidence continues to mount that if the earth was warming, it stopped quite some time ago .
New Age Rain
seablogger.com Found 19 hours ago
It's raining with the kind of delirious thoroughness that one only sees in the tropics. This is the fourth major rain in the last six weeks, and the unseasonal recharge of the aquifers is most welcome. Still, along with the warmth of this winter, the rains seem to me a portent of more troublesome weather in the summer. Global warming is not required for an active hurricane season. In fact warming had already ceased during the busy years of 2004-5. I am pleased to see the facts getting more circulation, but it will take some time to wring the hysteria out of the media and the global elite -- John McCain included.
Oh My Gosh, Were We Wrong About Climate Change?
kneedeepintheephemera.blogspot.com
Climate facts to warm to ,
http://kneedeepintheephemera.blogspot.com/2008/03/oh-my-gosh-were-we-wrong-about-climate.html
THE SATELLITE LOOKS DOWN..
atangledweb.squarespace.com
Fascinating article here on global warming, or the lack of it ...it's from an interview between journalist Michael Duffy and Jennifer Marohasy, a biologist and senior fellow of Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs Duffy: "Can you tell us about NASA's Aqua satellite , because I understand some of the data we're now getting is quite important in our understanding of how climate works?" Marohasy: "That's right. The satellite was only launched in 2002 and it enabled the collection of data, not just on temperature but also on cloud formation and water vapour.
PT's Parking Blog
parkingtoday.typepad.com
I know, I know, it has little to do with parking, but I just couldn't pass this up. You MUST read this article in the Australian. Basically is quotes a scientist, using UN and NASA data, as showing that global warming stopped in 1998 and in fact Global Cooling is now going on. HUH… This goes along with my theory that if politicians say something, believe the opposite. If this is true, what is the industry set up because of Global Warming going to do? What of carbon footprints or the SUV demise.
Northern hemisphere warming alarmingly
maggiesfarm.anotherdotcom.com
The snow and ice are melting fast. Spring must be here! It's the time of year when the rich and famous seek riches from alarmism. My friends and I were starting up a company to sell palm trees to the Eskimos, but unfortunately recent satellite data indicate that warming stopped a decade ago . Dang! Our investment is OK though - we shorted Palm Tree Futures as a hedge, and might get filthy rich with those. Plus the government will pay us handsomely not to grow Palms on our experimental Massachusetts Palm farm.
"Global Warming" Must Read of the Day
targetrichenvironment.net
Earlier I posted about Little Cesar worrying about not being able to do his science project on "global warming" because he's worried that Philadelphia will cut off his free wireless internet. It seems he won't have to worry quite so much about it now. If you read the dialogue at the beginning, this is priceless ( link ): If Marohasy is anywhere near right about the impending collapse of the global warming paradigm, life will suddenly become a whole lot more interesting. A great many founts of authority, from the Royal Society to the UN, most heads of government along with countless captains of industry, learned professors, commentators and journalists will be profoundly embarrassed.
Proponents Running for Cover as NASA Satellite Data Destroy Faulty Climate Models Used
managersrealm.com Found 10 hours ago
Co-host of Counterpoint Michael Duffy, recently interviewed Jennifer Marohasy, who is a "biologist and senior fellow of Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs." The interview took place on ABC Radio National. When Duffy asked Marohasy: "Is the Earth still warming?" Her response was: "No, actually, there has been cooling, if you take 1998 as your point of reference. If you take 2002 as your point of reference, then temperatures have plateaued. This is certainly not what you'd expect if carbon dioxide is driving temperature because carbon dioxide levels have been increasing but temperatures have actually been coming down over the last 10 years.
Warming Ended A Decade Ago
oblogatoryanecdotes.com
Climate facts to warm to
Should Al Gore return his Nobel?
outrage.typepad.com Found 7 hours ago
Link: Climate facts to warm to | The Australian . CATASTROPHIC predictions of global warming usually conjure with the notion of a tipping point, a point of no return. Last Monday - on ABC Radio National, of all places - there was a tipping point of a different kind in the debate on climate change. It was a remarkable interview involving the co-host of Counterpoint, Michael Duffy and Jennifer Marohasy, a biologist and senior fellow of Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs.
Climate facts to warm to
moneyrunner.blogspot.com Found 6 hours ago
Climate facts to warm to: The Earth is Cooling
Gulf Coast Hurricane Tracker
gulf-coast-hurricanes.blogspot.com Found 6 hours ago
Is the Earth still warming?
Interesting new data on the global climate
eclipseweb.blogspot.com Found 6 hours ago
From
The Limits of Our Knowledge
pinotblogger.com Found 6 hours ago
And then today I stumbled across this , from an ABC Radio interview with an Australian biologist named Jennifer Marohasy: Duffy (the interviewer): "Is the Earth still warming?" Marohasy (the biologist): "No, actually, there has been cooling, if you take 1998 as your point of reference. If you take 2002 as your point of reference, then temperatures have plateaued.
LIBERALISM IS A SICKNESS, CONSERVATISM IS THE CURE
theillustratedconservative.blogspot.com Found 6 hours ago
With catastrophe off the agenda, for most people the fog of millennial gloom will lift, at least until attention turns to the prospect of the next ice age. Among the better educated, the sceptical cast of mind that is the basis of empiricism will once again be back in fashion. The delusion that by recycling and catching public transport we can help save the planet will quickly come to be seen for the childish nonsense it was all along." - The Australian In recent weeks we have seen the foundat
The Joy of the Merely Real
vitalaccuratethinking.blogspot.com Found 6 hours ago
Climate facts to warm to
Climate facts to warm to
lesliesrussell.wordpress.com Found 5 hours ago
Last Monday - on ABC Radio National, of all places - there was a tipping point of a different kind in the debate on climate change. It was a remarkable interview involving the co-host of Counterpoint, Michael Duffy and Jennifer Marohasy, a biologist and senior fellow of Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs. Anyone in public life who takes a position on the greenhouse gas hypothesis will ignore it at their peril.Duffy asked Marohasy: "Is the Earth stillwarming?"She replied: "No, actually, there has been cooling, if you take 1998 as your point of reference.
Is the Earth Still Warming
coolmel.typepad.com Found 5 hours ago
I just read this interview with Jennifer Marohasy from The Australian. Marohasy paints a different picture of the Global Warming story. Climate Change skeptics will almost certainly pick up and flaunt this story soon. Hat tip to Uncommon Descent for the link. Here's an excerpt. "Last Monday - on ABC Radio National, of all places - there was a tipping point of a different kind in the debate on climate change. It was a remarkable interview involving the co-host of Counterpoint, Michael Duffy and Jennifer Marohasy, a biologist and senior fellow of Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs.
Er….
jaycurrie.info-syn.com Found 4 hours ago
"That's right, very much so. The policy implications are enormous. The meteorological community at the moment is really just coming to terms with the output from this NASA Aqua satellite and (climate scientist) Roy Spencer's interpretation of them. His work is published, his work is accepted, but I think people are still in shock at this point.
BUT IF HUMANS AREN'T WARMING THE GLOBE... (via Jim Yates):
brothersjuddblog.com Found 41 minutes ago
Climate facts to warm to (Christopher Pearson, March 22, 2008, The Australian)
Bill Clinton Like McCarthy
muskegonpundit.blogspot.com Found 22 hours ago
The BIDINOTTO BLOG
bidinotto.journalspace.com Found 3 days ago
UPDATE , 2/22/08 -- Other climate data contradict the global-warming hypothesis. I say "hypothesis" because the more the actual facts accumulate, the greater the temptation to demote it even from the category of "theory."
Climate facts to warm to
globalwarmingskeptics.info
Global Cooling Goes Mainstream
poppypundit.wordpress.com
This story has popped up on Drudge and Instapundit. The Australian Broadcasting Company National Radio recently aired an interview with Dr. Jennifer Marohasy , on the subject of global warming. The interviewer, Michael Duffy -- not Dr. Marohasy -- brought up the question of whether or not the planet is still warming. Marohasy took advantage of the opening to present evidence indicating that the warming trend has actually reversed over the last decade. The interview veered into a discussion of the accuracy of the climate models that have served as the foundation of the current warming hysteria.
http://poppypundit.wordpress.com/2008/03/22/global-cooling-goes-mainstream/
Man Made or Just Another Weather Cycle?
redstateeclectic.typepad.com
Someone really needs to call Al Gore about this--and maybe the Nobel Peace Prize selection committee. From The Australian :
Inconventient
buttle.wordpress.com
facts . "That's right. The satellite was only launched in 2002 and it enabled the collection of data, not just on temperature but also on cloud formation and water vapour. What all the climate models suggest is that, when you've got warming from additional carbon dioxide, this will result in increased water vapour, so you're going to get a positive feedback. That's what the models have been indicating. What this great data from the NASA Aqua satellite … (is) actually showing is just the opposite, that with a little bit of warming, weather processes are compensating, so they're actually limiting the greenhouse effect and you're getting a negative