If climate is a 150 year phenomenon, then "end of story."

But, what if climate changes over millennia, rather than "just" a hundred or so years?

There are probably a few more chapters in the story ...

A lot of the doubt stems from the fact that in the 1970s, there was much fearmongering over global cooling. That later evolved into global warming, which has since morphed into global climate change.

"Climate is what you expect, weather is what you get."

Yes, we had ourselves a little snowstorm. Big whoop. The polar ice caps are still melting.

Only an idiot (there are some) would deny that the planet is getting warmer and the glaciers and ice caps are melting. My question - as a dedicated leftie - is whether there is appropriate proof that the warming is caused by human activity vs. natural climate cycles or whatever. I don't ask this to be difficult, but because IF global warming is caused by human activity, the cost to remedy the problem will be placed on the shoulders of a lot of working class people in the form of lower wages, higher utility costs, higher municipal taxes, and higher costs for goods and services. Being "green" is a great luxury for those of us who can afford to pay extra for our power or to dine at "green" sushi restaurants (see Willamette Week this week) or whatever. But don't mistake it, a carbon tax or whatever will fall heavily on the middle and lower-middle class.

Meanwhile, the cost to heat my home in Palm Springs remains quite reasonable this winter, thank you for asking, although the pool boy charges me a mint and he looks at my wife with lustful eyes.

Excellent, quick synopsis, imo. To put it even stronger, weather isn't climate and most history is about weather.

New research specifically looking at global climate is welcome, but when people cite things like the Little Ice Age, that's weather too. That could have been a warm period in Africa, with the Gulf Stream in subsidence as it would be in a warming scenario and Europe cold. Possibly our history being European history, is the only reason we say it was an ice age.

Put another way, all weather lore is anecdotal and cannot be falsified, and ergo, is not scientific. Admittedly there is a lot of room for error, but when you aren't sure, is that a good time to be conducting an unmonitored planet-wide experiment?

Finally, no one dare call this nay-saying anymore. You're still talking "we can do something". There's a paper that was presented at the American Geophysical Union this week at Moscone Center that points to the observation that the permafrost area, off the shore of Siberia, is right at the melting point. One researcher has reported free methane bubbles rising to the surface. If that all breaks loose and melts, it may not matter what anyone does. Literally like trying to put the genie back into the bottle. We know we're ignorant about long term climate. This is different. Really, that's the contention anymore. Few right wing-nuts say nothing is changing, as few who support creationism would deny that species change. Now, their premise is there's nothing special about climate change (and everything special about the origin of species). At least arguing causation is a step in the right direction. It seems to be dawning on the right that simply denying everything is a good way to attract torts.

Some really need their conspiracy theories though, so I'll suggest an alternative. Instead of something about toothless Al Gore, how about how baby Bush got the military to seed the clouds coming down from Canada, to wipe out xmas, so we get an economic crisis (when added to the market and banks), so he gets to declare an economic emergency, seize control through his EOs already signed, and refuse to turn over power? CIA black ops have an ornery, perverted twist to them many times and causing a freeze-out while fighting attempts to curb climate change would be about par.

The Artic saw a low minimum in summer ice in 2007. In 2008, it actually had more summer ice then 2007. Antarctica has been consistently gaining ice for at least 10 years. This is even stated in the IPCC report. Climate change skeptics don't deny that climate changes. They have doubts that man is the cause through C02. 97 percent of CO2 emissions coming from the very Earth we live on. In the past 1000 years, we have had a Medieval Warming Period and a Little Ice age. Climate is not static. It never will be. It is vain to think we have more than a miniscule effect on it.

If you look at climate over the right time scale, you find ice ages and interglacial periods frequenting the last 5 million or so years on about a 100,000 year cycle. To look at a 50 year recent period and deduce that man is changing anything is downright silly.

What caused the last ice age? What ended the last ice age? And why was it so much warmer 6-8,000 years ago during the climate optimum? And the ice age before that and before that and ...

It's a sad fact that the "modern solar maxima" had to end just when the AGW hoax was going so good. Now the earth is cooling, and will continue doing so, until the sun decides to start operating normal once again.

The good news, Al Gore can't do adamn thing about that sad fact.

As if Theory and Bill are two people.

See, you can put the argument right out there and they are going to say what they are going to say. It's social for them (and some of you). They can't think, they can't imagine, most of them can't spell... What per cent of the world is Catholic? 15? 20? Read some good old-fashioned Catholic doctrine and realize the sheer volume of people that believe things like they preach are possible, have happened, and will continue to happen.

Politically, I think you should be thinking about slavery. No argument, no facts ever one the day. By being open-minded and have discussions, you nearly got the country destroyed and an awful lot of good people killed. The social divisions remain today. This election, for many, was about THEN. Those errors never die. Here we are again. Are we going to wait until they take up arms to defend ourselves again? They always take up arms, that's why it's their "most basic right".

News flash: the population rest of the planet will deal with all of us equally if we don't deal with them.

As expected, people are confusing weather and climate.

By the way, there are all sorts of proxy measures that have been developed by scientists in the last 50 years or so to complement and extend the historical record. These proxies play a huge part in the analyses that help us tease apart the anthropogentic effects from natural variation.

But hey, where's KarTalk when we need him? Yo, thanks, JK.

Somewhere in here there's an opportunity for mutual agreement regardless of one's opinion on human caused climate change. Emitting pollutants into our atmosphere is no good for our planet and it's inhabitants. Reducing consumption and phasing in greener energy sources over time would go a long a way.

”Over the approximate 140 years of the graph, it is easy to see that the snowfall in Oregon is on a downward trend. We're getting less snow, and more infrequent freezes, because our climate is warming over time. End of story.”

Wow! I don’t know what’s more stunning about that statement, how it profoundly presents a misunderstanding of geologic time compared to the minuscule time frame humans have been around to measure natural phenomena or the even more profound dismissal of scientific method that invites skepticism and review.

The Earth may very well be undergoing climate change, as it has for millennium, but demonizing those who question “Man Made Global Warming” is not worthy of any thinking person’s support.

Leslie's comment isn't being used to prove or disprove climate change. She's only directing people to look at the long term picture in regards trends in weather patterns.

You also don't really need to prove the benefit of conservationism. What is bad about using less energy, creating less waste, or saving money in the process.

To believe that we have minimal impact on the planet is ignoring environmental disasters from oil spills, huge collections of plastics in the ocean, or respiratory illness caused by smog in our cities.

Theory, it's not surprising there was more area covered in ice in the arctic in 2008 than 2007. That's what weather does, it varies a lot from year to year. The real question is "What's the long term trend in ice area?" and it hasn't been up. Some areas of interior of Antarctica are getting more ice and snow because it's getting warmer. The colder the air is the drier it is so air that's warmer but still cold enough to snow produces more snowfall. Around the perimeter of Antarctica lately there have been some unprecedented break ups of ice shelves as well (Google the Wilkins Ice Shelf) and overall the total amount of ice on Antarctica has been going down by about 150 cubic kilometers per year lately.

It's true that over 95% of CO2 emissions are natural but that's balanced in the carbon cycle by natural sinks that absorb that 95% plus maybe 40% or 50% of human emissions. The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has increased by 35% since 1832 from 284 parts per million to 384 ppm. I think it increased by over 3 ppm in just the past year. It's trivial to show that the increase is due to human activities. The normal time frame for a CO2 increase of 100 ppm is 5,000 - 20,000 years.

Bill, The current ice age started about 2.58M years ago. The closing of the Isthmus of Panama about 3M years ago, and the subsequent change in ocean currents, probably had a lot to do with it. During that period there have been glacials (more ice) and interglacials. They estimate the next glacial will start in 10,000 - 20,000 years. It appears the glacials and interglacials are due mostly to changes in the various orbital parameters of the earth.

"The sad fact" is that changes in solar radiation don't account fully for the climate changes that are seen. Unless someone comes up with some new property of solar radiation we don't know about it can't be the answer.

Scott, a study of papers in the 1970's found there were 7 concerned with possible global cooling and 42 about possible global warming. Time and Newsweek (among others) kind of sensationalized the story (that's what they do to sell their magazines) but it doesn't really mean much.

<h2>Jeff, weather changes are measured in minutes, hours and days, etc. Climate changes are measured in decades, centuries and millennia. Currently climate scientists are using a 30 year baseline for most things, long enough to smooth out the various short term oscillations such as El Nino/La Nina. Accurate thermometers have existed since the middle 1700's but humans have been gathering weather data for all of recorded history. It just gets more detailed and accurate as time goes on. As Leslie said there are other ways to measure climate besides direct observation.</h2>

The simple facts are that you can't account for the climate changes we've seen without including the increase in CO2 in the equations and you can't account for the increase in CO2 without including human CO2 emissions. If you could do that you might win a Nobel Prize. Yes, climate has always been changing over time but the rate of change we are currently measuring is unprecedented in earth history outside of the occasional catastrophic event. It all adds up to humans causing the majority of observed climate change.

Dave

What, so you mean the media's and politics' hysterical claims about global warming when there is hurricanes or heatwaves or lack of snow or forest fires or thousands of things caused by AGW are all hot air ?

From today's SF Examiner:

"For how many years must the planet cool before we begin to understand that the planet is not warming?" asked Dr. David Gee, chairman of the 2008 International Geological Congress’ science committee.

Demesure, to the extent that the media says "this hurricane only happened because of global warming," then, yes, that is hot air. It would be silly to argue otherwise.

I am by nature (and training) a skeptic. As such, I believe that a) global warming is real, and b) human activities are almost certainly a major cause of global warming.

I arrive at this conclusion by applying Bertrand Russell's "rules of skepticism," which are:

(1) ...when the experts are agreed, the opposite opinion cannot be held to be certain; (2) that when they are not agreed, no opinion can be regarded as certain by a non-expert; and (3) that when they all hold that no sufficient grounds for a positive opinion exist, the ordinary man would do well to suspend his judgment.

In the case of global warming, it seems pretty clear to me that the experts are agreed: global warming is real and largely caused by mankind. I know fanatical people on the other side claim otherwise, but I have not found, nor has anyone shown me, a legitimate, peer reviewed paper that states global warming is not caused by man. Instead, they always point me to confused webpages edited by non-experts who use their own misunderstanding of very technical papers to pretend that there are inconsistencies.

As a skeptic, I am frankly dumbfounded by how passionate and certain global warming deniers are. Their entire argument seems to rest on the principle that the science is unclear amd the scientists don't agree with eachother. If that is the case -- which I doubt (the scientists seem pretty agreed to me) -- then basic skepticism should lead them to state that no opinion can be held to be certain. Instead, they seem to fervently hold that global warming, if it is happening, is certainly not caused by humans.

Am I rambling? Let me try to wrap up in some way. Because I believe that scientists are overwhelmingly in agreement about global warming and its cause, I believe global warming is real and caused by man. Since the global warming deniers seem to believe that scientists are not in agreement, common sense dictates that they should hold no strong views about global warming. The fervency of their views shows they are not skeptical, but rather fanatical.

Posted by: Garage Wine | Dec 24, 2008 6:40:11 AM

From today's SF Examiner:

"For how many years must the planet cool before we begin to understand that the planet is not warming?" asked Dr. David Gee, chairman of the 2008 International Geological Congress’ science committee.

How 'bout listening to the webcast from the American Geophysical Union in SF last week, instead of a Mormon talking-head at the Examiner? If anyone would bother to look at the referenced data, it doesn't matter who's doing it, or what the trend is. Massive methane releases are an immediate problem, regardless of where we are on the trend line.

And trend-line fantasizers... When in the planet's history did the oceans become too acidic to support life? When did that last happen? We're less than an instant's thought from it in geologic time. Personally, given the level of discussion, I find comfort in the same two words the comedian Andy Hamilton does on the issue, "human extinction". No, it isn't going to destroy the planet or all life. It will destroy human civilization. "Peace on earth, Good riddance to man".

Oh, had to dig out this link . We've really progressed.

Side note: should we be noticing which posts say "open discussion". Seems to always go that way.

Nice to see that trolls don't take Christmas Eve off. Leslie, would you please post about the "theory" ("Theory") that the Earth is round, not flat, and see what the trolls do?

On a related note, can someone please advise as to where to find information about Portland's carbon emissions during the past week?

The global warming deniers are talking up the December cold spell but I noticed they didn't have much to say during our November and early December warm spell.

It is also worth noting that most of the information I have read claims that one of the effects of global warming is more severe weather.

Like 16 inches of snow in Portland.

As the climate changes, the patterns that we have become accustom to will change with it.

For the Portland area which has traditionally been very moderate, it could potentially mean more severe winters and hotter drier summers.

I am dreading all the "global warming my ass" people coming out of the woodwork. (Also, "global" implies bigger than Oregon...)

Zarathustra: I frequently come across things I would like to share with people here, fantasizing like minds and catholic reading habits... and there is typically not an adequately-related thread through which I can share the gleanings.

I don't know about others, but that is possibly what is happening.

Also: remember what the art of conversation is. It is not simply the ability to maintain a steady, unwavering focus upon one idee fixe and only that -- it's actually the ability to describe loops, spirals, angles and apertures whilst never really utterly abandoning the nugget we started from.

It behooves us to consider whether some treat this as a platform upon which to present well-crafted (off to the side in Word, no doubt) disquisitions, others may be treating this as an elegaic conversational opportunity that relies utterly on the willingness of others to acknowledge their presence, let them in on the play...

I am sure there are any number of other variations on understanding and useage of the blogspace. :)...

Antarctica has been consistently gaining ice for at least 10 years.

It seems that global warming deniers have a problem distinguishing small parts from the whole.

They see a certain cold weather event and say "hah, what global warming" (while pooh-poohing hot weather events)--they see one item as equaling the whole.

And they see ice increasing in one part of Antarctica and say that it's increasing in all of Antarctica.

Jamais (as in when people will get it) has it spot on, imo. It's about water. Mars is a great comparison; it lost most of it's. That's why things like the pH of the oceans are important. The earth is 3/5 water and it's true we know more about lunar geology.

That's why I always like the metaphor of turning up the heat in a terrarium. It'll get hotter, but water will start running everywhere and cause molds and all kinds of "cold weather phenomenon" like the soil being soppy in spots where it was dry when it was "cooler", etc. Simplistic, but it at least gets people thinking about the right variables.

This will be met with thunderous silence, disinterest, fair enough. But I'll say it anyway, as your converse just kicked a mini-epiphany into my brain. The Old Ones we walk with keep saying, "this is the time of Purification. It cannot be stopped, the only thing we can do now is every day do all we can to slow it. To give our children more time." I was thinking with the frantic, suspicious mind of human deviltries and all such. Now I realize: it is climate change. We cannot stop it, for it is natural, and the earth herself is moving through her times. We ARE making it move faster, and with more toxins as part of the mix. And so it is that the nay-sayers in a sense are "right", as we are undergoing the shifting of the earth's own physiognomy that cannot be stopped with any amount of Right Living and Environmentalist Orthodoxy. HOWEVER, we are pushing this faster and faster, and we are separating ourselves ever more completely from the Natural Way and the natural world so as to make more bleak our ability to adapt, survive and live for as long as it will be possible before this earth enters another age of healing.

I am thinking of the doors of the sweatlodge. The first round is the Purification round -- everyone is kind of suffering b/c we are not totally there yet, we have not shifted our consciousness completely. It is a lot like this time of toxic buildups, cataclysmic change and discomfort including the rise of discord in those who misinterpret the nature of what is occuring in its' wholeness and those who wish to deny it completely.

The second round is the Healing round - this is when we feel the heat with corporeal intensity, but actively pray for more and work to surf that heat like an eagle playing on the updrafts, no kidding. Still working, but now shifting. As the heated stones come into the lodge, we speak the names of those things needing healed - people, places, body parts. There will be a time when the earth is going into her hard freeze or whatever it is that is coming, and we will be mere ants crawling across the great change.

The third round is the Prayer round, and I have no intellectualization or innate understanding of what this could be. A good measure of where I am/not as a person, really. And the fourth is the Going Home/Sending Them Home round. We sing thanks and also send the helping ones home to see them again soon.

So today, your discussion gives me a little extra purchase on the Small Lodge prayer we make; and also an intuitive shift as to getting what the Old Ones are telling us. And why we are all arguing, fighting, intellectualizing over this.

We are so separated from the Great Rhythms of the Natural that we cannot accept what is coming with good grace, and work together to prolong the health and wealth of our lives as a phylum upon this earth.

rw, I've actually been thinking about pulling together some information on the an interpretation of the Maya calendar that pulls together exactly the themes you're talking about for New Years but was thinking also that it was a bit over the top.

I have to say, though, thinking that way has been something of a paradigm shift (and I'm a stickler for the term). One has to think that if the next Maya period is characterized by awareness of corporate ethics that people like Cheney have been necessary to raise consciousness toward that end. Anyway, humans traditionally invoke the spiritual to explain great things when reason cannot, and this topic definitely qualifies for a bit of that, in my estimation. Maybe a counter-balance to evangelical inspired skepticism.

ps so for those who read and dug Casteneda (to borrow phraseology from my elders that I hung out with), this is a realization that should cause us/me to live with intent, focus, will etc as if it really matters although I know it don't.

What was that phrase? Anyone remember that Toltec Sorcerer's rendering? Something something Fallacy. It's a magical, spiritual existentialism. It's the jiu jitsu we really need for these times.

Lislie: Climate, and climate change, is about long term 20 and 30 year trends. JK: There are a number of historical temperature record sets. The most accurate is generally considered to be the USHCN kept by, Al Gore advisor, Dr Hansen. It shows 1998 the warmest year in history TIED WITH 1934. Most show 1998 still the warmest year, so we have been cooling for ten years. Two recent papers, one from the Hadley center and one from NASA predict a ten year cooling period just starting. That meets your minimum definition of climate. Cooling.

JK: I hope you know about the solar scientists who study solar cycles. The sun has been in a record breaking state of high activity for the last few decades. Now it is bordering on record breaking low activity. Some of these scientists have noticed the activity and climate are related (first noticed 200 years ago). In fact if you look at the solar cycle length vs. temperature it is a very good fit. Much better than CO2 and climate. (BTW that million year chart of temperature and CO2 in Al Gore’s movie actually shows CO2 LAGS temperature - if there is a cause and effect it is temperature causing CO2 not CO2 causing temperature - AL lied - review that scene if you don’t believe me - AL never actually said CO2 caused temperature because he knew better.)

Anyway, many solar scientists think that we are just entering a 30 or so year cooling period resembling those of the early days on the O’s chart or worse.

Of course, The real issue is not wether we are warming. The real and only issue is: is man causing warming and thus can chancing man’s activities cure it?

Leslie:Over the approximate 140 years of the graph, it is easy to see that the snowfall in Oregon is on a downward trend. JK: Interesting thing is that all those big peaks are whole season snowfalls. Our season is just starting. This has been the snowiest December on record per channel 2. So it is apples and oranges until March. Also notice that the chart starts at the tail end of the “little ice age”(1500-1850), so one would expect a lot of snow.

Further, man did not emit a lot of CO2 until the 1950's. The warming started in the early 1900's. Notice the average lines: 1871-1900;1901-1930; 1931-1960;1961-1990. Each lower. Notice the big drop between the first two – far before man emitted significant amounts of CO2.

dmt: What is bad about using less energy, creating less waste. JK: That depends on the details. If we use less energy because BHO (or Oregon’s democrats) doubles the price of energy, a lot of people will suffer. If some magic technology appears that cuts both the cost and CO2, then we benefit. NO SUCH magic energy source exists. Not wind. Not solar. (both too expensive, unreliable.) Only Nu Clear appears to be able to save both CO2 and money. Unfortunately scientifically illiterate paranoids have effectively banned it in Oregon. (they don’t even know that long lived radioactive materials are the low level ones. It is the short lived ones that are dangerous, but only for a few years.)

riverat: It's true that over 95% of CO2 emissions are natural but that's balanced in the carbon cycle by natural sinks that absorb that 95% plus maybe 40% or 50% of human emissions. JK: This claim amounts to a claim that the Earth’s CO2 cycle is delicately balanced and just a little from man will throw it out of kilter. This amounts to a claim that the earth is unstable. If so why didn’t it run away millions of years ago when the CO2 levels were many times greater than now? The answer is that the earth is stable through many negative feedback mechanisms. Many yet to be discovered. One that the warmers never seem to talk about is the natural air conditioner provided by evaporation from tropical oceans.

riverat: The simple facts are that you can't account for the climate changes we've seen without including the increase in CO2 in the equations and you can't account for the increase in CO2 without including human CO2 emissions. JK: That is simply NOT TRUE. The correct statement is: we cannot figure out how to account for. . .there fore we will pick CO2 because there is a correlation. That is exactly what is going on here. Unfortunately for the CO2 believers, the correlation with temperature is better for solar cycle length than it is for CO2.

ValkRaider: It is also worth noting that most of the information I have read claims that one of the effects of global warming is more severe weather. JK: The issue is not wether we are warming. The issue is: is man causing the warming and thus can changing man’s activities cure it?

rw: . . .we are separating ourselves ever more completely from the Natural Way and the natural world so as to make more bleak our ability to adapt, survive and live for as long as it will be possible before this earth enters another age of healing. JK: Lets look at this a little closer: We have separated ourselves from many killer diseases through, not doing things the natural way. Small pox: gone from the earth; polio: almost unheard of; whopping cough: only springs up rarely in the unvaccinated; cholera: only occurs where some back to nature nut cut the use of chlorine in city water supplies (see some South American countries.) Diseases are natural, It is unnatural to kill off all those viruses and bacteria. I choose unnatural.

We practice the unnatural act of mining and transporting fossil fuels so that we don’t have to freeze in the dark. We practice the unnatural act of spinning magnets with steam and water so that we can have computers, lifesaving medical equipment and radio. Don’t forget arsenic, lead and heavy metals are 100% natural.

Shivering in a cave, fearing saber tooth tigers is natural. Modern life in unnatural. I choose modern life.

BTW, warming can be good: Warmer weather extends the growing season. Warmer weather has FEWER deaths than cold.

JK: Since there are so many well informed people here, perhaps someone can help me add to my collection of peer reviewed papers. Can you direct me to peer papers that prove the following:

1. Today’s climate is out of historical norms on a geological time scale.
2. CO2 can actually cause warming at today’s CO2 levels (past a degree or so.) 3.Man is actually the source of the CO2 buildup.

Again: The issue is NOT whether or not we are warming or polar bears or ice caps. The only issue is: is man causing the warming and thus can chancing man’s activities cure it?

Two very good videos on this subject are: The Great Global Warming Swindle Science & Context in the Global Warming Debate, blip.tv/file/791876/ (Select mp4 for near DVD quality on the slides)

Thanks JK

Human beings are the scourge of the planet earth. Most Americans act as if they are hell bent on rendering it unihabitable, with uncessant demand for SUVs, Slurpees, and Stuff.

As depicted in the movie Wall-e, we will consume the earth's natural beauty and leave nothing but trash and destruction in our wake. Unlike the indigenous people who only consumed what they required to survive and left nary a trace in their wake.

American Gluttony will eventually require us to colonize space and other planets until destroy the entire solar system. Then the cockroaches will return to the top of the food chain, and the universal equilibrium will be restored. That's why I drive a Prius and only smoke organic tobacco.

Jeff Alworth: As to those who wonder if climate change is caused by humans, the answer as an epistemological truth is of course elusive. But as a matter of science, it's settled. The overwhelming majority of scientists and a near unanimity of climate scientists finger humans. JK: What about the below 650 scientists and these IPCC scientists:

Warming fears are the “worst scientific scandal in the history…When people come to know what the truth is, they will feel deceived by science and scientists.” - UN IPCC Japanese Scientist Dr. Kiminori Itoh, an award-winning PhD environmental physical chemist.

“Gore prompted me to start delving into the science again and I quickly found myself solidly in the skeptic camp…Climate models can at best be useful for explaining climate changes after the fact.” - Meteorologist Hajo Smit of Holland, who reversed his belief in man-made warming to become a skeptic, is a former member of the Dutch UN IPCC committee.

“The quantity of CO2 we produce is insignificant in terms of the natural circulation between air, water and soil... I am doing a detailed assessment of the UN IPCC reports and the Summaries for Policy Makers, identifying the way in which the Summaries have distorted the science.” - South Afican Nuclear Physicist and Chemical Engineer Dr. Philip Lloyd, a UN IPCC co-coordinating lead author who has authored over 150 refereed publications.

I suggest you browse the list of scientists at: epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Files.View&FileStore_id=83947f5d-d84a-4a84-ad5d-6e2d71db52d9 Over 650 dissenting scientists from around the globe challenged man-made global warming claims made by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and former Vice President Al Gore. This new 231-page U.S. Senate Minority Report -- updated from 2007’s groundbreaking report of over 400 scientists who voiced skepticism about the so-called global warming “consensus” -- features the skeptical voices of over 650 prominent international scientists, including many current and former UN IPCC scientists, who have now turned against the UN IPCC. This updated report includes an additional 250 (and growing) scientists and climate researchers since the initial release in December 2007. The over 650 dissenting scientists are more than 12 times the number of UN scientists (52) who authored the media-hyped IPCC 2007 Summary for Policymakers.

Jeff Alworth: The "skeptics" are political hacks, JK: As if AL Gore isn’t a political hack. Or Jim Hansen. Or Michael Mann.

Jeff Alworth: or hacks from fields other than climate science. JK: Tell us what field Hansen and Mann have their Phds in? Hint: it is not climate science.

Thanks JK

Garage Wine, before you copy a sentence from the Web about "experts on climatology" please do at least a little research into the organization.

Here's the International Geological Congress and their sponsor list on the bottom (they don't have a strong incentive for being objective, being that most of them are oil companies.)

I'm sure Chinese researchers are just as objective regarding the effects of dumping factory water into their rivers....

dmt: ...before you copy a sentence from the Web ... please do at least a little research into the organization ... sponsor list ... being that most of them are oil companies. JK: So how about the accuracy of the information that was posted? Or are you incapable of judging the claims made? (I have noticed a tendency of Al Gore's followers to ignore facts and just attack the messengers.)

Thanks JK

JK: I hope you know about the solar scientists who study solar cycles.

If you do, you'll know that every new wavelength that gets explored reveals a whole new class of stellar phenomena that totally rewrite the "what is the sun doing now" hypothesis.

No reputable solar astronomer would tell you they understand the solar cycle let alone could relate it to meteorology and earth science.

And I repeat my first assertion, way back, history is weather, not climate, for the reasons already cited.

BTW, is there any indication that an Obama administration will increase basic research into comparative planetology, which budget currently consists of projects in the millions, not billions? We will never understand CO2 and solar cycles until we understand how Earth, Venus and Mars are different in the ways they are.

I have to wonder. The sci-fi series Space 1999 had the moon going out of earth orbit because of a nuclear accident. The thing is, the moon is leaving earth orbit, orbiting further and further out every minute. No one would say that the dramatized event wasn't caused by human activity, even though it "merely" reinforced an existing, natural tendency, right? (You want to talk about human induced climate change, try blowing the moon off) It's really an identical scenario, except for the time scale of the human effect. So, it's just a matter of our inability to deal with the time scale. Whatdyaknow...that bit on the Mayan calendar wasn't so off!

Jeff, I guess we define weather differently. The common definition of weather is the atmospheric conditions at a point in time and climate is the statistical compilation of weather conditions over long periods of time. Climate defines the envelope of conditions that weather fits in to. Any change in long term weather patterns is by definition climate change regardless of the source. But I understand where you're coming from.

Dave

billy/JK: The atmosphere in total contains about 3.3Tt (trillion tons) of CO2. In 2004 human burning of fossil fuels (FFs) released about 30Gt tons (billion tons) of CO2. That's easily calculated from the equations for the chemical reactions in the combustion of those FFs. We know how much CO2 is released when we burn a ton of coal. Of that 30Gt right now about 40% (12Gt) are absorbed by the oceans and biosphere and 60% (18Gt) remains in the atmosphere which correlates well with the 3.x ppm increase in atmospheric CO2. The fact that the increase is caused by the burning of FFs is shown by the change in the ratio of the isotopes C12 to C13 in the atmospheric CO2. The living organisms that produced the organic material that became the FFs prefers C12 over C13 therefore FFs have a higher ratio of C12 to C13 than the atmosphere so burning them changes the ratio. Also the reduction of oxygen in the atmosphere correlates well with the burning of FFs. It takes 2 oxygen atoms for each carbon atom to make CO2. Besides, measurements of the amount of CO2/C stored in the oceans and biosphere show both to be increasing. If those are increasing and the atmosphere is also increasing then where is the CO2 coming from? You might think volcanic activity but that's only about 0.33Gt per year (about 1% of human emissions). Maybe outer space? But the only real answer is the burning of FFs.

Of course there are negative feedbacks and that's why there has been no runaway reaction. But taking carbon that's been sequestered in the form of FFs for hundreds of millions of years and putting it back in the active environment changes the equilibrium and the carbon cycle will keep adjusting until we stop emitting CO2 and it reaches a new equilibrium. Of course the energy absorbed by evaporation over the ocean is released again when that water vapor condenses and falls as rain/snow. It never disappears. That's basic thermodynamics.

To say "...we pick CO2 because there's a correlation" is bass ackwards. The chemical and physical properties of CO2 have been studied in detail. We know the absorption characteristics for different wavelengths of energy at different concentrations of CO2. We can measure the solar energy and wavelengths falling on the earth and can measure the energy and wavelengths re-radiated from the surface. From that we can calculate how much energy the CO2 will absorb. The first speculations that increases in CO2 might cause global warming were made over 100 years ago when the absorption characteristics of CO2 were first being studied. The correlation between global temperature and solar activity was good until around 1975. Since then global temperature has continued to rise sharply while solar activity has leveled off.

If you want peer reviewed papers I suggest you go look at Skeptical Science or RealClimate.org. Both contain many references to them on various subjects. Here's a post on The Great Global Warming Swindle that analyzes the science in it.

The evidence is pretty clear that most of the climate change we are seeing is from human activities therefore changing them can affect the course of climate change.

Dave

riverat: The fact that the increase is caused by the burning of FFs is shown by the change in the ratio of the isotopes C12 to C13 in the atmospheric CO2. The living organisms that produced the organic material that became the FFs prefers C12 over C13 therefore FFs have a higher ratio of C12 to C13 than the atmosphere so burning them changes the ratio. JK: Burning includes natural fires of fossil fuels. How the about decay of ancient organic material? How about unknown processes? Again correlation DOES NOT EQUAL causation. Until we know ALL POSSIBLE sources, we cannot just assign some unknown part to man.

riverat: If those are increasing and the atmosphere is also increasing then where is the CO2 coming from? JK: Here you repeat a basic fallacy: we can’t think of anything else, so it must be CO2..

riverat: Of course the energy absorbed by evaporation over the ocean is released again when that water vapor condenses and falls as rain/snow. It never disappears. JK: And exactly where that energy goes is unknown. Some goes to space & some back to earth & some stays put but in what proportions?

riverat: The correlation between global temperature and solar activity was good until around 1975. Since then global temperature has continued to rise sharply while solar activity has leveled off. JK: The climate correlation is with sunspot cycle length. My graph shows good correlation until it ends in the late 1980s (it is based on a 1991 paper: Friis-Christensen, E., and K. Lassen, Science, 254, 698-700, 1991)

However if you agree that the solar correlation was good until recently, perhaps we should be looking at what happened recently. First CO2 increase started big time around 1950 - decades too soon to explain the 1975 deviation. Since satellite data shows little warming, perhaps we should suspect contaminated ground data - you know those weather stations in the middle of growing urban areas and parking lots. Rural stations generally show less warming. McKitterick found a correlation between surface temperatures that have been CORRECTED FOR URBAN HEAT ISLAND effect and city growth -- OOPS.

riverat: If you want peer reviewed papers I suggest you go look at Skeptical Science or RealClimate.org. JK: OK, so you haven’t seen actual evidence either.

Since you mentioned realclimate, you may be interested in their take on CO2 vs H2O (CO2 at most is 30% of warming): . . . the maximum supportable number for the importance of water vapour alone is about 60-70% and for water plus clouds 80-90% of the present day greenhouse effect. (Of course, using the same approach, the maximum supportable number for CO2 is 20-30%, and since that adds up to more than 100%, there is a slight problem with such estimates!). (realclimate.org/index.php?p=142)

Thanks JK

However if you agree that the solar correlation was good until recently,

It wasn't. n-1 data points will always predict n random samples with no error. If your degrees of freedom increase and your error variance increases with it, that's called a bad theory, not contaminated data. This is why people scoff at 16 dimensional universes and the like. If you add enough terms to the equation, you will eventually "predict" everything you've observed.

You could have a rewarding career as a statistician for a major pharmaceutical concern, though, or fighting job discrimination suits (they use the effect in reverse)!

Heheheheh.... Zara, after Chris Lowe pointed out that I can be a fearsome shredder with pointy teeth, I turned it off, mostly. But you tempt me....heheheheheh

Zarathustra: However if you agree that the solar correlation was good until recently,

It wasn't. JK: Actually it was (and is)very good. Better than CO2. See: see: Friis-Christensen, E., and K. Lassen, Science, 254, 698-700, 1991

Thanks JK

I am fifty four years old. I became an environmental activist in 1970.

The air is cleaner than it was in 1970.

The water is cleaner than it was in 1970.

Environmental conciousness was almost zero in 1970, now it is on the forefront of most people's minds.

A modern V8 SUV burns cleaner and way more efficiently than the V8 sedans and station wagons of 1970.

There was no recycling in 1970. Now it is nearly universal.

The fact is we are doing way better than we were forty years ago. And we will continue to improve.

People on here who advocate an immediate stop to using fossil fuels, banning all autmobiles and tearing down dams just don't get it.

Live a little longer and maybe you will.

There was no recycling in 1970. Now it is nearly universal.

The fact is we are doing way better than we were forty years ago. And we will continue to improve.

Your generation is proud of its environmental record, but as you might say, if you're not a part of the solution you're part of the problem.

Recycling nearly universal? Very progressive and respected contributors for this blog work for apartment complexes that don't have recycling facilities for glass, IN PORTLAND.

Yes, people slowly learn. The thesis is, we don't have another 40 years. Personally, I would like major monuments, explicit monuments, to the human-uber-alles culture. My one fear is that there won't be enough technology in the future to read electronic media like this, and no one will be able to tell the story of what happened. We need major monuments that say, "We own the earth. God gave it to us. We use it as we please, we smite disease and want, and we will determine its future". These generations won't get it in time. You want a fact that you need to accept as you grow older? That's one you can hang your hat on. This culture isn't up to the challenge. You raise generations that can't think for themselves, inundate their "leisure viewing" with scenes of unrealistic relationships, stupid ultimatums, revisionist history and the cult of "the great male". You elect governments that appeal to the lowest common denominator and lie and lie and lie, even to your significant others. Anywho, if there's a lucky mutation and society ever becomes something more than a bunch of chimpanzees with toys, it would be nice if they knew how and why we screwed the pooch.

Yes, age is relevant. I like the way Blue Oregon is so open to comments, but having userIDs would help the debate, I think. I love the idea that people can throw rhetorical stink bombs- how else do you know what they are thinking? I love the idea that kids can debate politics.

Unfortunately it is just a waste of time letting people that aren't old enough to vote shout their opinions as fact with the same bandwidth as actual voters. "Billy" needs someone to talk to, but it wasn't the intention of the people that came here to read Blue Oregon to babysit him. I would bet my last dollar that 1/3 of the posts currently up suffer from this effect. A quicker solution would be to start a topic about WWF and ban the IPs of anyone that posts to it. Would you debate this with Beavis and Butthead? Then, why are you?

Locutus of Aloha "Billy" needs someone to talk to, but it wasn't the intention of the people that came here to read Blue Oregon to babysit him. JK: So, what is your problem with fact based discussion? Except that facts sink a lot of people's delusions?

Thanks JK

Locutus: although I think I understand where your frustrated sentiments come from, I have to say a couple of things about that, courteously.

I've only skimmed most of what JK says, as somehow I do not find myself interested in the emptiness and rationalized content and am not tempted into a pissing match with this JK nor am I fantasizing JK will ever meet me in the middle of anything. SO I am not promising I've totally "gotten" all that is wrong with JK as you experience him. But:

1. Your tone, if I were to take you at face value, indicates a healthy disdain for younger people, and endangers any rhetoric you might have offered up about how wonderful the Obama-supportive youth vote is and any other rhetoric about how we must help kids learn and practice citizenship to become strongly participatory citizens;

2. Are you really so sure that kids waste their time researching anti-anti-globalism, anti-anti global warming and the like? Not awfully likely;

3. I've noticed, actually, more rage and caustic hate-posting on the part of self-proclaimed Left Wing extremists (I will not lean to calling them "radicals", as I still have a bit of respect for that moniker!) than on the part of this kid;

4. I've also noticed more rudenss, and petty picking on the part of probably-clearly adult posters who get "respect" on this board and seem to show a little bit of a cliquey or status heirarchy posture, than this kid.

I know this JK has a stick in the shit-bucket and keeps stirring, stirring over a period of days, but, frankly, at a level that at least is intricate enough to warrant more respect than you pay it, and at least as much respect as such as "Ray Duray" or "Harry Kershner", or at least to recognize as anticipatory socialization -- mammalian play. In sociological terms -- the activities of juvenile anything/whatevers that are preparing for real life tasks. Think of lions and bear chasing down prey then getting bit on the pay, not sure of the next step. Like that.

Lastly, if someone wants to joust this person with spoon to fork over the lunchtable on a snowy set of days, my guess is that something in THEM is playing out and being satisfied (whether positive or negative), and you might just as well question them too!

Not meaning this to start a fight. It all just popped into my head.

One thing about when we take to poking someone sardonically - we will often use weapons of word that say a lot about us. Disdain for the efforts of the youth is the most important part of that here. Or it can say something about the known weaknesses of the target - in our house nobody said "You are ugly"... they ALWAYS said, "You are stupid" even if that did not fit. The goal always to hurt the other, and the known was that stupidity was feared and disdained too. Use that always, as you want to hurt for real, always.

Just a wee-hours thought about your post.

JK could be silenced if nobody responded to JK. It is BO bloggers who keep it going. :)

billy, You don't address the fact that we know how much CO2 is produced by the burning of FFs and other human activities and the increase in atmospheric CO2 is about 60% of that amount. So if human produced CO2 isn't causing the increase where is it going instead?

Again, your fallacy argument is bass ackwards. CO2 has certain energy absorption characteristics that we've measured. We can measure the energy available that fits those absorption characteristics. Why would you expect that more CO2 isn't absorbing more energy in the atmosphere?

What makes you think we don't know where the energy from water vapor condensation in the atmosphere goes? Certainly there is more to learn but that doesn't mean we have no idea what's happening to it.

The Friis-Christensen/Lassen paper is rather controversial and in particular there are questions about the methods that were used in there curve fitting. Human CO2 emissions have been occurring for a long time, in particular since industrial use of FFs started in the 1700. The increase really took off during and after WWII but that increase in industrial activity also increased the output of various aerosols that masked the global warming signal from CO2. 1975 was around the time we were cleaning up those aerosols so that's when the correlation of solar forcing and climate change breaks. The urban heat island effect has been studied intensively and found to be pretty trivial. Compensation for it has been included in the calculations. The global warming signal is seen in measurements over the oceans which contain no UHI's

Water vapor and clouds are the majority of the greenhouse effect and CO2 is second. If there was no greenhouse effect at all the average temperature over the surface of the earth would be something like 33C (60F) lower than it is now. You cherry pick one comment out of the Real Climate article where they acknowledge the crudeness of a back of the envelope calculation that don't take the overlap in absorption of the various greenhouse gases but ignore the overall point of it. Did you read all of it or just look for something to support your opinion?

Dave

riverat: billy, You don't address the fact that we know how much CO2 is produced by the burning of FFs and other human activities and the increase in atmospheric CO2 is about 60% of that amount. So if human produced CO2 isn't causing the increase where is it going instead? JK: You are making the error of primitive man: we can’t figure it out, so we assume it is caused by . . . (in their case a GOD, in you case man. same non-logic.)

riverat: The urban heat island effect has been studied intensively and found to be pretty trivial. JK: Then why do rural stations show less warming than urban stations - by a huge amount? Why to properly soited stations show a huge amount less warming than improperly placed stations? You really need to look at data beyone realclimate and the iPCC - they are boty political sites, not science.

riverat: Compensation for it has been included in the calculations. The global warming signal is seen in measurements over the oceans which contain no UHI's JK: Then why doesn’t this show in the satellite data? (Only a little warming shows in satellite data)

riverat: Water vapor and clouds are the majority of the greenhouse effect and CO2 is second. JK: Right. By a wide margin. Why do you concentrate on CO2? The only answer seems to be as an excuse to tell people to quit sinning against nature by wasting energy to heat their homes and drive their cars.

riverat: You cherry pick one comment out of the Real Climate article where they acknowledge the crudeness of a back of the envelope calculation that don't take the overlap in absorption of the various greenhouse gases but ignore the overall point of it. JK: What overall point? That site is just drivel created to defend the hockeystick fraud. Here is a classic example of their deceptions: All that the lag shows is that CO2 did not cause the first 800 years of warming, out of the 5000 year trend. The other 4200 years of warming could in fact have been caused by CO2, as far as we can tell from this ice core data. (bold added) Yes, it could. That proves nothing it is pure speculation. It could also have been caused by whatever caused the original warming simply continuing. Which is the most logical? The original cause continuing, or the original cause stopping and CO2 taking over? But the fact remains: WE DON’T KNOW. So, like David, they simply assume that man is the cause.

BTW, we are still waiting for proof that: 1. “CO2 causes warming” (make that significant or harmful warming)

2. “the science is that the world is warming and man is responsible for much of it. This is well-established in the scientific literature.”

3. CO2 can cause “far more than 0.5 C warming”

4. “if you're going to damage the climate by burning carbon "

Thanks JK

As I said on "snowpacylpse", CO2 is just one consideration. CH4 is 72 times more potent as a greenhouse gas and even if the thaw in the Arctic is normal, it makes the issue of "added greenhouse gasses" a relevant one.

Chris, I really don't get where you come with that "corollary" this n that? I notice that you all tolerate the ranting and rage of certain extremist lefties. JK seems like another version of unpalatable poster, only he specializes in doing the three-legged dog - running in circles.

I was pecking at the poster who was smirking around at the thought of kids filling the blog with less than well thought out writing. Perhaps it was a lame attempt at kinda-sorta irony? I was picking at it as that lame and making a different point utterly. Just another pettish hijack, Chris.

Real kids should be encouraged to present themselves in real forums and get accustomed with the experience of having their ideas tested, having to admit if they discover they entrapped themselves in a fallacy, and be generous with others who do the same.

I am bored by this JK person, find his endless well of tripe so suffocating as to inspire me to not read most of what he posts. His posts clearly were not those of a kid, by my lights. HOWEVER, my son, when he concentrates, is mistakeable for a fully grown, robustly-concepting adult for the past few years -- so I never rule that entirely out.

I think the best way to silence this person is to ignore him and perhaps communicate back-channel to Kari that he's up here stirring it again. Altho, not sure why we allow the porn link poster, the payday loan asshole to spam this list if JK cannot bloviate like a champion lump of coal.

I say stop engaging this idiot, he is clearly up here to pick a fight and drag you in circles like ripe carrion.

... altho, Chris, I might have utterly missed the subtlety of your corollary saying I am a fan of beating down the likes of JK... heh.. You know I'm a great fan of being right, and am only SLOWLY coming around to gracefully admitting when I've been an arse.

You just busted my li'l bubble of belief - I thought I was the Queen of Subtle and could follow any gossamer thread. And you just pulled a Civilettian-negative jiu jitsu in your third sentence. Further opaquities.

Ah Den of Density, creating posting iniquities.

:(.... ehhhhh.

And, Chris, the "pettish hijack" was mine! I was busy hijacking converse earlier by picking on someone I fancied to be either revealingly smarmy or just not very robust in their effort at subtle irony. Both are crimes in our family.

You were not doing the pettish hijack, much.

:)

Chris Lowe: would you please give a fuller description of what would constitute a "relevant" peer-reviewed study: what criteria would it have to meet? JK: Why did you quote the word “relevant” I can find no evidence that I used such a word? If indeed I didn’t use that word, why should I expect you to get anything like real proof right?

Chris Lowe: Because I am guessing that what we have are a lot of peer-reviewed studies that show different dimensions of what is going on plus reasoning that connects them, JK: Mostly what appears to connect them is a lot of words like “may”, “possibly”, “should”, “might”, “could”.

Here is a nice example: All that the lag shows is that CO2 did not cause the first 800 years of warming, out of the 5000 year trend. The other 4200 years of warming could in fact have been caused by CO2, as far as we can tell from this ice core data. (realclimate.org/index.php?p=13).

Notice this dramatic claim of CO2 causing warming, eventhough the evidence shows the reverse, is accomplished by saying that whatever is not proven “could” have been caused by CO2. This is typical of the field. (There is a simpler explanation: we don’t know yet. But I would place my bets on whatever caused the first 800 years of warming simply continuing.)

Thanks JK

Thanks for the JK ref., Chris to JK's campaign/platforms. Either he's not a Libertarian or I just left the party!

"More liberal than a progressive"?!!!??! Cite some facts to back that one up. How about more trogloydyte than Dick Cheney dressed as Fred Flintstone!

Besides the arguably pointless nature of trying to win a debate with someone that's obviously working backwards from an a priori conclusion- again, back to the Snowpocalypse post- he states that CO2 is an unqualified benefit to life and poses no risk. Debate that, but don't debate what pollutes less or what contributes to atmospheric levels, if you don't accept that it's a problem. You add it all up, this looks like pure sophistry

Let's move this forward. It would be the progressive position, I believe, that this is one we have to act on, without the benefit of full understanding.

Put another way, we're being a bit academic/groidy about it all. Reminiscent of an old joke about the diff between an engineer, physicist and mathematician. All awake in the middle of the night to a small fire in the middle of the room. The engineer empties the trash can, fills it with water, putting out the fire, checks to see it's out and goes back to bed. The physicist works out a page of calculations, fills a glass with water, throws it at just the right point on the fire, putting it out, and goes back to bed. The mathematician works out 5 pages of calculation, determines "a solution exists", and goes back to bed.

We need to get bailin' with the trash can while the calculations are being carried out. As it involves resources, profitability and getting lazy people to act differently, all those interests will urge us to wait for more data to determine that a solution exists before proceeding. While it's good professional practice, it fails to address that the house is on fire.

As long as there is a buck in it, then there will be people running around and say the sky is falling.

Get oer it as the weather will continue to change as long as there is a sun.

Chris Lowe: I am not deeply conversant in the relevant literature and can't dispute your characterization of it, except to say that if it is true, it is hard for me to understand how the shift in the weight of scientific opinion has come about to the extent that it has. JK: You have touched on the crux of the situation: there are a lot of highly motivated people saying things far beyond the evidence: 1. The UN’s IPCC report was not signed off on by thousands of scientists. It reviews the work of thousands. The actual report has several layers, the upper level summaries being mostly written by politicians.

1. Prominent scenists are obviously emotionally attached to the CO2 hypothesis. Jim Hansen is one, He maintains the USHCN temperature records at NASA and has been caught making several errors that tend to make warming look worse. He also has a habit of issuing dire warnings that regularly appear in the major media. He helped with a paper in 1970 warning of climate cooling. Surprise of surprises - the solution to cooling was also to cut burning fossil fuels. Some cynics see a pattern here and it is not science, instead it is the religion of man is living a sinful life of waste that must be sopped. Example: Maurice Strong ``If we don't change, our species will not survive. . . . Frankly, we may get to the point where the only way of saving the world will be for industrial civilization to collapse.''

2. Several prominent warmers have actually said it is OK to lie to the public: AL Gore: ”I believe it is appropriate to have an over-representation of factual presentations on how dangerous it is as a predicate for opening up the audience to listen to what the solutions are...”; Al Gore in Grist, 09 May 2006, (bold added.) Steven Schneider , Editor of Climate Change Journal: ... we need to get some broadbased support, to capture the public's imagination. That, of course, entails getting loads of media coverage. So we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might. have. (DISCOVER OCTOBER 1989, Page 47) Jim Hansen: (Controls NASA’s historical climate records) Emphasis on extreme scenarios may have been appropriate at one time , when the public and decision-makers were relatively unaware of the global warming issue, and energy sources such as "synfuels," shale oil and tar sands were receiving strong consideration. Now, however, the need is for demonstrably objective climate forcing scenarios consistent with what is realistic under current conditions.

3. Trading carbon may become a BILLION dollar industry. A lot of people are trying to get rich: Al Gore is Chairman of Generations Mutual fund. see: generationim.com/about/team.html Al Gore is a partner in Silicon Valley's preeminent venture firm: See: Al Gore’s “will be focused on equity investments in small companies in four sectors: renewable energy;” energy efficiency technologies; energy from biofuels and biomass; and the carbon trading markets.

*Al Gore appears to get $100,000 for speaking. (BTW, a British court found a bunch of inaccuracies in Gore’s film (“over-representation of factual presentations”?) See: newparty.co.uk/articles/inaccuracies-gore.html) Sir Nicholas Stern: (Wrote British report on CO2) Is the VP of IDEAglobal, a carbon rating company.

The markets for emission reductions under the flexible mechanisms and the EU ETS have increased from small and hesitant trades to a growing market, projected to possibly exceed $10 billion in the CDM alone. In a follow up commitment period to the Kyoto Protocol, projections place a market size at over $100 billion.

(The money isn’t a few thousand from some oil company - the real money is the $100 billion from carbon trading which will be paid by you and me.)

The links to the original articles quoted above: portlandfacts.com/FollowTheMoney.htm

Thanks JK

Here is a nice compact description of the real reason for the CO2 - global warming hysteria: (these are all excerpts out of the Financial Post linked below)

According to the World Bank, the value of carbon trading reached US$64 billion last year, up from US$30 billion in 2006 and US$10 billion in 2005. In fact, CO2 has emerged as an entirely new asset class, with an entirely new trading infrastructure and an entirely new lexicon: carbon credits, carbon offsets, carbon funds, carbon futures, carbon aggregators, carbon markets, carbon exchanges. Some estimate the trade will reach the trillion-dollar threshold within a decade. ... London, the epicentre of the rising global carbon market, is already littered with specialty hedge funds and private equity funds trading carbon-emission credits. Similar funds are popping up in other countries, including Canada, where trading is poised to gain momentum with the recent opening of the Montreal Exchange's new platform for trading greenhouse gas emissions, MceX ... Still, despite the growing pains, the system has flourished. More than a billion metric tonnes of CO2, worth $24.3 billion, were traded within the EU ETS in 2006, making it by far the world's largest carbon market. ... In North America, the development of carbon markets has been bogged down by the refusal of the U.S. to sign the Kyoto Accord and foot-dragging on the part of successive Canadian governments in coming up with a national strategy to combat greenhouse gases. ... Another alternative to the MCeX is the carbon funds being set up by the likes of Toronto's Front Street Capital, which is investing heavily in acquiring a portfolio of carbon offsets, either by signing agreements with green technology companies, or by becoming equity investors in projects that throw off credits, ... Front Street - which is launching a $50-million to $100-million retail fund this summer, and a larger institutional fund later in the year - .... "The entire carbon market is driven by policy. If we get that right, there's no reason it can't reach a trillion dollars," Rogers says. "The challenge will be to integrate those regional and national policies into a true global market. How we do this remains to be seen." Adds Deloitte's Chort: "It depends on how the emission caps are set going forward, and whether everyone can be held accountable. In practice, it's supposed to work."

Finiancial Post, Tuesday, June 03, 2008, financialpost.com/magazine/fp500/story.html?id=532840

JK: Every time I reply to you I ask myself "Should I keep feeding this troll?" This thread is getting pretty old so maybe no one will read it but I just can't keep myself from pointing out some of your misinformation. This will probably be the last time though.

What makes you think we can't figure it (whatever "it" is) out? The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere is rising at around 18Gt per year lately. Human emissions of CO2 are on the order of 30Gt per year lately. The surface of the earth receives radiant energy from the sun that is measurable. The surface of the earth re-radiates a measurable amount of that energy. CO2 has measured absorption characteristics across the spectrum of radiant energy. Those are observed facts, not assumptions. Calculations based on those observations match pretty well with observed global temperature change. I think it's up to you to show why that information doesn't indicate the climate change we are seeing is not anthropogenic. I think it's up to you to show why the compensations applied to correct for the urban heat island effect are not valid.

Water vapor is the most significant GHG but it's average lifetime in the atmosphere is around 10 days (vs. multiple decades to centuries for CO2) so instead of driving climate change it responds to it by responding to the immediate climate conditions. Analysis show that if you removed 100% of the water vapor from the atmosphere it would be back to normal levels in 50 days or so just based on evaporation from the oceans. That's not long enough to significantly drive climate change. Warmer temperature increases atmospheric water vapor and and colder decreases it. The upshot is that it has a small amplifying effect on the trend, up or down.

You should know that satellites don't measure temperature and aren't readily comparable to direct measurements. Instead they measure the strength of radiant energy across the relevant spectrum. The temperature of various levels of the atmosphere is calculated from that information. An expected effect of climate change driven by CO2 is that the stratosphere actually cools some and that has been observed to be true. So if you make a synthesis of temperature for the full depth of the atmosphere you would expect it to show less warming than surface measurements. Nevertheless satellite data still shows a warming trend.

The overall point of the original article you cherry picked from was to explain why water vapor isn't particularly relevant to the current climate change as I explained above. The point of the article you quote here is that just because CO2 lags but amplifies natural climate change during the ice age doesn't mean it can't be driving it now. It's not an either/or thing. BTW, analysis of the Mann et al "Hockey Stick" graph and other studies in the 10 years since it was published have shown that while the methodology may have been somewhat flawed the results were fairly accurate.

JK, as you are not a lone voice with a loony position but have a position of responsibility, you need to be dealt with as much as any of these topics do. I call on all real progressives to do what they can toward that end.

riverat: What makes you think we can't figure it (whatever "it" is) out? The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. . . Those are observed facts, not assumptions. JK: YOUR assumption is that you know all of the sources and all of the sinks AND each of them at an accuracy such that man’s contribution is well out of the sum of the error bands AND that only man’s CO2 has a particular fingerprint. Those are all major gaps in the logic chain that make your claim unsupported by the evidence.

riverat: Calculations based on those observations match pretty well with observed global temperature change. I think it's up to you to show why that information doesn't indicate the climate change we are seeing is not anthropogenic. JK: Correlation is not causation. Especially when there is a better correlation between the sun and climate. It has been known for over 200 years and you just ignore it.

riverat: I think it's up to you to show why the compensations applied to correct for the urban heat island effect are not valid. JK: Ross McKittrich alread did. Also others. Surface stations compared properly sited stations with the others and found lots less warming. AND remember, even your GOD, the IPCC recognizes some warming as natural.

riverat: Water vapor is the most significant GHG but it's average lifetime in the atmosphere is around 10 days (vs. multiple decades to centuries for CO2) . . . JK: What does lifetime have to do with it? H2O has many times the effect of CO2. PERIOD. END OF DISCUSSION.

riverat: You should know that satellites don't measure temperature and aren't readily comparable to direct measurements. Instead they measure the strength of radiant energy across the relevant spectrum. The temperature of various levels of the atmosphere is calculated from that information. An expected effect of climate change driven by CO2 is that the stratosphere actually cools some and that has been observed to be true. JK: WHAT? The AGW theory says CO2 IR absorption should heat an atmospheric layer - that layer has been cooling.

riverat: The overall point of the original article you cherry picked from was to explain why water vapor isn't particularly relevant to the current climate change as I explained above. JK: MY POINT was to point out the article’s lack of logic. Typical of the entire AGW “proof”

riverat: The point of the article you quote here is that just because CO2 lags but amplifies natural climate change during the ice age doesn't mean it can't be driving it now. JK: “ doesn't mean it can't be driving it now” – your illogic is showing. It also doesn’t mean that Superman, or Batman, isn’t driving climate. Just as logical as what you just said. Realclimate wrote that to trick people into thinking that it was a cause and effect, instead of a speculation.

riverat: ...analysis of the Mann et al "Hockey Stick" graph and other studies in the 10 years since it was published have shown that while the methodology may have been somewhat flawed the results were fairly accurate. JK: How come the earth has been cooling for several years - that is NOT shown on the “hockey stick”. How come the little ice age is not shown on the “hockey stick”? How come the Mediaeval warm period is not shown on the “hockey stick”. It FAILS ALL BASIC TESTS of validity: It got the past wrong. It got the future wrong. Its methodology (as you admit) was wrong. It used proxies well known to be ill-suited for temperature. Without those, there is no hockey stick shape. It used improper data pre-processing. Without improper pre-processing, there is no hockey stick shape. It is wrong on just about every count and probably a fraud.

Time to wake up, David.

BTW we are still waiting for your evidence.

Thanks JK

JK: What does lifetime have to do with it? H2O has many times the effect of CO2. PERIOD. END OF DISCUSSION.

If you do not get that you really should not be talking. It also matters where the compound migrates to in the atmosphere. A high GHG potential compound that stays low is different than a moderate one that circulates. You're arm chairing this. Not the data, reasoning with it. You are an egomaniac. You really believe that you can pick up some studies on the web and pull the conclusions together better than communities of researchers can. Maybe, until you make a statement like the one I quoted. That is atmospheric physics 101 and being able to boldly state that you don't get it is an indication that, despite your obvious belief to the contrary, you aren't up to the task! Yet, you think you are one of the few that does it well. That is the definition of "narcissistic personality" disorder. Your rage is narcissistic, not factual. "How dare they spend my money that way". It is fuel for those that ban all rage as wild and threatening.

This is all a matter of perspective, scale and people not being able to do the math. Look at the atmosphere from space. It is a tiny, tiny fraction of the earth. An egg's shell is 1000s of times thicker relative to the egg. If you were shut up in an extremely small, air-tight space with JK, running out of oxygen and faced with imminent demise, and he started to purposely hyperventilate, because he really believes CO2 is good, what would you do? Would you argue with him as that tiny bit of atmosphere is used up and die together? His behavior would lead to the conclusion that only by strangling him could you hope to survive. Just a metaphor, of course, though a comforting one.

Zarathustra:
JK: What does lifetime have to do with it? H2O has many times the effect of CO2. PERIOD. END OF DISCUSSION.

...It also matters where the compound migrates to in the atmosphere. A high GHG potential compound that stays low is different than a moderate one that circulates. JK: The quoted article was in terms of overall effect, not some subset. You are discussing subsets. Irrelevant.

Zarathustra: That is the definition of "narcissistic personality" disorder. Your rage is narcissistic, not factual. "How dare they spend my money that way". It is fuel for those that ban all rage as wild and threatening. JK: It is always interesting to see how long a warmer can go without resorting to ad hominian. That usually indicates a person who has run out of arguments.

Zarathustra: This is all a matter of perspective, scale and people not being able to do the math. Look at the atmosphere from space. It is a tiny, tiny fraction of the earth. An egg's shell is 1000s of times thicker relative to the egg. JK: How is that relevant to anything. It simply is. Has been for millions of years.

Zarathustra: If you were shut up in an extremely small, air-tight space with JK, running out of oxygen and faced with imminent demise, and he started to purposely hyperventilate, because he really believes CO2 is good, what would you do? JK: I didn’t claim CO2 is good for man to breathe. I simply stated that CO2 is good for plants and plants are necessary for man to live. Please quit distorting my position. Another sign you have run out of arguments.

Zarathustra: Would you argue with him as that tiny bit of atmosphere is used up and die together? His behavior would lead to the conclusion that only by strangling him could you hope to survive. Just a metaphor, of course, though a comforting one. JK: This is the second tip-toe around shutting me up. When do the death threats start?

And that pretty much proves you are not a Libertarian.

Thanks JK

I'm tired of wasting the bandwidth here. You wouldn't notice, but it's rude. Next time you have a public engagement to spew this nonsense, we'll continue this. I'll invite friends that stood with Ron Paul in his first Congressional run and you can tell us to our face that we're not Libertarians.

Fuck off, Kurt Hagadakis

You missed a trick to demonstrate the diff between weather and climate, relate it to the season, and make one posters point that history is not climate.

"A Christmas Carol" by Dickens portrays a London that is frozen in weeks of snow. 50 years later, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes finds it, in "The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle" (great xmas read), to be "just above freezing". The bookies currently offer odds on snow falling in London on xmas at 1:18. If you talk about snow on the ground, it has gone from a high of about 1:4, around 1780-1820, to 1:40 today. So, short term weather, in the last 150 years it is 10x less likely for there to be snow on the ground in London on Christmas day.

Please do not feed the pseudo-libertarian trolls with their selective culling of the scientific literature and inability to reflect upon their own dogmatic assertions.

I was thinking, while reading this, that people as obnoxious as JK are usually crooks. There's nothing happening today in State gov., and am bored, so I checked out his profile. Bingo! So, what's the penalty for defrauding voters, knowingly publishing materially false statements in the Oregon Voters' Guide, through the SOS?

This is a good gauge how to take JK, and why no one has to get violent to extract a pound of flesh from his thick hide! In the 2008 Voters' Guide , first line, you have the unambiguous statement, "Occupation: Co-owner, electronics manufacturing company." That is supplied by the candidate, no? Now, in the Secretary of State's office you have the only business registered to Jim Krlock, at his address (you can only query by corp name, taxpayers), and it has been dissolved for five years! I have looked at a lot of these records, and it is the first case I've seen of a lawyer, his agent for service process, resigning from a corp with no economic activity. There's no reason a lawyer would do that out of the blue. Something happened. When? November, 2008! What a coinkydink! Almost to the day when the Voters' Guide came out. So, basically, after making a false statement to commit vote fraud, his lawyer said he didn't want anymore of the situation, was getting out, and Krlock did nothing to modify his statement!

You don't need toughs at his next gig, just a sheriff's deputy with a warrant. At least vote fraud should be good enough to keep him off the ticket next time. Run yourself on the platform, "the last L running in this district used it to stand for liar; I stand for Libertarians", and systematically deconstruct all his poison! You're a legend, man. Go for it!

(I guess you can't write his name without triggering a filter).

John Davis: In the 2008 Voters' Guide , first line, you have the unambiguous statement, "Occupation: Co-owner, electronics manufacturing company." That is supplied by the candidate, no? Now, in the Secretary of State's office you have the only business registered to Jim Krlock, at his address (you can only query by corp name, taxpayers), and it has been dissolved for five years! ... So, basically, after making a false statement to commit vote fraud, his lawyer said he didn't want anymore of the situation, was getting out, and Krlock did nothing to modify his statement! JK: Stock holders do have to register with the SOS. It is stock ownership that determines ownership of a corp.

I demand that you retract the liable before I am compelled to have a chat with my attorney on this matter.

This is furher evidence of the lack of eveidence that the warmers have when they have to fabricate personal attacks and pretend to know about corporate ownereship, when they obviously know little.

I must be really getting to Oregon’s power structure. Let me throw more gas on the fire:

The head of Oregon’s Global Warming Commission, charged with recommending actions to the upcoming legislature, was the President of company that sells carbon offsets called “green tags” (the last time I checked their web site in December). It appears to me that he is in a position to personally profit from his group’s recommendations to the legislature.

Of course AL Gore, Nick Stern, Maurice Strong, all major players in the global warming fraud are ALSO ALL POSITIONED TO MAKE MONEY off of carbon trading.

Thanks JK

John Davis--right, if you properly spell Kaarlock's name, it is flagged by a filter here at BlueOregon. Crude filtering, obviously: in comparison, when Jack Bogdanski banned me from his blog after failing the obsequiousness test, he used an IP address filter. But in any case, how can you possibly be committing "liable" (JK's spelling) when you were commenting on a posting by someone who just calls himself "billy"?

You are a liar, James. I'm the one that needs the lawyer!

Of course AL Gore, Nick Stern, Maurice Strong, all major players in the global warming fraud are ALSO ALL POSITIONED TO MAKE MONEY off of carbon trading.

What about the thousands of scientists publishing in the peer-reviewed literature? Lots of financial conflicts there, too?

Kaarlock keeps interesting company.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=Jim+Kaarlock

Looks an attack of the sock puppets.

I sure must have hit a sore spot.

BTW, rw, you could learn a lot of actual facts and real data if you follow some of those links your Google search turned up. You could become educated!

Thanks JK

Not sock puppets, JK. By the way, on your Save Portland website, you go on and on about unfair tax breaks, but wait a sec--I mean, you're with the Libertarian Party, the party of "taxation is theft", so how can a tax break--any tax break--NOT be good by definition?

I agree about the unfair tax breaks for real estate developers, actually. I just think your position as a Libertarian is incoherent.

Don't mean to spam, but this thread seems also a good place to put this link.

http://narfnews.blogspot.com/2008/02/narf-alaskan-native-village-sues-24-oil.html

A tiny AK native group fighting forced relocation from their place upon the earth due to the climate/waming-influenced and rapidly increasing intensity of storms taking away their land with every landfall.

They are not flower of word, their utterances are simply, brown paper bag plain. I saw on OPB an interview, and the man's face... he likened being removed to being broken apart and each put into some stranger's house somewhere to live permanently... I could tell he was searching himself for words to reach us, words to speak the natural reality we do not understand. Walt Whitman speaks of the mutely speaking turned back of our Great, Dumb Mother Earth... (Song of the Rolling Earth); this man gave up... his plain utterance of a homely likening would have to do.

And this people, embattled by spiking changes and pressures to abandon the body of themselves which is earth they live wtih there.. these are the warriors taking on the Great Oil interests on our behalf!

This is worth keeping an eye on. Hope you read the link and comment.

The Maldives have their first democratically elected President, and you know what his message for hope is? He's diverting a portion of the tourist budget to buy a new homeland for when they become environmental refugees. That's today and that's real people.

rw: A tiny AK native group fighting forced relocation from their place upon the earth due to the climate/waming-influenced and rapidly increasing intensity of storms taking away their land with every landfall. ... This is worth keeping an eye on. Hope you read the link and comment. JK: Just one little observation about: Drowning polar bears, drowning penguins, melting arctic, melting ice caps, melting Greenland, heat spells, cold spells, record hot, record cold (amazing how one thing can cause all these opposites): if you cannot prove man’s CO2 is the cause, there is no reason to believe that cutting CO2 (and hurting millions of people) will accomplish anything except make Al Gore (and his Wall St. buddies), Maurice Strong (199x Rio Conf leader), Nick Stern (Stern Report), et al very rich. Do you happen to know where to find real proof of CO2 being the cause?

Zarathustra: The Maldives have their first democratically elected President, and you know what his message for hope is? He's diverting a portion of the tourist budget to buy a new homeland for when they become environmental refugees. That's today and that's real people. JK: That is a good example of the real harm being done to real people by Al Gore’s fear mongering. The oceans are not rising any faster than they have been for the last few thousand years. In fact some data shows the rise has been a bit slower lately. Also, see above answer.

Thanks JK

Sorry, Kari, just trying to keep Oregon from hurting a lot of people with needless and ineffective measures to restrict energy usage by forcing the cost of energy to increase to the point where people cannot afford to heat their homes and drive cars. That is what cap & trade is designed to do.

Where is the concern for the job losses that will result?

Where is the concern for the people that will have to choose between heat and food?

Where is the concern for the people who will loose their jobs because they cannot afford to drive and transit takes too long?

I see no such concern. That should deeply concern all Oregonians. Especially the ruling party who is proposing such actions.

On the other hand, maybe I should shut up and wait for the revolution in two years. That would be in my self interest, but I am more concerned about doing the right thing. And hurting low income people is NEVER the right thing to do.

You might ask the warmers why they push for such measures when they cannot even prove that CO2 causes dangerous warming or that man’s CO2 is responsible for the observed CO2 increase. Or ask to see the actual proof, not some SCFI movie or correlations.

PS: I do hope that you know that at least Oregon climate change decision maker heads a non-profit that sells carbon offsets?

Thanks JK

Kaarlock sez: "...record hot, record cold (amazing how one thing can cause all these opposites)"

Actually, the computational global climate models predict precisely this: along with an overall warming trend, a marked increase (relative to, say, the last century) in deviations from that trend, that is, extremely hot periods, extremely cold periods, droughts, etc. There is nothing particularly new about this prediction, by the way.

Kaarlock sez: "...record hot, record cold (amazing how one thing can cause all these opposites)"

Actually, the computational global climate models predict precisely this: along with an overall warming trend, a marked increase (relative to, say, the last century) in deviations from that trend, that is, extremely hot periods, extremely cold periods, droughts, etc. There is nothing particularly new about this prediction, by the way.

JDW, and Z, u know how at holiday dinner, there's someone home from college that has to keep at Grandpa George and Grandma Ada who will spend an infinite amount of time, trying to convince anyone that will argue with them that FDR was a communist? At some point the rest of the kinfolk wonder why the kid thinks he's gonna change their mind as much as why G & A have been on about it for 60 years. Actually, they've gotten used to G & A and know they're old and not worth it.

Is it climate change yet?

I'm looking at this late in the conversation, and I haven't read every post - but - one thought seems to be missing. Should humanity change it's ways whether or not global climate change is real? During the administration of Bush the First, our president decided that there wasn't solid proof that climate change was happening, and that it was being caused by humans. So the U.S. did nothing. George the Second tried the same tactic.

In my mind, if there is credible evidence that human activity could be causing unfavorable changes to the planet, that is reason enough to change our ways. If climate change is real, and we wait until it's too late to do anything about it - well....

Is becoming more sustainable a bad thing? So why argue about global climate change?

pfishman: In my mind, if there is credible evidence that human activity could be causing unfavorable changes to the planet, that is reason enough to change our ways. If climate change is real, and we wait until it's too late to do anything about it - well....

Is becoming more sustainable a bad thing? So why argue about global climate change? JK: That depends on the price tag. All the popular “solutions” that I have seen are just not really workable: Solar electric costs over ten times what coal or nuclear power costs. Also we have no low cost way to store power for cloudy days and those 14-16 hrs/day when they don’t put out much power. If we were to switch to solar, the monthly electric bill would go up by a factor ten or so. Are you ready for $1000/month electra bills in place of your $100/month?

Wind. Europeans are discovering that wind really doesn’t save much fossil fuel because of its intermittent nature - they have to keep fossil fuels plants fired up in case the wind dies. (I’d guess they would find the same for soar if they had solar on the same scale.) This problem shows up at around 10% of total power being wind. Here in the NW, we have a lot of hydro which can be turned on and off quickly, so Oregon/Washington will fare a bit better. But the saving will be water savings more than fossil fuel savings.

Nu Clear Also known as nuclear, this low cost, non CO2 emitting, power source has essentially been banned in Oregon.

Tidal Unproven. Oregon has a CO2 reduction goal target date of 2020 - just 11 years away and nothing that isn’t at the first large scale plant state of development cannot be relied on to provide utility scale power in such a short time frame.

Geothermal Works, but has a host of practical problems, Corrosion. Heat source depletion.

Bottom Line There is no viable way to get our electric power at a cost anywhere neat today’s cost, except nuclear which has been effectively banned. The consequence is if we force people to switch to solar and wind, we will be forcing then to choose between paying the electric bill and food for their family. Or rent. Or clothes for the kids. Of course, this will help low cost super stores like Wal mart.

The other big CO2 emitters are industry and transportation.

Industry Industry is very cost concious. If there is a lower cost way of doing something, they jump on it. However, they do not jump on unproven, pie-in-they-sky ideas. Unfortunately that exactly fitst most CO2 reduction schemes that promise to reduce costs.

Transport Some random thoughts: Electric cars will require nuclear to supply their massive requirement. The pressure to get people to use mass transport blindly assumes that mass transport has some overall advantage. It does not save energy compared to a small car(look at the data before you jump on me for this), and a small car is more space than you get on mass transit and it is more convenient. Mass transit takes more time than driving. Planners simply do not recognize the value of getting a job done quickly, as in getting to you destination quickly so that you can accomplish something. Slower travel is a lowering of our standard of living. The time it takes to reach your job is an important determinate as to whether or not you can get that job. Faster travel allows a wider choice of jobs for a given travel time. A wider choice of jobs gives you a better chance of getting a better job. It also gives the employer a better field of candidates for a job, resulting in better job - people match ups. And that is better for everyone. Specialized industries (most high tech) absolutely require specialized employees, which are spread over a wide area. Fast transport over wide areas makes this practical. Fast transport over wide areas means cars on free flowing roads, not mass transit. To force people out of their cars is to strangle an area’s potential productivity.

Forcing people onto mass transit will result in lowered incomes, wasted and time and a lower standard of living.

Enough for now.

Thanks JK

Oy! Lots of interesting points JK, way more than I have time to deal with. My basic concern is that your points are all from the basis of the existing petrol economy. I agree that there is no magic solution, and, in fact, corporate greed has already begun to coopt the sustainability movement (i.e. corn-based ethanol). But certainly we big-brained bipeds can think our way out of this conundrum if we really wanted to.

btw JK, if you are paying $100/month for electricity, your power usage is part of the problem!

pfishman: btw JK, if you are paying $100/month for electricity, your power usage is part of the problem! JK: Telling other people how to live IS THE PROBLEM.

Why do you think you have the right to tell others how to live?

BTW, $100/mo is not too far off of the average electric bill, so you are making my other case that the warmers are going to force people to live with less and thus lower their standard of living.

Thanks JK

why would facts matter with such a compelling and emotional argument. If you want an interesting read check out

read http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/ice_ages.html