Not with a bang but a whimper

Written By: - Date published: 9:12 am, May 27th, 2012 - 128 comments
Categories: climate change, Media - Tags: ,

Bad news from Bonn:

Bonn climate talks end in discord and disappointment

Climate crisis is not caused by lack of options and solutions, but lack of political action, says Greenpeace spokeswoman

The latest round of international climate change talks finished on Friday in discord and disappointment, with some participants concerned that important progress made last year was being unpicked.

At the talks, countries were supposed to set out a workplan on negotiations that should result in a new global climate treaty, to be drafted by the end of 2015 and to come into force in 2020. But participants told the Guardian they were downbeat, disappointed and frustrated that the decision to work on a new treaty – reached after marathon late-running talks last December in Durban – was being questioned.

China and India, both rapidly growing economies with an increasing share of global emissions, have tried to delay talks on such a treaty. Instead of a workplan for the next three years to achieve the objective of a new pact, governments have only managed to draw up a partial agenda. “It’s incredibly frustrating to have achieved so little,” said one developed country participant. “We’re stepping backwards, not forwards.” …

The reasons why this is incredibly bad news are, of course, obvious to anyone except climate change deniers.

But what I find almost as depressing is the total absence of media coverage in NZ. Did you know the talks were on? 3 News had an AP piece a few days ago, but apart from that, there was pretty much nothing. Did you know the talks had failed? At time of writing I see zero NZ coverage. None. Nada. It’s only the most important story in the world. Instead The Herald is leading with a story about a rescued surfer, and Stuff with a piece on care for the elderly. Similar stuff on the TVNZ and 3 News sites. Re the subject of the post, I’d say Elliot had it right.

128 comments on “Not with a bang but a whimper ”

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  1. Jimmie 1
    27 May 2012 at 9:41 am

    I’m sorry to say it but climate change is yesterdays news. More people are figuring out that it was an agenda pushed by scientists whose end goal was chasing research $$$ in return for trying to stop ‘the end of the world’ scenarios.

    It’s time for well meaning folk like yourself to put climate change into the same little box that ozone holes & overpopulation scares have been put into.

    With most of the world trying to stop their economies contracting, the thoughts of trying to get countries to agree to whack their folk with more taxes in the name of the environment just was never gonna work.

    Give it a rest, go take a happy pill, coz the World aint coming to an end due to global warming…..there feel better all ready?

    • lprent 1.1
      27 May 2012 at 10:09 am

      I guess that we have an idiot who has never bothered to learn enough to understand any of the issues he just referred to in either science or economics. Hell, he is so stupid that he prefers to put his own spin on what people are worried about rather than actually reading what they say. That would involve him thinking – something that he is clearly not capable of.

      Queue up another whine about politeness from someone who cares more about his pathetic ego by making unsubstantiated assertions than actually offering up any argument. But I merely followed his lead of self-evidient assertions – but concentrated on the individual in front of me.

      I rather suspect that even the skeptics and maybe even a few deniers will (secretly) support my view on this dumbarse troll.

      Jimmie – a ‘person’ who is so self obsessed that he doesn’t even bother to stick his head in the sand like ostrich. Instead he sticks his head up his arse in case he sees anything he doesn’t like and where the smell is more familiar.

      • bbfloyd 1.1.1
        27 May 2012 at 11:00 am

        beautiful…

      • muzza 1.1.2
        27 May 2012 at 11:40 am

        Well given that those factions who partake in such events are completely controlled for the most part in any case (think politicians, scientists, green peace et al) , it really only means that the financial cartels are seriously not finished bankrupting/polluting/destroying the planet just yet, and need to make sure that India and China etc continue to “grow”.

        You see you have to create an environment where people are begging for the solutions you want them to accept, and we are not quite there yet, or we would have has consensus by now!

        There are presently much more pressing issues for the “decision makers” than this, like holding their financial system together, thats why its not being covered, because the media arms, are “told” not to!

        But the world will get its global climate treaty, but not until such time as the decision makers say so, it wont be what those who see it as a good thing will have expected though, thats my prediction.

        Its no harder picking this stuff, than it is picking which articles the MSM are going to run with, and which way the financial markets will move….unless you can’t get your head around the core problems, then of course its s total mystery to people!

        Most cant, which is why you get abuse as a reaction!

        • Oscar 1.1.2.1
          27 May 2012 at 2:31 pm

          I could comment at length on the rich irony of the failed talks, however I won’t. I will simply remain mute until the snows come again for Wellington and sit back and say ITYS.

          In reality, worrying about CO2 emissions is nothing compared to the weakening magnetosphere of this blue ball we call home.

          No magnetosphere + X-Class solar flare = Mass Extinction. So good bye to the wankers and climate change believers. Your CO2 emission reduction schemes won’t help you then.

          As for any pithy remarks to come from people who study Earth Science a hundred decades ago, science has moved on and there is now strong corroborating evidence that our magnetic fields flip rather quickly when they do, and precede ELEs.

      • Dan 1.1.3
        28 May 2012 at 11:59 am

        [Potty mouth, homophobia, we don’t need you here Dan. Take a month off. — r0b]

    • Dr Terry 1.2
      27 May 2012 at 11:47 am

      Such bald complacency spells out exactly why catastrophe threatens.

      • Dr Terry 1.2.1
        27 May 2012 at 11:51 am

        Reply above intended for Jimmie (and his like).

        • Reagan Cline 1.2.1.1
          27 May 2012 at 8:14 pm

          Jimmie’s lasr two paragraphs are true, aren’t they ?

          Climate change is a long term process and the outcomes are not certain enough to predict definite catastrophe.

          Most people have been earbashed enough by now to at leasy think about reducing use of internal combustion engines fuelled with fossil fuel and buying plastic.

          At least one Auckland primar school is awarding stickers for green behaviours, the green party vote is increasing, so NZers might eventually do more greeen stuff like walk, turn the light off, open the window a fraction and do without a dehumidifier, bring food home in a string bag etc etc etc

          So fucking boring !!!

          Most people will not change because thery have more important things to think about and doomsday is still way ou of sight.

          Think global act lccal. Small is beautiful.

  2. Richard Christie 2
    27 May 2012 at 9:50 am

    “More people are figuring out that it was an agenda pushed by scientists whose end goal was chasing research $$$ in return for trying to stop ‘the end of the world’ scenarios.”

    Tell us how it’s done Jimmie.

    Tell us how the the konspiracy mind meld actually manipulates every single scientific academy on the planet.
    Tell us how it intimidates several thousand scientists dispersed across the globe, and all their families into silence about the sekrit agenda. Who is in charge? Surely there must be a Dr Evil in charge, how exactly does he/she manage it?

    Please tell us.

    • Jimmie 2.1
      27 May 2012 at 10:40 am

      Lol. It’s not that hard to do (And I never said conspiracy did I?). It’s called the sheep or band wagon mentality.

      When one sheep runs through a gate to a new paddock of grass the rest of the flock see it and they all run through as well. (think grass = easy public research$$$)

      You don’t think the esteemed scientists around the world are incapable of such a phenomenon?

      Look at their recent history: We were told in the 1980’s that the world was going to starve to death and that the Ethiopian famine of the mid 80’s was but a fore runner as the world could not produce enough food to feed itself – turned out to be a load crap as with advances in agri-science turns out even with an ever increasing population food production can increase as well – quite comfortably.

      The next band wagon was the Ozone holes – they were going to increase in size until everyone on the planet got fried or cooked. So all the old fridges got banned, new refrigeration gases were developed.

      No one stopped to ask how fridges in major cities round the world would cause Ozone holes above the poles. No it was much easier to accept public $$$ to ‘research’ a non existent problem. Well guess what the old fridges are long gone, the ozone holes are still there neither increasing or decreasing to any great extent and the fringe of science has gone onto its new ‘baby’ AGW.

      Mark my words within 5 years ‘AGW’ would have run its course and something else will be the next environmental armageddon.

      • lprent 2.1.1
        27 May 2012 at 11:05 am

        So you are confirming that you never bothered to find out anything about the science of CFC’s and O3? Or read any of the materials on the observations on UV radiation?

        I guess your arse must be a comfortable womb surrogate.

        Incidentally, you do realize that the first conferences by politicians on climate change happened when Margret Thatcher attended one as britians PM. Idiots like yourself have been predicting its dissolution as a topic for discussion in 5 years ever since then.

      • Colonial Viper 2.1.2
        27 May 2012 at 11:08 am

        Mark my words within 5 years ‘AGW’ would have run its course and something else will be the next environmental armageddon.

        AGW will still be progressing and changing our climate in 5 years time.

        But I agree that it won’t be the most pressing issue then. Global energy depletion will be.

  3. Matthew Hooton 3
    27 May 2012 at 10:38 am

    Why are you linking to some nutter quoted in a 2009 Independent story talking about “mass extinction of almost all life … reduc[ing] humanity to a few struggling groups of embattled survivors clinging to life near the poles,” “billions of people find[ing] themselves in areas of the planet which are essentially uninhabitable,” “hundreds of millions … forced to move inland due to rapidly-rising seas” and so forth?

    What the IPCC says is that over 100 years, the worst case scenario is that temperatures might rise by 2.4 – 6.4 degress which could cause average sea level rises of 26 – 59 cm, which would cause some negative impacts but not the ones described above. The midpoint scenarios are much less than 6.4 cm and 59 cm. (See http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/syr/en/spms3.html )

    What happened to the scienfic consensus? You seem to be smearing people at one end of the scientific bell curve as “deniers” but then linking approvingly to someone else at the other end of the scientific bell curve who could equally be called a “denier” of the scientific consensus.

    • Colonial Viper 3.1
      27 May 2012 at 10:48 am

      The next band wagon was the Ozone holes – they were going to increase in size until everyone on the planet got fried or cooked. So all the old fridges got banned, new refrigeration gases were developed.

      The world acted, technology was put in place, old refrigerants banned and new chemicals and methods implemented.

      Things were done and change achieved.

      On the other side. You’re fighting against change and trying to make sure nothing is achieved.

      • Colonial Viper 3.1.1
        27 May 2012 at 11:10 am

        Whoops this was a reply to jimmie

      • Poission 3.1.2
        27 May 2012 at 12:22 pm

        The next band wagon was the Ozone holes

        The ozone anomalies are very real and have cumulative effects on environmental systems and cllimate,the open problem is what are the constraints on say SH weather systems by the implementation of the montreal protocol.

        There are two UN bodies the IPCC and the UNEP/WMO that produce reports,the latter (2011) suggests that

        Observations and model simulations show that the Antarctic ozone hole caused much of the observed southward shift of the Southern Hemisphere middle latitude jet in the troposphere during summer since 1980. The horizontal structure, seasonality, and amplitude of the observed trends in the Southern Hemisphere tropospheric jet are only reproducible in climate models forced with Antarctic ozone depletion. The southward shift in the tropospheric jet extends to the surface of the Earth and is linked dynamically to the ozone hole induced strengthening of the Southern Hemisphere stratospheric polar vortex.

        The southward shift of the Southern Hemisphere tropospheric jet due to the ozone hole has been linked to a range of observed climate trends over Southern Hemisphere mid and high latitudes during summer.

        Because of this shift, the ozone hole has contributed to robust summertime trends in surface winds, warming over the Antarctic Peninsula, and cooling over the high plateau. Other impacts of the ozone hole on surface climate have been investigated but have yet to be fully quantified. These include observed increases in sea ice area averaged around Antarctica; a southward shift of the Southern Hemisphere storm track and associated precipitation; warming of the subsurface Southern Ocean at depths up to several hundred meters; and decreases of carbon uptake over the Southern Ocean.

        As the reversal of the OH has the property of cancelling climatic conditions to some extent in the SH summertime we can say that the MP did work.

        • Oscar 3.1.2.1
          27 May 2012 at 2:34 pm

          Only issue with the Holes is that there is now doubt as to whether CFCs even caused said holes, or if the holes are a naturally occurring phenomenon. After all, it wasn’t until the 1970s that the holes were found to exist and science did as science does – made up a problem to fit the question.

    • lprent 3.2
      27 May 2012 at 10:55 am

      The IPCC takes the approach in the science sections that they use the most conservative confirmed knowledge from the time that a particular report is being assembled. It is what is required for advising governments. In the case of IPCC 4 that cutoff was at about 2003. So they left out vast ranges of material because they were hypotheses rather than having confirming data.

      The study of climate change is pretty new and rapidly evolving. It was a unconfirmed interesting idea 30 years ago when I was doing my earth sciences degree. That was about the time that the first geo observation satellites were picking up enough global data to confirm it as something to look at.

      It has been confirmed as being a probable global disaster since the early 90’s and still subject to a lot of upwards refinement as information is gained. The data is still incoming because we’re talking about a fast geological process – but that still takes decades to measure.

      IPCC 5 will almost certainly confirm that the IPCC 4 report’s worst case is better than the IPCC5’s best case. You just reiterated the median case from IPCC4’s decade old report. It is a meaningless appeal to authority where if you read the IPCC4 preface, they happily state that it is merely a snapshot from a decade ago..

      You are also looking a gross physical changes, which really aren’t the danger in the short term. The big danger is that even small changes in heat balances cause major shifts in weather patterns. Climate is after all, just a way for differences in energy to equalize. Ask any farmer what happens to food production when weather doesn’t follow patterns.

      Climate change is going to cause major disruptions in food production, storage, and distribution. It will happen as we start to hit peak population and as cheap fuels become a thing of the past. Even you can figure out probable consequences..

      • Matthew Hooton 3.2.1
        27 May 2012 at 11:26 am

        In fact, each IPCC report has forecast a LOWER maximum temperature and sea-level rise than the one before. For example, the third AR report in 2001 forecast a sea-level increase of up to 70cm. This was cut to 59cm in AR4 in 20-7. In 2014, I expect this will continue, with AR5 forecasting lower maximum rises than AR4 in 2007. We’ll know in two years. But whichever way the 59cm maximum moves, I still don’t see why the writer here links to a nutter making statements every bit outside the consensus as might be expected from, say, ExxonMobil.

        • Kotahi Tane Huna 3.2.1.1
          27 May 2012 at 11:59 am

          In fact, IPCC forecasts are being shown up as too conservative across a range of observations.

          • Matthew Hooton 3.2.1.1.1
            27 May 2012 at 4:40 pm

            What possible observations since the 2007 IPPC AR4 report could possibly have shown its forecasts to be too conservative? Since 2007, observed temperature has been broadly stable with no warming trend at all ( see http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata_v3/GLB.Ts+dSST.txt ) so it is diffcult to see that AR4, which projected warming, could be “too conservative”. You must be referring to observations other than temperature, but I am not sure that, say, sea levels have been observed to have risen faster than forecast by the IPCC in 2007.

            • Kotahi Tane Huna 3.2.1.1.1.1
              27 May 2012 at 7:42 pm

              Off the top of my head, minimum Arctic sea-ice extent, Greenland ice-sheet melt. It’s hardly surprising though, given the general “caution” that goes into preparing their reports.

              This article from Stefan Rahmstorf discusses issues with sea-level predictions.

              First, although the temperature scenarios of IPCC project a maximum warming of 6.4 ºC (Table SPM3), the upper limit of sea level rise has been computed for a warming of only 5.2 ºC – which reduced the estimate by about 15 cm. Second, the IPCC chose to compute sea level rise up to the year 2095 rather than 2100 – just to cut off another 5 cm. Worse, the IPCC report shows that over the past 40 years, sea level has in fact risen 50% more than predicted by its models – yet these same models are used uncorrected to predict the future! And finally, the future projections assume that the Antarctic ice sheet gains mass, thus lowering sea level, rather at odds with past ice sheet behaviour.**

              Some scientists within IPCC warned early that all this could lead to a credibility problem, but the IPCC decided to go ahead anyway.

              Nobody cared about this.

              I mention this because there is a lesson in it. IPCC would never have published an implausibly high 3 meter upper limit like this, but it did not hesitate with the implausibly low 59 cm. That is because within the IPCC culture, being “alarmist” is bad and being “conservative” (i.e. underestimating the potential severity of things) is good.

            • lprent 3.2.1.1.1.2
              28 May 2012 at 1:04 pm

              Since 2007, observed temperature has been broadly stable with no warming trend at all..

              Another idiot response culled from data cherry pickers.

              Climate has many short-term cyclic patterns. Apart from the yearly cycles, the strongest ones happen over about a decade. Trying to look at a measurement over 3-4 years (2008-2011) is completely meaningless for anyone who has even a modicum of science because you’re as likely to be looking at a downside of a cycle. So whenever anyone gives you some crap based on few years in any earth sciences you can generally expect that they are trying to con you.

              Clearly any idea of actual science or statistical validity is something that PR people lack. And it appears that you are a sucker for a good story as well.

              • Matthew Hooton …
                28 May 2012 at 1:15 pm

                I agree with you, so what could have changed since 2007 that could lead people to insist the IPCC recommendations of that year so dramatically understated the problem?

              • Richard Christie …
                28 May 2012 at 1:21 pm

                Another idiot response culled from data cherry pickers.

                and I’m concerned that such breathtaking scientific illiteracy is in all likelihood being whispered in the ears of elected representatives by spin doctors and political analysts.

        • lprent 3.2.1.2
          28 May 2012 at 12:56 pm

          For example, the third AR report in 2001 forecast a sea-level increase of up to 70cm. This was cut to 59cm in AR4 in 20-7. In 2014, I expect this will continue, with AR5 forecasting lower maximum rises than AR4 in 2007.

          Sea level rise is the least of the problems from climate change (did you read my pointed remarks about that?).

          And in any case I’m pretty sure that you’re incorrect. I can’t be bothered looking it up and linking because it is a myth I have seen several times before. There are several scenarios given (not just one as you’re implying) based on different possible ranges of data and theories. It is difficult to compare one to another as you’re doing because the premises change.

          What I think you are regurgitating (probably from that idiot meteorologist Watts) is what happens when people cherry-pick the predictions from one scenario and compare them with a quite different scenario in a different report.

          But even a shift downwards wouldn’t surprise me. Quite simply the amount of information available changes the models. AR4 deliberately left out much of the ice melting that was estimated in the previous report because it was considered to be have insufficient information on melt rates in Antarctica and Greenland. That research has been done now especially in the Antarctica peninsula and Greenland for current day, and in the West Antarticia icesheet from the geological past. It will be in AR5.

          But as I said – sealevel rise is a nice simplistic measure for idiots to cling to. Apart from people who own coastal properties it isn’t a major issue unless the cold currents around Antarctica shift. The real issue is weather pattern changes

      • Jackal 3.2.2
        27 May 2012 at 11:45 am

        There is scientific consensus on climate change, the only disagreement is to what extent it will develop. It’s also worth noting again that the current changes far outstrip previous predictions.

        It is well within the range of scientific predictions for there to be a global rise in sea levels of 1 metre by 2100, which would have a devastating effect on much of New Zealand. Despite this clear and present danger, National has recently dropped a proposal that would require councils to meet a national standard when planning for sea level rise of between 50 to 80 centimetres by the end of the century. They aren’t even preparing at all.

        It’s interesting that Hooten criticizes information from 2009 while linking to a report from 2007. Here is what the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reported (PDF) this year:

        It is very likely that mean sea level rise will contribute to upward trends in extreme coastal high water levels in the future. There is high confidence that locations currently experiencing adverse impacts such as coastal erosion and inundation will continue to do so in the future due to increasing sea levels, all other contributing factors being equal. The very likely contribution of mean sea level rise to increased extreme coastal high water levels, coupled with the likely increase in tropical cyclone maximum wind speed, is a specific issue for tropical small island states.

        There is high confidence that changes in heat waves, glacial retreat, and/or permafrost degradation will affect high mountain phenomena such as slope instabilities, movements of mass, and glacial lake outburst floods. There is also high confidence that changes in heavy precipitation will affect landslides in some regions.

        […]

        Extremes sometimes result from the interactions between two unrelated geophysical phenomena such as a moderate storm surge coinciding with an extreme spring tide, as in the most catastrophic UK storm surge flood of the past 500 years in 1607 (Horsburgh and Horritt, 2006). Climate change may alter both the frequency of extreme surges and cause gradual sea level rise, compounding such future extreme floods (see Sections 3.5.3 and 3.5.5).

        So it’s not just the increase in sea levels, it’s a combination effect that will cause problems. I guess such things are beyond the comprehension level of most climate change deniers though… I give you exhibit A.

        • Matthew Hooton 3.2.2.1
          27 May 2012 at 4:51 pm

          Jackal – you may be a bit out of date with your claim of 1m sea-level rises. That was the worst case in the first IPCC Assessment Report in 1990 (AR1) – see http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/far/wg_II/ipcc_far_wg_II_spm.pdf

          As you will see from that report, the scientific consensus at that time was for “a sea-level rise of about 0.3-0.5 m by 2050 and about 1 m by 2100” but since then the IPCC has cut this back in every subsequent Assessment Report with the last Assessment Report, published in 2007, forecasting a sea-level rise of 0.18-0.59m by 2100 (actually 2095 compared with 1980-1999).

          So, interestingly enough, since the Rio conference twenty years ago, the extent of sea-level change forecast by the IPCC has nearly halved.

          • Colonial Viper 3.2.2.1.1
            27 May 2012 at 4:55 pm

            Only two years ago, the UN’s Intergovermental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said in its Fourth Assessment Report, or AR4, that the worst-case prediction for global sea-level rise was 59cm by 2100. But the scientists in Copenhagen suggested that the 2007 report was a drastic underestimation of the problem, and that oceans were likely to rise twice as fast.

            http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/sea-levels-rising-twice-as-fast-as-predicted-1642087.html

          • Jackal 3.2.2.1.2
            27 May 2012 at 7:35 pm

            I hate to burst your bubble Matthew Hooton, being that you seem so certain of your claims, but the IPCC projections do not take into account uncertainties in climate-carbon cycle feedbacks nor do they include the full effects of changes in ice sheet flow melt.

            The IPCC has not projected an upper level, and the projections you’ve quoted do not take into account all the known factors involved. So unless you can show that anthropomorphic climate change is not causing increased ice flow melt (which you cannot) a 1 metre increase in sea levels is well within the current scientific projections.

            • Matthew Hooton 3.2.2.1.2.1
              27 May 2012 at 8:05 pm

              Well done for cutting and pasting from wikipedia, but I think I’ll treat the IPCC reports as more likely to be authoritative. And the overall trend in these over 20 years is an increase in certainty that AGW is happening, a narrowing of the range of projected impacts and a decrease in the upper limits.

              • Jackal …
                27 May 2012 at 8:37 pm

                Then you should really read what the IPCC states: “Model-based range excluding future rapid dynamical changes in ice flow.” Being that scientists have observed an acceleration in ice flow rate since 2007, how can you claim that you’re using the “extreme end of the IPCC’s worst case scenario” when they do not take into account all the known factors involved?

                You have not provided the “extreme end of the IPCC’s worst case scenario” Matthew Hooton because they do not provide one. You’ve provided a range that does not include all the factors involved. It should therefore not be waived around as gospel that there’s no reason to have concern about the effects of anthropomorphic climate change.

    • Richard Christie 3.3
      27 May 2012 at 11:03 am

      “What happened to the scienfic consensus? You seem to be smearing people at one end of the scientific bell curve as “deniers” but then linking approvingly to someone else at the other end of the scientific bell curve who could equally be called a “denier” of the scientific consensus.” – M Hooton

      Squirrel!

    • bbfloyd 3.4
      27 May 2012 at 11:05 am

      Do you never go outside without a suit on mattie? have you never felt the sun burning on your skin quite unlike it ever did when i was a child? Are you that tied to your idealogical antasies that you have become incapable of even noticing your immediate environment changing more each year?

      i pity the fools that can’t see the truth in front of them… i despise the jackal that refuses to acknowledge the same reality because it is inconvenient…..

    • r0b 3.5
      27 May 2012 at 11:11 am

      Matthew – there’s a graph you should consider – I can’t find it until I get home late tonight, but will try and post it then.

      Done – see new comment 19 below.

    • Barry 3.6
      27 May 2012 at 11:21 am

      Matthew,

      IPCC projections are not the worst case scenario, they are business as usual. The sea level rises exclude possible contribution from ice melt which was deliberately left out because there was too much uncertainty, but it will certainly not be negligible.

      Tell me that an average global temperature rise of 6.4 degrees wouldn’t be a catastrophe justifying extreme language.

      My own projection for this century is a temperature increase of 2 degrees and 50cm sea level rise, but there is no reason to expect a stop there even if emissions drop to zero. A similar rise in the next century will already be committed.

      In any case you would have to agree that a failure to agree on a treaty to do something about it is to condem our grandchildren to a planet very different from what we grew up in.

      • Colonial Viper 3.6.1
        27 May 2012 at 11:36 am

        My own projection for this century is a temperature increase of 2 degrees and 50cm sea level rise, but there is no reason to expect a stop there even if emissions drop to zero. A similar rise in the next century will already be committed.

        So even if we cut GHG emissions by a spectacular and unlikely 25% (made even more unlikely by continued massive population growth), what would that mean over the next 100 years? Why change our behaviour now, if the next 100 years of dramatic climate change is already committed too?

      • Matthew Hooton 3.6.2
        27 May 2012 at 11:42 am

        Barry, they are business as usual in the sense of forecasting what will happen in the absense of climate change policies, and the IPCC provides a range of scenarios. In AR4, these were:

        Temperature change (°C at 2090-2099 relative to 1980-1999)
        B1 scenario 1.1 – 2.9
        A1T scenario 1.4 – 3.8
        B2 scenario 1.4 – 3.8
        A1B scenario 1.7 – 4.4
        A2 scenario 2.0 – 5.4
        A1FI scenario 2.4 – 6.4

        Sea level rise (m at 2090-2099 relative to 1980-1999)
        B1 scenario 0.18 – 0.38
        A1T scenario 0.20 – 0.45
        B2 scenario 0.20 – 0.43
        A1B scenario 0.21 – 0.48
        A2 scenario 0.23 – 0.51
        A1FI scenario 0.26 – 0.59

        In my comments above, I have used the extreme end of the IPCC’s worst case scenario. So, the IPCC is saying that even in the event of no climate change policies the temperature and sea-level impact may be less than what I quoted.

        I don’t see that even if sea levels are 59cm higher in 2095 than in 1990 as a result of there not being a new climate change treaty that we would have “condemned our grandchildren to a planet very different from what we grew up in” – although I do expect that the world in 2095 to be very different from the world in 1990, in the sense of it being better in almost every respect for the overwhelming majority of people, just as 1990 was better for the overwhelming majority of people than 1885.

        • Richard Christie 3.6.2.1
          27 May 2012 at 12:08 pm

          Mathew Hooton, do you think time stops in 2095?

          Do you think that the processes that result in the outcomes of the conservative forecasts of AR4 suddenly switch off in 2095?

          • Colonial Viper 3.6.2.1.1
            27 May 2012 at 12:26 pm

            Forget about damning future generations. With 270,000 NZ children growing up in poverty and a youth unemployment rate hovering around 25%, we are damning the current young generation.

            It seems to me that caring about what comes after 2095 is a luxury few citizens can afford today.

          • Matthew Hooton 3.6.2.1.2
            27 May 2012 at 5:21 pm

            No, but I do think that there are so many variables involved that forecasts beyond a certain point become much less meaningful. For all we know, cold fusion will have been achieved by 2095 or new geo-engineering techniques developed. Who knows? People in 1912 had no idea of what 1995 would be like, and the rate of scientific and technological change 2012-2095 will be much greater than 1912-1995. So it becomes deeply hubristic to think that opinions we hold or policy positions we take in 2012 will have a greater influence on the world post-2095 than all the developments that will take place between now and then.

            And, stange as it may seem, I agree with Colonial Viper here. It is much more important to worry about the real issues of today, about which we have very good – almost perfect – data – compared with matters 100 years hence, about which we really can know very little.

            • Colonial Viper 3.6.2.1.2.1
              27 May 2012 at 5:25 pm

              Always good to bring up miraculous technology breakthroughs to provide us with unlimited carbon free, nuclear free, cheap, sustainable energy. Some time in the future.

              Bring on the cornucopian justifications for ever more Business As Usual.

              • Matthew Hooton …
                27 May 2012 at 5:32 pm

                You may call it cornucopian, but I just think that scientific and technological advances over the next 100 years are likely to be more significant than gramaphone to iPhone and Vickers monoplane to International Space Station and Hubble Telescope, and so forecasting the impact of human activity on the climate in, say, 2150, is a bit arrogant.
                Also, if you are right about peak oil, the imminent meltdown of capitalism etc, then all climate forecasts are wrong and too pessimistic, even on a much shorter timeframe than 100 years.

                • Jackal …
                  27 May 2012 at 8:55 pm

                  You’re presuming that mankind can reduce its reliance on polluting systems to such an extent that will allow developments before the effects of climate change really take hold and before cheap fuel that has driven most of the worlds advances runs out.

                  There is no way for you to know what future developments will be able to be undertaken, and therefore your reliance on this mystical technological saviour is highly foolish!

                  It’s naive and as backwards as John Key claiming that climate change is a hoax in November 2006… some 40 years after scientists first raised concerns about anthropomorphic climate change.

            • felix 3.6.2.1.2.2
              27 May 2012 at 6:58 pm

              “the rate of scientific and technological change 2012-2095 will be much greater than 1912-1995”

              Based on what?

              Maybe you should take cheap oil out of your equation and recalculate.

              • Colonial Viper …
                27 May 2012 at 7:04 pm

                well I think that there WILL be a great amount of technological change between now and 2050.

                Just not in the direction most people assume.

              • Matthew Hooton …
                27 May 2012 at 7:27 pm

                Based on the trend line of 200,000 years since the evolution of homo sapiens, and especially the last 600 or so years.
                Take “cheap oil” out of the equation, and I think the rate of scientific and technological change would increase given it would involve an obvious need to find a new sources of energy. That is already happening and will accelerate at the point of peak oil.

                • felix …
                  27 May 2012 at 7:44 pm

                  “given it would involve an obvious need to find a new sources of energy. That is already happening and will accelerate at the point of peak oil.”

                  Ah, the market will provide.

                  Nope, it’s not an abstraction. It’s a real resource, we’re really running out of it, and we need absolute fuckloads of it to build any sort of new energy infrastructure.

                  And while we’re not getting that fuckload of oil that we can’t afford to build the tech that we haven’t actually invented yet, we also need another fuckload of it to keep our existing tech going. Which we also can’t afford.

                  Market theory, meet physical reality.

                  • Colonial Viper …
                    27 May 2012 at 8:03 pm

                    Hooton hasn’t quite understood it eh. You can’t even make pig iron if you don’t have the energy to build and heat the furnace.

                    Imagine discovering a massive oil deposit on the moon. When you don’t have the money, energy and materials required to build the space vehicles and infrastructure needed to get there and back.

                    And even if you did, and a barrel of oil was worth so much that it was financially feasible to drill for it on the moon, you hit the minor physical barrier of using up more energy to recover each barrel of oil than the barrel of oil can provide you.

                    At that point it doesn’t matter if that barrel of oil is worth $100 or $100M. Its not worth recovering, physically.

                    That is already happening and will accelerate at the point of peak oil.

                    That was 6 years ago. What energy breakthroughs have happened since then?

                    In fact, what energy breakthroughs have happened in the last 20 years? Nuclear power was a breakthrough of the 1940’s and 1950’s. Solar cells were a breakthrough of the 1950’s and 1960’s.

                    Wind turbines use technologies established a century ago.

                    My bet: there’s no cold fusion, no tylium and no dilithium coming online in time to save our civilisation’s ass.

                    • Matthew Hooton …
                      27 May 2012 at 8:10 pm

                      In which case, we may as well party like there’s no tomorrow.

                    • felix …
                      27 May 2012 at 9:38 pm

                      No tomorrow? Not at all, Matt.

                      What we’re looking at is a very different tomorrow to which we’ll need to be skilled and flexible enough in our lifestyles to adapt. Many of us are part of the way there already btw.

                      It’s not actually helpful or useful to say there’s no point living in a world that doesn’t continue to meet your unrealistic expectations.

        • Barry 3.6.2.2
          27 May 2012 at 8:21 pm

          Mathew,

          A1F1 is BAU. All aother scenarios require some meaningful (i.e. considerably better than what we are achieving now) attempt at reducing emissions. The NZ government aspires to a reduction but our emissions continue to grow.

          You can argue about the language in a link from the post, but it doesn’t change the need to do something to cut emissions drastically.

          You say we should wait for the next IPCC report, or wait until the results of warming is clearer, but the longer we wait the harder it will be to keep the world in a state that we can recognise.

    • Johnm 3.7
      27 May 2012 at 12:31 pm

      Hi MH
      “Why are you linking to some nutter quoted in a 2009 Independent story talking about “mass extinction of almost all life … reduc[ing] humanity to a few struggling groups of embattled survivors clinging to life near the poles,” “billions of people find[ing] themselves in areas of the planet which are essentially uninhabitable,” “hundreds of millions … forced to move inland due to rapidly-rising seas” and so forth?”

      James Lovelock is not a nutter, he has infinitely more credibility on this subject than your superficial and arrogant assertions. Please view the following link to view his Scientific Credentials. What scientific credentials do you have ? NONE.

      Link: http://www.jameslovelock.org/page5.html

      • Matthew Hooton 3.7.1
        27 May 2012 at 12:48 pm

        The quotes aren’t by James Lovelock. I don’t have any scientific credentials. I’m just quoting the IPCC.

    • Johnm 3.8
      27 May 2012 at 4:43 pm

      Hi MH

      “World on course for catastrophic 6° rise, reveal scientists
      Fast-rising carbon emissions mean that worst-case predictions for climate change are coming true”

      The link you noted above is as follows:
      http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/climate-change/world-on-course-for-catastrophic-6deg-rise-reveal-scientists-1822396.html?action=Popup

      The scientists , not “some nutter’, said: ” This means that the most extreme scenario envisaged in the last report from the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, published in 2007, is now the one for which society is set, according to the 31 researchers from seven countries involved in the Global Carbon Project.”

      “the Global Carbon Project study, led by Professor Corinne Le Quéré, of the University of East Anglia and the British Antarctic Survey, which found that there has been a 29 per cent increase in global CO2 emissions from fossil fuel between 2000 and 2008, the last year for which figures are available.”

      “The study by Professor Le Quéré and her team, published in the journal Nature Geoscience, envisages a far higher figure. “We’re at the top end of the IPCC scenario,” she said.

      Professor Le Quéré said that Copenhagen was the last chance of coming to a global agreement that would curb carbon-dioxide emissions on a time-course that would hopefully stabilise temperature rises to within the danger threshold. “The Copenhagen conference next month is in my opinion the last chance to stabilise climate at C above pre-industrial levels in a smooth and organised way,” she said.”

      Bottom line these people aren’t Nutters!

      • Matthew Hooton 3.8.1
        27 May 2012 at 5:08 pm

        University of East Anglia. Tyndall Centre. Hadley Centre. If they aren’t nutters they are something worse.

        I think we should just wait for the IPCC AR5 in 2014 don’t you?

        • Colonial Viper 3.8.1.1
          27 May 2012 at 5:09 pm

          Wait…wait…wait…sounds like a Business As Usual strategy to run out the clock

          • Matthew Hooton 3.8.1.1.1
            27 May 2012 at 5:14 pm

            What I meant was that johnm seems to be convinced that these scientists are correct in forecasting that the IPCC’s most extreme scenario is the one that is coming true. In two years, the thousands of scientists we are told are involved in IPCC Assessment Reports will release their consensus view. In the meantime, rather than basing policy on johnm’s favoured 31 scientists (led by the University of East Anglia!) it would be better to base it on the existing consensus report, which is IPCC AR4.

        • Richard Christie 3.8.1.2
          27 May 2012 at 6:35 pm

          “University of East Anglia. Tyndall Centre. Hadley Centre. If they aren’t nutters they are something worse.” Mathew Hooton

          No, no no. You don’t drop that one and get to walk away.

          Explain.

          • Matthew Hooton 3.8.1.2.1
            27 May 2012 at 7:42 pm

            You don’t really need an explanation do you? Statements from those institutions, especially in late 2009 in the lead up to the Copenhagen conference should be treated with a very high degree of (am I allowed to use the word?) skepticism for reasons that are well documented. The IPCC reports are the generally accepted sources of consensus forecasts, not the politically motivated exaggerations of personnel at the UEA and its associated “centres”.

            • Kotahi Tane Huna 3.8.1.2.1.1
              27 May 2012 at 7:46 pm

              “Reasons that are well documented” link please – I am aware of some hysterical nonsense that’s been passed around, but perhaps you have something credible?

            • Draco T Bastard 3.8.1.2.1.2
              27 May 2012 at 7:57 pm

              You mean all the reasons that the RWNJs and deniers came up with that have subsequently been refuted?

              • Matthew Hooton …
                27 May 2012 at 8:27 pm

                No, the findings of the formal inquiries, including by the university. Much was made of the fact that these inquiries all found that the poor behaviour did not undermine the view that AGW is real, and that there was no actual malpractice, but that wasn’t the point. The inquiries did find a culture of scientists trying to exaggerate their findings when presenting it publicly, not being open to other ideas and not making their data available for peer review. So I prefer to rely on the IPCC reports.

                • Kotahi Tane Huna …
                  27 May 2012 at 8:29 pm

                  “The inquiries did find a culture of scientists trying to exaggerate their findings when presenting it publicly,”

                  I do not recall a single investigation that concluded anything of the sort. Link please.

                • Kotahi Tane Huna …
                  27 May 2012 at 8:57 pm

                  Matthew Hooten, there is nothing about peer-review failures or exaggeration in the Oxburgh report. Nothing in the House of Commons investigation. Either your memory is faulty, you have been duped, or you are fabricating.

                • Richard Christie …
                  27 May 2012 at 11:14 pm

                  “You don’t really need an explanation do you? Statements from those institutions, especially in late 2009 in the lead up to the Copenhagen conference should be treated with a very high degree of (am I allowed to use the word?) skepticism for reasons that are well documented. ….
                  The inquiries did find a culture of scientists trying to exaggerate their findings when presenting it publicly, not being open to other ideas and not making their data available for peer review.”- Mathew Hooton

                  Why am I not I surprised by your spin?

                  Climategate.

                  Eight separate inquiries found the science of the institutions sound and unchallenged by the email hack.. No evidence of fraud or scientific misconduct. Nor was the outcome of the peer review system found to be subverted by any actions of those concerned.

                  In essesnce, scientists were found only to have not been as forthcoming as they should have been in regard to OI requests which simply reveals lax internal systems and also that the scientists concerned has a very human reaction to a blitz of vexatious FOI requests for data. Sometimes numerous requests in a single day.

                  Your insinuation that the science produced by UEA and HadCRUT is unsound reveals how superficially you follow the issue.

    • Murray Olsen 3.9
      27 May 2012 at 6:29 pm

      The deniers are not even on the scientific Bell curve, whatever that is. The sad fact is that they are generally cranks or incompetent scientists from, at best, vaguely related areas. The other sad fact is that they are actually the ones who are getting the famous $$$$$ from spouting what the fossil fuel industry and the right wing want them to say. In fact, in Australia we even have Ian Plimer, a mining geologist and mining company director, who has published that the Sun is made of iron. These guys are cranks, not sceptics.

  4. Sam Hall 4
    27 May 2012 at 10:39 am

    Google rise in ocean salinity

  5. Jackal 5
    27 May 2012 at 10:43 am

    The cone of silence surrounding climate change seems impervious to even the most newsworthy stories. Apart from this article in the Herald last week, the MSM hasn’t bothered to keep people informed about what is only the biggest story in mankind’s history at all.

    The report emphasises the potential of climate change to wreak havoc on biodiversity. It notes that 55 per cent of humanity’s ecological footprint comes from the carbon footprint – an estimate of the amount of forest needed to sequester CO2 emissions from fossil fuels.

    It quotes Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) findings in 2007, which flagged an ecologically catastrophic cocktail of global warming – bringing more severe droughts, flooding, sea level rises and ocean acidification – mixed with land use changes, pollution and over-exploitation of resources. This “unprecedented combination” would bring conditions likely to wipe out many ecosystems this century.

    New research on ocean acidification, published in Science in March, warns that “the current rate of CO2 release stands out as capable of driving a combination and magnitude of ocean geochemical changes potentially unparalleled in at least the last 300 million years.”

    Now we’re back to the same old non-reporting to keep people ignorant. The sky might fall on the climate change deniers heads if we actually had to change our ways and reduce our greenhouse gas emissions… How terrible for their oily wallets that would be.

  6. Colonial Viper 6
    27 May 2012 at 11:27 am

    Economic decline and the debt-based constraints the world economy will be under for the foreseeable future will take care of greenhouse gas emissions more effectively than anything else.

    See this: China defaulting on contracted deliveries of imported coal because of the economic down turn.

    http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/05/21/china-coal-defaults-idUKL4E8GL1BS20120521

    • Kotahi Tane Huna 6.1
      27 May 2012 at 12:05 pm

      Perhaps, but we’ve already booked another forty years of warming even if Co2 levels stay where they are – and they aren’t – if you catch my drift.

      • Oscar 6.1.1
        27 May 2012 at 2:36 pm

        Forty years of cooling would be a more approximate estimation.

        • McFlock 6.1.1.1
          27 May 2012 at 2:46 pm

          “Forty years of cooling would be a more approximate estimation.”

          Stop using words that are bigger than you.
          It makes it difficult to identify just what flavour of stupidity you’re trying to sell.

          • Oscar 6.1.1.1.1
            27 May 2012 at 3:27 pm

            Hah, I’m the stupid one?

            Each of the last icy periods have been longer and colder than the one preceding, since the Holocene period began.

            The problem with the AGWers is you all live in lala land thinking that the Earth is only getting hotter. Not once does it seem to cross your minds that cooling is just as real, and will be worse for humanity as cold = death.

            All signs and indications are that we’re heading for another period of cooling. How many years before the Thames freezes again? 2 years? 3 years?

            Those estimates are far more appropriate than the warmistas falsehoods of sea level rises (when they’re actually dropping) and melting ice caps. Newsflash – Arctic sea ice extent for 2011 was greater than the previous 7 years and increasing.

            • Colonial Viper 6.1.1.1.1.1
              27 May 2012 at 3:33 pm

              The problem with the AGWers is you all live in lala land thinking that the Earth is only getting hotter.

              Climate CHANGE mate

            • Kotahi Tane Huna 6.1.1.1.1.2
              27 May 2012 at 3:42 pm

              Oscar, you with the cretinous drivel, yes, you’re the stupid one. Nothing you’ve written has any bearing in reality, and your arguments are shallow and futile.

              How delusional do you have to be to imagine that anyone is going to take you seriously? Are you so fucked in the head you think anyone will take your worthless word for it?

              Sad.

              • muzza …
                27 May 2012 at 5:26 pm

                Well you bothered to reply, which means you read his post, digested it. then made a conscious choice to throw some diss at his comments….

                Bit like I’ve made a choice to reply to yours, having read your standard level of abuse, and had a chuckle at the fact your online ego is still going strong!

            • prism 6.1.1.1.1.3
              27 May 2012 at 8:11 pm

              Oscar you get the golden ass. What does it matter whether it gets a lot colder or a lot hotter, it all acts to muck up our growing seasons and affect our health and the quality of our housing and….

              We are good at fouling things up for personal short-term gain when things are proceeding in a fairly normal way, ie the leaky building muck-up. Seasonal changes will stretch our irrational minds and unsustainable practices to the utmost. How will you cope yourself thinking, or not, as you do?

              • Oscar …
                28 May 2012 at 7:20 pm

                Yes, mankind is excellent at befouling the waters. Climate Change apparently now is analogous with it getting hotter. Not one of the drivel that you warmistas spout pays any attention to the fact that Earths natural state is ICE, tempered by short bursts of interglacials.

                The last 10,000 years have been a blip. Homo Sapiens was lucky to survive with around 20,000 people after that last glacial.

  7. marsman 7
    27 May 2012 at 1:27 pm

    Interesting, it seems to be that the people who stand to make or save money by pollution or pollution producing materials are the ones who try and pretend that their pollution is not harmful to our planet. Unfortunately these people also have the ear of mainstream media and they have lots of money to finance their hoodwinking by various devious means. It’s the usual case of bully quickly turning victim when challenged.

  8. burt 8
    27 May 2012 at 2:02 pm

    I use to like the good old days when the IPCC said that solar forcing was of no impact to climate and that the solar cycles were irrelevant to climate… back then we could all believe that the reason it was colder at night than during the day was because CO2 increased during the day rather than the warming effect was a result of the suns rays.

    • Kotahi Tane Huna 8.1
      27 May 2012 at 2:10 pm

      And despite the fact that they said it all that time ago, you still haven’t the first tiny clue what it means, and boy are you eager to demonstrate your ignorance.

    • Oscar 8.2
      27 May 2012 at 2:37 pm

      They still say that – most recent report states that “the sun has little to no effect on the Earth’s climate”

      Never mind that we’re currently on track for a Dalton type minimum with the lack of sunspots, and could even head into a Maunder Minimum.

      This at a time when cycle 24 is supposed to be ramping up, not down.

      • Kotahi Tane Huna 8.2.1
        27 May 2012 at 3:03 pm

        Sorry, but I get my information from peer-reviewed science, not morons.

        • Oscar 8.2.1.1
          28 May 2012 at 7:21 pm

          IPCC are morons then if they ignore the biggest driver of climate on Earth as being the sun

  9. Sukie Damson 9
    27 May 2012 at 2:53 pm

    How much of planet Earth is made of water? Very little, actually. Although oceans of water cover about 70 percent of Earth’s surface, these oceans are shallow compared to the Earth’s radius. This illustration shows what would happen if all of the water on or near the surface of the Earth were bunched up into a ball.

  10. Jimmie 10
    27 May 2012 at 4:09 pm

    As usual the AGW/CC believers resort to personal abuse when challenged on their beliefs.

    I really don’t get why its such a big deal to them? 30 years ago the concept didn’t exist.

    Then along came a bunch of guys in white coats & fancy computer projection programs and suddenly they all want to die in a ditch to defend what ever end of days projections the guys in white coats come out with.

    I mean are scientists omniscient? Do they have a crystal ball that can accurately predict the future?

    I mean if climatologists can’t accurately predict short term weather more than 1-2 days out (and even then half the time the forecasts change) then why the heck should we believe them when they forecast 50-100 years hence?

    Even if CO2 and other gases do contribute to any greenhouse gas effect how can science know what side effect/spin off effect will result from this? Also why would this be seen as something negative?

    They have never lived through a period of such warming so at best their estimates are guesses.

    (News flash: Just because you get a computer to do it still means its a guess)

    Now you could ask, what is the big deal? Who cares if a bunch of nutty green/nerds want to preach the end of the world as we know it?

    The big deal is they want to use this armageddon scenario to justify introducing significant new taxes to hammer industrialised countries. That is a big deal – just a pity for the believers that the biggest emitting countries don’t want a bar of it, and those that may have (think Europe) now have more pressing issues to deal with.

    Oh dear, how sad, never mind……….

    [This post is about the politics around the response to AGW climate change. It is NOT a forum to debate the existence and reality of the phenomenon. If you want to do that, take your data and arguments to a science forum and convince some real climate scientists of the truth of your argument. In other words you are thread-jacking…. this is your only warning. RL]

    • Draco T Bastard 10.1
      27 May 2012 at 5:04 pm

      You didn’t challenge any beliefs nor did you challenge the science. You made some assertions that have already been proven untrue.

    • Kotahi Tane Huna 10.2
      27 May 2012 at 5:22 pm

      “Even if CO2 and other gases do contribute to any greenhouse gas effect…”

      Listen to yourself. CO2 is a dipolar molecule. How could it not contribute to warming? This is well understood, but apparently not by you.

      Joe90 has already pointed out your ignorance regarding the provenance of climatology.

      So, in the above drivel, you make two factual assertions and both of them are shot down immediately. I expect you’ve got some more piss-weak nonsense to follow up with.

    • Blue 10.3
      27 May 2012 at 5:29 pm

      Like most climate change deniers, you’ve only proven that you don’t WANT climate change to be real.

      Because that would threaten what you have built your life upon – the modern industrialised society where you can pollute all you like at no cost and you can tell yourself it doesn’t affect anything.

      So you and Matthew Hooten sit and look for reasons why it’s all a big conspiracy, and it couldn’t possibly be real in order to avoid having to deal with this threat to your belief system.

      Somehow I don’t think Matthew would throw out his belief in economics despite every Treasury forecast in recent memory being completely wrong. But if science doesn’t predict the exact temperature change or sea level rise then it’s all a hoax, right?

      • Matthew Hooton 10.3.1
        27 May 2012 at 5:43 pm

        Blue, in all my comments on this thread, I have assumed the scientific forecasts, as reported by the IPCC, are correct, so I don’t get your point. Just like economic forecasts, the IPCC’s climate forecasts will, of course, change over time and end up being not quite right. This has been happening. Over the last 20 years, the consensus scientific forecasts for temperature and sea-level rises as a result of AGW, as reported by the IPCC, have narrowed and the worst-case scenario has fallen. I’m not alleging any conspiracy – just reading the reports.

    • Anne 10.4
      27 May 2012 at 8:01 pm

      30 years ago the concept didn’t exist.

      You lie, you lie, you lie Jimmie!

      Forty years ago global warming was both recognised and widely discussed among meteorologists – and related professions – both here in NZ and elsewhere in the world. How do I know? Because I was a part of the sector for 25 years. You CC deniers are full of bullshit, lies and/or are blinded by ideological crap. It’s time the MSM stopped giving the corrupt pseudo-scientists who wilfully muddy the waters any publicity whatsoever.

      Btw Anthony: the reason (as I’m sure you are well aware) the popular media don’t cover it is because it requires thought and careful analysis and that is far too much to expect in this era of shallow, sensational type of tabloid journalism.

      • Murray Olsen 10.4.1
        27 May 2012 at 8:37 pm

        All the main deniers lie. They just make stuff up, like Monckton. They’re well funded and they communicate in sound bites, which is what the media love. Scientists in general are not as good as communicating with the public because they deal with complex issues and do not want to simplify things beyond any sensible recognition. Explaining things in depth makes for boring news or television whereas claiming that scientists are part of a well funded conspiracy appeals to those who wouldn’t know a hyperbolic tangent if it jumped up and bit them and are suspicious of those who do. In this sense, one of our main problems is a public without the critical faculties to evaluate the evidence and larger class sizes and charter schools will only make this worse. As they’re designed to do.

        • Anne 10.4.1.1
          27 May 2012 at 9:09 pm

          Thank-you Murray Olsen. You have articulated the situation so well. The truth is, these deniers are not capable of understanding or even admitting the truth and they feel personally threatened.
          Indeed it comes across to me as a form of ostrich-like, primeval heads in the sand. If we can’t or won’t see it, then it isn’t there.

  11. joe90 11
    27 May 2012 at 4:26 pm

    I really don’t get why its such a big deal to them? 30 years ago the concept didn’t exist.

    Svante Arrhenius 1896: On the Influence of Carbonic Acid in the Air upon the Temperature of the Ground

  12. terryg 12
    27 May 2012 at 5:20 pm

    deniers might want to watch Earth: The Operators Manual.

    Then try and explain the relative ratios of C12, C13 and C14 isotopes.

    C12 is very common in plants
    C13 is more common in volcanic gases
    C14 is radioactive, with a half-life of 5370 years, and is mainly produced in the upper atmosphere
    (this half-life is why radiocarbon dating only works for objects > 50,000 years old).

    measurements show C12 is going up, but C13 is not and nor is C14. This means that the Carbon is not coming from volcanoes, it is coming from plants that have beenn dead for a very, very long time.

    Gee, I wonder what that might be?

    • terryg 12.1
      27 May 2012 at 5:25 pm

      weird. ate half my comment. I wonder if it was my use of >> characters? guess this’ll show me

      nope. clearly I cant drive a keyboard. clearly the proximity of so much stupid has negatively affected my typing skills. I suspect an hour of Monckton would render me incapable of speech…..

    • terryg 12.2
      27 May 2012 at 6:53 pm

      oops

      (this half-life is why radiocarbon dating only works for objects less than 50,000 years old).

    • Murray Olsen 12.3
      27 May 2012 at 8:41 pm

      C12 pretends to believe in AGW and therefore gets more of the lucrative research monies and can have bigger families? I’ve tried to give as ridiculous an answer as possible, but I’m sure the deniers can come up with worse.

      • terryg 12.3.1
        28 May 2012 at 9:51 am

        heh. two words: Ancient Aliens

        AGW deniers are approaching Erich Von Daniken levels of willful ignorance. and thats REALLY saying something.

  13. Kotahi Tane Huna 13
    27 May 2012 at 5:44 pm

    Discussion on Real Climate of the idea of using video to better present scientific info. They are looking for feedback.

  14. Afewknowthetruth 14
    27 May 2012 at 9:48 pm

    May 15, 2012

    In April 2012, the average temperature of Earth’s Northern Hemisphere was the warmest of any April in the past 133 years.

    Globally, April 2012 marks the fifth warmest April since temperature records began in 1880. It was the 326th straight month with a global temperature above the average for the 20th century.

    http://co2now.org/

  15. Carol 15
    27 May 2012 at 9:49 pm

    It’s so good to see some right wingers so strongly articulating their ideal of “responsibility”.

  16. Afewknowthetruth 16
    27 May 2012 at 9:54 pm

    Weekly Data | Atmospheric CO2

    Atmospheric CO2 – Weekly Data
    Mauna Loa Observatory | NOAA-ESRL Data

    Week Atmospheric CO2

    May 13 – 19, 2012 397.04 ppm (last week)

    May 13 – 19, 2011 394.55 ppm (1 year ago)

    May 13 – 19, 2002 375.33 ppm (10 years ago)

    (Historical norm 280ppm.)

    • Oscar 16.1
      28 May 2012 at 7:23 pm

      If thats the historical norm, then there can’t have been much plant life. 90% of plants require there being over 300ppm of CO2.

  17. OneTrack 17
    27 May 2012 at 10:16 pm

    Actual temperatures haven’t aligned with the “models” for the last fourteen years at least. If I was a scientist I might be looking at reconfiguring those models with the lack of accuracy they seem to have (call me old-fashioned that way). But that might reduce the “research” budget if catastrophic outcomes weren’t being predicted.

    • Colonial Viper 17.1
      28 May 2012 at 12:56 am

      The real money is with the polluters being able to continue Business As Usual pollution. Can’t have that changing.

  18. OneTrack 18
    27 May 2012 at 10:27 pm

    And the other reason why these summits are falling over is because it has become clear they have turned into wealth redistribution mechanisms, from “rich” countries to “poor” countries which won’t actually do anything to help the climate anyway.

    So, why should a poor person in NZ pay the ongoing costs of our ETS when it won’t make any difference except make them pay more for their petrol and/or transport and heating, etc.

    • Draco T Bastard 18.1
      28 May 2012 at 12:35 am

      So, why should a poor person in NZ pay the ongoing costs of our ETS when it won’t make any difference except make them pay more for their petrol and/or transport and heating, etc

      Translation: Why should we pay the full costs of the stuff we use when we can put it on others.

  19. r0b 19
    27 May 2012 at 10:30 pm

    This is mainly for Matthew Hooton, who has been engaging constructively in this thread (for a change!). Matthew, the reason I linked in the OP to some of the more extreme predictions is because that is what is happening. All the evidence suggests that we are on course to exceed the IPCC’s scenarios.

    Global warming seen worse than predicted

    CLIMATE CHANGING FASTER THAN EXPECTED

    Climate Change Likely To Be More Devastating Than Experts Predicted, Warns Top IPCC Scientist

    Arctic Ice Thinning 4 Times Faster Than Predicted by IPCC Models, Semi-Stunning M.I.T. Study Finds

    Oceans rising much faster than IPCC predicted

    Here’s another summary of what we have in store:
    An Illustrated Guide to the Science of Global Warming Impacts: How We Know Inaction Is the Gravest Threat Humanity Faces

    And here’s the graph I mentioned earlier in the day, ponder the implications:
    ‘Hug The Monster’: Why So Many Climate Scientists Have Stopped Downplaying the Climate Threat

    • Puddleglum 19.1
      29 May 2012 at 10:37 pm

      Thanks for those links r0b.

      The last one doesn’t surprise me at all. I’ve long thought that the likely effect of being an official body (the IPCC, I mean) would be to err on the side of ‘conservatism’. That’s the usual effect from creating official bodies.

      For a whole range of psychological, social, institutional and political reasons, underplaying an unpalatable truth is far more likely than overplaying it. An individual scientist may take a chance on being hyperbolic to kick-start their career but, en masse, the institutionalised social forces ensure that the tendency will be overwhelmingly in the other direction. 

      Also, the ‘don’t scare the horses’ sense of responsibility (or paternalism) that many professionals have when ‘communicating’ with the public is common. Scientists seem to be wary of panicking what they often appear to see as the “bewildered herd” – to use one of Chomsky’s expressions.

      Closer to home, I had a sense that some of our geologists saw their role as primarily one of ‘calming fears’ over the recent earthquakes – acting ‘responsibly’ by not speaking frankly – rather than straightforwardly communicating what was and was not known.

      • r0b 19.1.1
        29 May 2012 at 11:00 pm

        Thanks for those links r0b.

        No problem Puddleglum, though not exactly cheerful reading. And the quakes, yes, “authorities” always want to “prevent panic”.

  20. MrSmith 20
    29 May 2012 at 4:52 pm

    So lets see what cards from the Denialists deck, Mr Hooton and others have been playing.  
     
    Denialists’ Deck of Cards: Nit Pick, and Muddy the Waters
     
    With nit picking, the denialist finds one problem with a fact asserted or the proposal for reform, and then harps on the problem incessantly.
     
    Denialists’ Deck of Cards: The 5 of Spades, “Delay Tactics”
     
    lets wait and see

    Denialists’ Deck of Cards: The 2 of Clubs, “No Problem”

    “No problem” is the chorus of a denalist argument.  The skilled denalist, even after engaging in a debate for an extended period of time, will never concede that a problem exists.

    Denialists’ Deck of Cards: The 3 of Hearts, “No Harm”

    Okay, my industry lobbyists in training. You’ve said “no problem” over and over. You’ve dismissed problems as attributable to bad apples, or diminished the problem as a “mere inconvenience.” But people still seem to think that the problem that doesn’t exist still exists. You’re getting more and more press calls on the non-existent problem. What next?

    No harm. The problem that doesn’t exist doesn’t cause harm, so there’s no problem.

     
  22. Steve Wrathall 22
    30 May 2012 at 12:07 pm

    “At least one Auckland primar school is awarding stickers for green behaviours,”…
    Pity yours didn’t award them for spelling.

    ” the green party vote is increasing…”
    Unsurprising the way deep green catastrophism saturates the state education monopoly.