Harvard is taking it seriously
Someone should tell The Dominion Post that climate change denial is SO last century. Their editorial on the demise of the carbon tax today shows a stunning level of ostrich syndrome. They write:
The whole affair is yet another example of the muddle-headed hysteria surrounding the discovery that the Earth appears to be going through a warming phase.
The planet has been cooling and warming for millions of years and homo sapiens has been successfully adapting to the changes for hundreds of thousands of those years.
At this stage it is far from clear the world is facing a crisis. In fact, from a purely selfish point of view, a few extra degrees would do wonders for Wellington summers.
But even if a crisis is looming, New Zealand, responsible for 0.22 per cent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, can do little about it.
and then later:
The long-term solution to global warming, if one is needed, lies in human ingenuity.
Expecting rich or poor countries to voluntarily curb activities that provide jobs for their citizens is a recipe for certain failure.
On that last point - Kyoto is about creating economic incentives to spur on human ingenuity.
But on the earlier out-and-out dismissal of the whole issue as “muddle-headed hysteria”, their editorial writer may like to try this on for size.
Climate Change Futures: Health, Ecological and Economic Dimensions is a recent report written by The Center for Health and the Global Environment at the Harvard Medical School, supported by Swiss Re, the world’s largest re-insurer, and the UN Development Programme.
That’s an unusual combo to say the least, but not one given to “hysteria” I would have thought. The Right like to dismiss the UN, but I would hope they would sit up and listen to Harvard and the world’s largest re-insurer.
And guess what? There is no question in their minds that climate change is happening and is caused by human actions. From the preamble (PDF, go to page 5):
While no one event is diagnostic of climate change, the relentless pace of unusually severe weather since 2001 - prolonged droughts, heat waves of extraordinary intensity, violent windstorms and more frequent “100 year” floods - is descriptive of a changing climate.
The reasons for the changed weather patterns are well understood. Five years ago, Levitus and colleagues at the US Department of Commerce’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reported that the world’s oceans had warmed to a depth of two miles in five decades. This year Barnett and colleagues at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography reported that the oceans had absorbed 84% of the globe’s warming and that the warming pattern is unmistakably attributable to human activities.
And then from the Recommendations, under Financial Incentives (PDF, go to page 110):
Negative incentive options: Carbon taxes that discourage fossil fuels and generate funds
Sigh, oh, well, never mind…
December 22nd, 2005 at 12:49 pm
“homo sapiens has been successfully adapting to the changes for hundreds of thousands of those years…”
Yes, like tribes having to trek thousands of kilometres to find new places to live in the case of tracts of land becoming flooded or made into deserts.
“Expecting rich or poor countries to voluntarily curb activities that provide jobs for their citizens is a recipe for certain failure.” Perhaps, if those citizens rely on the disinformation they get from most of the media.
December 22nd, 2005 at 2:11 pm
This piece by the Dominion Post is almost criminally negligent in its interpretation of the current scientific standing of human-induced global warming. They are disagreeing with the majority of scientists on planet Earth. Lets choose between the Dominion Post on the one hand and Harvard, the National Academy of Sciences USA, the Royal Society of London, et cetera et cetera on the other. I know which side I would believe…
December 22nd, 2005 at 3:37 pm
I think both sides of this argument are only scratching the surface of the issue.
Yes, we are definitely in a natural period of warming, after all we are coming out of a little ice age. We have compelling (but not conclusive) evidence that our behaviour is also having an effect on the Climate. After all, we have deforested most of the planet and are rapidly depleting the oceans.
Yes, “impact sceptics” do have a point, but they may as well be defeatism apologists for all that their position adds to the argument. Just ask someone in Siberia or Prague whether they think another few degrees would interfere with their life.
Personally I think this argument could be effectively sidestepped by expanding the scope of Kyoto to cover all emissions that are considered to be noxious. It may take decades or centuries before we have enough information to really know how the world’s CO2 equilibrium works. Then, if it turns out to be a red herring - its component can be simply dropped from the accord, and we are left with a workable global anti-pollution treaty.
December 22nd, 2005 at 5:04 pm
I’ve just come back from a month in Europe. When I arrived in London, the first ad in Heathrow was BP, touting carbon savings as the future of their operation (http://www.bp.com/sectiongenericarticle.do?categoryId=9005519&content Id=7010759). The political debate in Europe has moved on to such an extent that even oil giants are marketing themselves as carbon friendly (irony intended). Returning to NZ is like stepping onto another (political) planet. The Dom writers and the rest of the NZ right need to get out a bit more.
The current warming is definitely not “natural”, and the evidence of humanity’s fingerprints all over it is pretty damn compelling - at least it is if you prefer to believe the real scientists rather than the contrarians - or the Dominion Post.
December 22nd, 2005 at 8:40 pm
The editorial manages to successfully illustrate one of the big problems in the (anthropogenic) climate change debate, and one of the main reasons that people who have a slightly better idea of what they are talking about no longer use the term ‘global warming’.
‘Global warming’ does not mean that everywhere notches up by 1.7/3.2/whatever degrees, but rather that more energy (’heat’) is retained in the climate system.
One of the ways that this can manifest is in higher sensible temperatures, but another, and just as relevant is latent heat, f’rinstance the energy required to change water from a liquid to vapour. Ever notice the difference in temperature between a 30 degree day with 50% humidity and a 30 degree day with 90% humidity? Trick question (ha ha) but while the temperature is the same, there is more energy in the local system on a higher humidity day.
From what I understand (and I’m a couple of years behind now but this is still relevant…) is that the measured change in _average_ temperatures over the last 100 years or so is not attributed to higher daytime temp’s, but to higher _nighttime_ temp’s. This is pretty well correlated with an increase in nocturnal cloud cover, and hence insulation.
Wellington may very well notch up a couple of degrees, but you’ll probably be asleep. Then again, it may just rain more often…
Another point is that global warming is a very, very general term; and earth 5 degrees (say) warmer is not an across the board up a few notches but again, an average. 3 degrees warmer here, 15 over here and (say) 7 degrees colder there. (to my mind) People who think that things would be better if we had a few extra degrees are either very sparsely informed, or lead such airconditioned lives that they’ve lost a realistic idea of the world that they live in, always thinking of how it could fit to their idea of ‘better’ rather than enjoying what they’ve got… They also show an appalling lack of regard for those for whom a rise of (eg.) 3 degrees/ 3 metres is not a good thing at all. I’m alright jack; good luck with your problems!
Yup; humans and their ancestors (and the rest of the biosphere) have been surviving climate change for somewhere in the region of 4 billion years. The point is that some of it has been gradual, but the most significant bits have been catastrophically sudden; the biodiversity that we see today reflects both of these elements. So far, anthropogenic (ie. the discernable human induced component) has been gradual, but there is compelling evidence that the (known, often very recently…) feedback loops that have dampened the impact of our carbon emissions can only be stretched so far (feelin’ lucky, punk?). Personally, I’m happy with a background rate (including variation thereon) of climate change; I’m not that cool however with (for example) massive releases of methane hydrates if sea floor temperatures and ocean circulation change more suddenly than they usually do.
Oddly enoughly, the nastiest scenarios for likely climate change are those that that assume a BAU (business as usual) set of assumptions. The models that predict in the range of 2-5% average global warming assume quite a lot of effort will be put into reducing carbon (and other greenhouse gas) emissions, which by the current looks of things is rather optimistic.
The biggest problem here is people believing what they want to believe rather than educating themselves and taking part in informed debate. Why do the sorts of people who regard Greens as Chicken Little scare bunnies scream so hard that the sky is gonna fall on our heads if we so much as step onto some sort of changing our ways paper road?
Surely if economic models are dependant on unsustainable behaviours (that in the end are going to bite you, or more likely your grandchildren _real_ hard on the arse), then you obviously need to apply a tiny bit of imagination to making your economic models fit the real world a little bit better.
You need to have your head stuck _very_ firmly in ummmmm……. the ground to miss that point.
December 22nd, 2005 at 11:46 pm
You guys know that the Dom Post accept letters online, right? If you want to let them know what you think, look for their section of the stuff.co.nz website.
December 29th, 2005 at 10:22 pm
There is no denying that the world is getting warmer than it was 100, 200 and 300 years ago.
There is also no denying that we are not as warm as we were 1000 years ago (the Mini Warm Period)
Yes, 1000 years ago when the permafrost in Greenland didn’t exist and the Vikings discovered this big hunk of land that Columbus accidently stumbled across 500 years later.
Climate Change happens, and yes, human activity impacts on it. But whether we are having a catastophic effect or not is open to debate. Scienctists are split on this.
P.S. Prague is fine, it has been flooded so many times that a medievil king raised the city by 3 metres - and it only stopped the floods for 100 years.
December 30th, 2005 at 4:42 am
The Siberian permafrost certainly didn’t unfreeze 1000 years ago, Michael. I suspect you’re a bit behind the game. The feedback loops are kicking in big time.
January 1st, 2006 at 10:05 am
Michael - The CO2 levels we are seeing now have not been seen in 650 million years. Now providing that you understand that the planet has been around that long, you might want to count the Ice Ages and Interglacials and work out how we’ve done something quite unique in releasing half the carbon sequestered in those dead dinosaurs so many millions of years ago.
This interglacial should be ending, but it is not. That would be a relatively good thing for us if we’d just quit while being ahead, like about 15 years ago… but no, we’ve got to go and push the envelope. Have you noticed the rise in the OCEAN temperatures.
We (as a SPECIES) are in trouble ace, and doing something about it is more necessary than ever.
respectfully
BJ
January 1st, 2006 at 12:14 pm
I agree with Michael,……. 1 + 1 = 3.
Saw it on the television, papers, internet sights, heard it on the radio.
Besides, the planet came out of an exploding star or at least the galaxy was formed from a big bang, all nuclear explosions of some sort, so i think you can therefore quite reasonably argue that global nuclear warming from atom bombs also is a natural weather cycle. When you see things in this light, you begin to see that a lot of these issues are just part of the natural cycle of life, so don’t worry, be happy!
January 1st, 2006 at 6:04 pm
Even - Only for large values of one
I think you are having me on, but I am not QUITE sure
The fatalistic viewpoint isn’t commonly accepted by people like me, technocrats, engineers, scientists… we have our big brains in order to be able to adapt faster than normal evolution and modify our environment to suit us, rather than waiting for it to modify us. In other words, I see working for species survival as a duty/responsibility under evolutionary law… for animals the effort is instinctive but short sighted. The future doesn’t really exist as a concept for most or all aniimals, and that is one of the things IMHO which separates us from the other animals.
It’s a contest whether we wish it or no, and giving up doesn’t just hurt the individual, it hurts everyone.
respectfully
BJ