The results are in and Climate Realist Steve Koonin has trounced Alarmist Andrew Dessler in this debate. Alarmists are rarely ever willing to debate Climate Realists so this was a huge and significant victory.
Texas A&M University’s Andrew Dessler vs. Steven Koonin, former undersecretary for science at the Department of Energy, at the Soho Forum.
Does the world need to rapidly convert to using renewable energy to save the planet from global warming? That was the topic of a Soho Forum debate held at the Sheen Center in New York City on Monday, August 15, 2022.
Andrew Dessler, the director of the Texas Center for Climate Studies at Texas A&M University, argued that fossil fuels are endangering life on the planet by causing global warming through greenhouse gas emissions. He contended that solar and wind represent safe, reliable, and cost-effective means to decarbonize the electric grid.
Steven Koonin, who served as undersecretary for science at the Department of Energy during the Obama administration and is the founding director of New York University’s Center for Urban Science and Progress, argued that making large and rapid reductions in greenhouse gas emissions aren’t necessary to protect the earth. He also contended that doing so isn’t cost-effective and that it’s immoral. Koonin is also the author of Unsettled: What Climate Science Tells Us, What It Doesn’t, and Why It Matters.
The debate was moderated by Soho Forum Director Gene Epstein.
Intro edited by Regan Taylor; interview body edited by Brett Raney.
Photos by Brett Raney.
Steven Koonin ran rings around Dessler, who only had assertion compared to Koonin’s facts. I just wish our politicians would debate folk like Koonin, with an audience present, to demonstrate to them how naive and false their belief in ‘climate change’ is and such policies as net zero are.
And suddenly the science was no longer settled
Would someone who has the patience to listen to the whole debate please tell me if there is much discussion about the mild, harmless global warming since 1975? And about the contrast between actual mild, harmless global warming since 1975, contrary to predictions of rapid, dangerous warming since 1975? CAGW is about predictions, not reality, so the low quality of past CAGW predictions is VERY IMPORTANT. The “authorities” have 50+ years of wrong predictions, yet we are still attacked by the Climate Howlers with their appeal to authority logical fallacy and MORE predictions of climate doom!
I continue to object to the wording of the debate subject:
“Does the world need to rapidly convert to using renewable energy to save the planet from global warming?”
I think there were too many issues for one debate:
(1) Does the planet need saving from global warming? is enough for one debate.
The next debate could be on the subject of converting to renewable energy, or Nut Zero, which might need two different people debating. That Nut Zero debate would be further complicated by the word “rapidly”. Converting, and converting rapidly, might be determined only after deciding how fast the planet needs to be saved. And the planet does need to be saved — that is a fact — saved from the Climate Howlers’ bizarre junk science religion and their Nut Zero panic reaction to a non-existant global warming emergency. Spend a huge amount of money to ruin the electric grid — who does that?
I decided to listen right away this time since the last time the video disappeared quickly, I lasted five minutes listening to Dessler’s scaremongering. He talked about 300 feet of sea level rise since (since peak glaciation ice about 20,000 years ago) when the consensus estimate is 400 feet. That’s a pretty big error. He talked about +6 degrees (I assume C. degrees) global warming in the future, which is a delusion.
That was enough suffering for me. The thought that Dessler had a lot more time to bloviate made me nauseous. At my age — 69 — I have a very low tolerance for predictions of climate doom and other environmental BS. Anyone who listens to Dessler’s scaremongering deserves hazardous duty pay. I wouldn’t mind a transcript of ONLY Koonin’s words! I could not have survived the actual debate — I’d have walk out — like watching a bad movie — you paid for the ticket, but why suffer for two hours? Sorry for the long comment — I’m not a concise person!
“Spend a huge amount of money to ruin the electric grid — who does that?”
Our current batch of clueless politicians.
I think it’s all getting ready to come to a head, though. The reckoning is coming. Soon the public’s eyes will be opened to the folly their politicians are trying to implement. It’s going to come crashing down around their feet.
Just about to hit the reality wall.
It’d be helpful for the USA understanding if the EU / Canada crashed and burned first. Although, since most younger USA citizens can’t seem to name the countries of North America, maybe it still wouldn’t make any difference.
In what State is Utah?
Been hearing this for a couple of decades now. It only gets worse.
Sadly true.
“Would someone who has the patience to listen to the whole debate please tell me…”
I personally don’t have that much patience, but I made the effort, Richard. Dessler is painful to listen to. I suffered it, I think you should too.
Why should I suffer?
I gave Dessler 5 minutes more.
Got sick again
Can’t tolerate a BS artiste.
Richard Greene: “Why should I suffer?”
Because you want to comment on the content.
Watch it all – Koonin’s summation applies well to you.
“That was enough suffering for me. The thought that Dessler had a lot more time to bloviate made me nauseous. At my age — 69 — I have a very low tolerance for predictions of climate doom and other environmental BS”
Not just nauseous, but it’s irritatingly grating to listen to clueless idiots lie as
much as they do. The same with campaign ads which I turn off
immediately. When I reach my limit, I have to walk away from it
all for a while or vent a lot which probably explains your lengthy post!
The silver lining is to realize that at least your oars reach the water!
Every winning team I’ve been on was chock full of intelligent,
creative & witty people, just like deplorables & deniers everywhere.
I couldn’t imagine being a Warmunista & having to hang with The
MannChild™ & other nasty idiots. Now that would be Hell on Earth!
In answer to your question…Certainly Dessler made no mention of the benign warming of the last 50 years, but insinuated that the warming was making storms and weather significantly worse! He used an anecdote about how the northwest heat wave, nearly identical to heat waves of the past, was much worse than it would have been with lower CO2, and appealed to the authority of those who develop computer games as proof! Koonin showed the data revealing that during the era of supposedly dangerous global warming, the weather did not become more severe and that weather related casualties declined significantly, demolishing Dressler’s argument.
The debate was not about man-made global warming. The IPCC projections of warming based on projected CO2 emissions were assumed to be accurate, despite all the real-world evidence that they are completely over-baked! The debate was about wind and solar. Are renewables the best way to deal with the (imaginary) problem of global warming due to CO2 emissions? Even in this contrived environment, Dessler needed to invoke the absolute worst case scenarios for fossil fuels, while invoking the absolute best case scenarios for renewables in order to make an argument that was still less than compelling. The huge technological problems with renewables were all solved with ‘pixy dust’, while the minor problems with fossil fuels were declared to be insurmountable and unacceptable.
The entire climate change narrative is like a bad movie that we are forced to watch. We have to pay for it with our wealth, our sovereignty and eventually, our lives. Dessler declares that his grandchildren will spend every day just trying to survive because the planet will be 6 degrees warmer, without providing any rationale for this fear porn. Europe is already in very serious trouble because of their push towards renewables, and they face a winter were millions will spend every day just trying to survive! That is not a computer generated future scenario. That is our impending reality this winter!
“The debate was not about man-made global warming. The IPCC projections of warming based on projected CO2 emissions were assumed to be accurate, despite all the real-world evidence that they are completely over-baked!”
I’M GLAD I STOPPED LISTENING AFTER 10 MINUTES (5 + 5)
In the old days I had a 10-minute rule for movies in theaters the wife dragged me to see — if I didn’t enjoy the first ten minutes, I was gone — often to watch a different movie in the multi-theater complex.
If the debate was not about AGW, and especially CAGW, it has skipped the first two steps of the assumption ladder leading to Nut Zero, and that is unacceptable to me. I do not consider Dessler or Koonin to be experts on wind and solar energy, although I would tend to trust Koonin. If Dessler told me the time, I’d still check my watch. I don’t believe there are any experts in the world on Nut Zero, since it is only an infeasible, unaffordable, unnecessary pipedream.
Who’d does Dessler remind you of?
I am disappointed that the discussion did not focus on the alleged science of CO2-induced global warming. Instead they largely talked about presumed or envisioned economic issues of increasing temperature, dodging what I believe is the elephant in the room – that CO2 really can’t cause much global warming. It should cause a hot band in the troposphere around the equator according to theory, but there is none. Is should cause atmospheric humidity to increase, but atmospheric humidity is decreasing. Cloud cover has decreased slightly in the past several decades; enough to cause the observed temperature increase, so where is the CO2 effect? And the bull elephant, Happer and Wijngaarden have shown that the IR spectroscopic bands in which CO2 can operate are nearly saturated and more CO2 cannot have much effect (and also determined that methane can have no detectable effect.) Perhaps I am wrong about these points?
No, you are correct. That was a good summary of the real situation.
CO2 really can’t cause much global warming.
TRUE
It should cause a hot band in the troposphere around the equator according to theory, but there is none
PREDICTED TO BE SIX MILES UP, BUT IT NEVER SHOWED UP
YET ANOTHER WRONG GLOBAL WARMING PREDICTION.
Is should cause atmospheric humidity to increase, but atmospheric humidity is decreasing.
HUMIDITY IS INCREASING, WITH A WARMER TROPOSPHERE
Since 1970, dew points have been increasing an average of 0.053 degrees per year. That sounds insignificant, but that corresponds to a 2.6-degree increase today, compared with 1970. And that means there’s 9.7 percent more moisture in the air now, on average, than there was in 1970.
Cloud cover has decreased slightly in the past several decades; enough to cause the observed temperature increase,
MAYBE TOO SMALL TO MAKE A DIFFERENCE
Are clouds decreasing?
The study, published recently in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, revealed an overall trend of decreasing cloud height. Global average cloud height declined by around one percent over the decade, or by around 100 to 130 feet (30 to 40 meters).
so where is the CO2 effect?
CO2 CAUSED FROM ZERO TO 100% OF THE WARMING SINCE 1975
UNLIKELY TO BE ZERO, AND UNLIKELY TO BE 100%. SO YOUR GUESS IS AS GOOD AS MINE. THERE ARE TOO MANY CLIMATE CHANGE VARIABLES TO KNOW EXACTLY WHAT CO2 HAS DONE SINCE 1975. PROBABLY CONTRIBUTED TO THE MILD, HARMLESS GLOBAL WARMING SINCE 1975. SO WHAT?
Try talking English to the 90% of the world that doesn’t know what a dew point is because they haven’t got a basic science eduction.
Do you imagine kids nowadays lectured at school in LGBT/gender studies/media studies/left wing politics understand what you’re saying?
They haven’t a clue. And if they’re not voters now, they soon will be!
It’s people like you who have got us here in the first place. When the left spewed lies about climate change you got on your pompous scientific back legs to impress your scientific peers with how clever you are, and 90% of the world haven’t understood a damn word you’ve said for the last 50 years.
How about getting your head out your a$$ and figure out a way to communicate with the 90% who all have a vote.
Read some of Matt Ridley’s stuff and learn how to communicate with the man in the street.
Its simple arithmetic:
Persuade the 10% of people on the planet who are scientists you’re right and you get 10% of the vote.
Persuade the dumb masses who don’t understand science you’re right and you get 90% of the vote.
*”you” being a generalised term for almost every scientist on the planet.
No one ever described my legs as “pompous scientific back legs”. I’ll add that to my resume.
I try to keep my comments as simple as possible.
I agree the belief in a coming climate crisis was not based on facts, data, logic and science, so it can not be refuted with facts, data, logic and science.
Scaremongering is predictions of doom
Politics, not science. 50 years of wrong predictions of doom. If people believe wrong predictions of doom for 50 years, then what hope is there of changing their beliefs?
We climate realists can highlight and ridicule those 50 years of always wrong predictions. Make the climate science “authorities” look like the fools they are. That’s the key to refuting the appeal to authority logical fallacy — attack the incompetence of the so-called “authorities”. A very tough job, since Climate Howlers have a religious belief based on faith.
The first step is to agree with the very small amount of real science behind CAGW: Never claim there is no such thing as AGW. Never claim there is no greenhouse effect. Never claim the warming since 1975 has stopped, or that humans had no effect on the climate. If we Climate Realists attack the real science supporting AGW, we will never be able refute the junk science of CAGW. People will stop listening.
Temperature is not a measurement of energy. Nor do the two always rise in tandem. We are using the wrong metric for global warming. Simple enough?
See climate4you.com for humidity and cloud cover data. Relative humidity has been decreasing at all altitudes since 1948. Specific humidity may be a wee bit higher near the surface (at 1000 mb) but at almost any altitude including 4km and higher, it has been decreasing for decades. This info from NOAA Earth System Research Laboratory. Cloud cover data show it has decreased from 64ish percent to 61ish percent since 1982; this from the EU Satellite Application Facilities. This decrease is likely to be enough to do the trick. Cloud height is not the same as cloud cover.
I vote for close-to-zero or perhaps 0.5C as Lindzen says.
Cloud data I viewed at the link below does not agree with NOAA:
“In the present study an increasing trend of about 5.54 ± 2.07% in convective cloud cover over land (20 °–60 ° N) is also derived, which is comparable to the NOAA HIRS trend of about 6.57 ± 2.53% increase per decade.”
Investigating changes in cloud cover using the long‐term record of precipitation extremes – Mishra – 2019 – Meteorological Applications – Wiley Online Library
Water Vapor data I viewed at the NASA website does not agree with Climate4You:
The warming trend over the last 50 years (about 0.13° C or 0.23° F per decade) is nearly twice that for the last 100 years. The average amount of water vapor in the atmosphere has increased since at least the 1980s over land and ocean.
“Data from satellites, weather balloons, and ground measurements confirm the amount of atmospheric water vapor is increasing as the climate warms. (The United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Sixth Assessment Report states total atmospheric water vapor is increasing 1 to 2% per decade.)Feb 8, 2022″
Steamy Relationships: How Atmospheric Water Vapor Amplifies Earth’s Greenhouse Effect – Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Planet (nasa.gov)
Data from different sources does not agree with your sources:
Investigating changes in cloud cover using the long‐term record of precipitation extremes – Mishra – 2019 – Meteorological Applications – Wiley Online Library
Steamy Relationships: How Atmospheric Water Vapor Amplifies Earth’s Greenhouse Effect – Climate Change: Vital Signs of the Planet (nasa.gov)
“Relative humidity has been decreasing at all altitudes since 1948. “
Should be true with global cooling from 1940 to 1975. Not true with global warming since 1975. A warmer troposphere holds more water vapor. That is a fact. The troposphere is warmer since 1975. Therefore, water vapor must have increased. More water vapor is a positive feedback from a warmer troposphere. Any source that contradicts that basic science must be WRONG.
Sorry but the measurements don’t lie. Water vapour levels have certainly increased at lower levels of the atmosphere but have decreased at higher levels as DNR has stated. However, water vapour levels and their impact on the greenhouse effect are very dependent on elevation levels. Given that the greenhouse effect is essentially saturated at lower levels, the impact at these levels is minimal whereas at higher levels of the atmosphere decreased water vapour levels have a much stronger impact. Hence the predicted “hot spot” at higher atmospheric levels just isn’t happening . . .
90% of the worlds population don’t understand science so why do you persist talking to them in a foreign tongue? People don’t have a clue what the troposphere is never mind how much CO2 is in the atmosphere for Pete’s sake.
You have been doing it for the last 50 years and look what good it’s done. What did Einstein say about the definition of madness?
Figure out a plain language to communicate with ordinary people then we might get somewhere.
I am not a climate scientist nor a climate science prosthelytizer. For the last 50+ years I have been a nuclear engineer, a maritime engineer and an expert witness. I just ask myself a lot of questions and then try and find the answer. As re climate science, the answers are easy to come by, at least at my level.
Generally you get to “that is big oil company propaganda” when trying to talk to the majority, or “I don’t believe in conspiracy theories”. Those two contradictory positions are often held by the same person. Either or both block any further reasoning at every level.
Forget the Climate “Science”, instead make John and Jane Q. Public understand the full implications of actually enforcing Net Zero, namely poverty, mass starvation, little or no electricity, no private transport, etc. etc. Of course, this would not affect the Global Elite.
You will, in general, be believed even less than when you try to provide data an basic physical facts that can lead to, rather than providing, a non-“consensus” conclusion.
I have a younger brother who once said to me: “Your Common Sense might not be the same as someone else’s Common Sense”. This, alone, is indication enough to me, that Common Sense, in most people I have contact with, is non-existent.
Dessler has stated that he won’t talk about the science anymore … it is done and what he wants to focus on is the ‘what we are gonna do about it’ part of the scheme.
How, now, are we going to massage our public policies, based on what we “know”.
Dessler is a turd in (a poor) disguise.
The likes of Dessler have the propagandasphere behind them…
“England endures its joint hottest summer EVER! This year’s heat ties with 2018 in data stretching back to 1884, Met Office reveals “
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11169941/England-endures-joint-hottest-summer-years-heat-ties-2018-Met-Office-reveals.html
Whatever happened to 1976???
It didn’t happen
2022 WAS THE HOTTEST SUMMER
since the last hottest Summer
Then figure out your own propaganda.
To disprove it the alarmists have to resort to science and they will lose because 90% of the world doesn’t speak ‘science’. It’s completely unintelligible to them.
Look at what happens: alarmists lie – sceptics disprove it with science that no one understands.
How well has that gone for the last 50 years?
Sorry, Daily Mail, I didn’t endure anything. It has been fab.
Now:
Then:
Just saying
I haven’t repeated your 17.1C & 17.8C because I haven’t seen the original sources. You may be right but I don’t know.
Just a few very hot days doesn’t necessarily make it a hot summer. I don’t think the mean global temps were extreme for the same period ie. this was local weather not a global warming trend. I’ll have to wait longer to see different sources (when finally updated) to check my hypothesis. Maybe they’ll find a way to adjust the data to match the headlines.
In general (no accusation of anyone specific):
It’s easy to get confused with the numbers quoted & parameters eg. England not equal to UK; selected month vs 3 months; average max vs average of min+max; actual ground weather station vs derived 2m or LT altitude from satelite measuring microwaves. It’s easy to quote numbers or show fancy graphs but it’s harder to check the details & compare sources from different publications. It’s hard to get a full picture. It’s easy to pick short or long & find data that fit a claim. It’s hard to keep a non-biased view. It’s a lot of extra work to find, record & repeat the sources & parameters of a value or quote.
Failed to discuss 1) CO2 release in the manufacturing, transport, and installation of wind and solar infrastructures and just how long before that release is counterbalanced (when or if?); 2) loss in transmission over distances (no, as the sun rises over Maine, that solar generation will not power the lights in Oregon without significant loss); 3) energy in the free marke, as witnessing in UK, where the wind power is heading to the open market and costing the UK customers far higher prices for that wind energy.
Dressler lost the debate despite talking far more minutes than Koonin.
More minutes = more BS
How long have sceptics been explaining all that?
And the alarmist left comes back with “but the sun and wind are free”.
The left communicates in lies and sound bites the public understands and can easily recite to their mates.
Sceptics send people to sleep with long, boring science lectures.
We don’t need a science debate, we need a fist fight!
My response to the “sun and wind are free” is that coal and oil are also “free” they’re just laying around, but you can’t plug your EV into the wind any more than you can plug it into a block of coal. The tricky, and expensive, bit is turning the “free” stuff into useable energy, available when and where it is needed. This seems to escape the RE zealots.
Fish are free. No fodder required, vet bills, farmhand wages, etc.
Not free at the shop!
There’s an unofficial version?
Dessler had a good debate with Alex Epstein. Epstein got some applause when he mentioned the slave labor in China used to make solar panels.
We should be listening, should be willing to hear Dessler out. Because if we have any chance whatsoever in convincing our lawmakers, who are STEM-illiterate and easily filled with fear, we have to know what the Desslers out there are claiming.
So I appreciate his willingness to go out there and debate. Koonin, too. I read Koonin’s book and was impressed with his understanding of the political climate out there and dedication to working within science, not defining science to suit his position, as the media does.
It’s too bad, for now, that lawmakers won’t listen to a debate like this. It’s also too bad that Dessler made such a poor showing. Quoting Rolling Stone magazine? We need the best they’ve got, and level-headed arguments.
Civilization is being led off of a cliff here, and damage that will be done will mean the end of what we’ve considered quality of life. To have any hope, we have to calmly and rationally separate church and state here. So far, we’re losing badly.
We don’t have the luxury of not listening to Dessler because we don’t share his belief. This is now the state religion, and it’s only through working with those within the religion who are willing to listen to us that we can break this terrible cycle.
I’ve been looking forward to watching this debate and gracious, Mr Dressler really isn’t at all convincing. If I were a climate alarmist, I’d be converted to scepticism after listening to him.
A point I find interesting.. This post has been up for over 10 hours as I am reading it, and not one of the usual trolls has chimed in to defend Dessler. It’s almost like they know he’s full of it..
A 6 F warming is about 15 C to 18 C.
If Earth average temperature is 18 C will there be a significant increase in global water vapor, and will this significant increase water vapor reduce amount deserts in the world- in which currently 1/3 of all land area is deserts.
Or how much will the Sahara Desert, green?
How much is it worth to green 1/2 of the Sahara desert?
How much of other deserts in the world, will green?
How much is that worth?
Of course more CO2 will increase growth of all vegetation, in terms crops.
how much is that worth, globally?
Can we agree that most of 6 F warming will night time and winter time warming?
How many lives will be saved by having less cold temperatures and how much more
crop growth will occur by having less cold conditions. And how much land which is too cold
to use for farming will become available to productive farm if there are warmer conditions.
We are living in coldest times of 33.9 million year Ice Age, most life lived in a world with average global temperature of 18 C [or warmer] for thousands of years.
We in Ice Age because we have a cold ocean. Our cold ocean has average temperature of
3.5 C. Life on Earth have recently lived when the average temperature of the ocean was 4 C, with the Sahara deserts were mostly grassland with forests, rivers and lakes, and having ocean which 4 C or warmer, causes an average global temperature of more than 18 C.
Or It’s possible the world is not warm enough at 18 C to totally green the Sahara Desert.
And next question is when could we expect the world to warm to 16 C, and than 17 C and then 18 C? And maybe 19 C?
And at what point will 1/2 of sahara desert become, green?
Thanks for sharing the debate … was hopeful to have the possibility to watch it. Wil come back here afterwards
CO2 is caused by “Global Warming”
Consider the following sequence of events:
Condition 1
Water and ice mixture is allowed to melt in a shallow tray in and enclosed space.
The bulk of the mass of ice is grounded on the base of the tray.
Ambient temperature is permitted to influence the condition of the water in the tray.
Water temperature remains constant until all of the ice has melted. (Latent heat of fusion.)
Dissolved gases remain unaffected because the water temperature does not vary. (Henry’s Law. Net sink?)
Water level rises due to the melting of the ice but PPM of CO2 remains relatively constant.
Condition 2
Water volume (as described in condition 1) is contained in a shallow tray and is now ice free.
Ambient temperature is permitted to influence the condition of the water in the tray.
Water temperature steadily rises and dissolved gas is liberated due to the temperature rise (Henry’s Law)
Water level rises due to the expansion of fixed mass of liquid water.
PPM of CO2 contained within the enclosed space increases (Henry’s Law)
Conclusion
Atmospheric CO2 ppm is a function of sea temperature.
The rate of rise of atmospheric CO2 depends on whether condition 1 or 2 predominates.
When sea level rise is primarily due to the melting of land based ice then atmospheric CO2 PPM will remain largely unaffected.
When sea level rise is primarily due to the water expansion due to temperature rise – then the rate of CO2 PPM rise will be greater.
The above condition is demonstrated by long periods of relatively stable atmospheric CO2 PPM following a glacial period followed by a rather dramatic rise in PPM later on in the interglacial.
The present (post 1850) sequence of events is possibly caused by the low hanging fruit of medium & mid latitude land based ice having by now largely melted.
Oops. Should read.
“CO2 rise is caused by Global Warming”
The effect of clouds on daily air temperature is irrelevant in the greater scheme of things.
Air temperature can vary from negative night time temperatures to temperatures in excess of 50c at midday.
Day to day air temperatures are fleeting, ephemeral, evanescent, transient, momentary, extremely brief…..
Average air temperatures are moderated world wide by ocean temperatures and heat is stored/buffered in oceans.
Ocean heat is circulated/distributed to higher latitudes by ocean currents.
The only MEANINGFUL consideration with regard to average long term global atmospheric temperature is the rise or fall of ocean temperature.
Ocean temperature rise or fall is dependent on SHORTWAVE solar energy.
Longwave energy is a trivial factor.
Clouds shade the ocean to a lesser or greater degree and thereby moderate SHORTWAVE solar energy penetration of the ocean.
Clouds are therefore the most relevant factor to be considered in the climate debate!
https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/light_travel.html
Shortwave energy penetration:
Sunlight may be detected as far as 1,000 meters down in the ocean, but there is rarely any significant light beyond 200 meters.
Cloud cover will affect the depth of penetration and therefore the energy transfer.
The Schmidt Spencer debate was classic! Gavin left the stage!
How did Dessler get away with that graph showing today’s temperatures as being the highest of the entire Holocene? What happened to the Holocene optimum, the Minoan, Roman and Medieval warms periods? Mann-Gore erasing the Medieval warm period was bad, but Dessler’s effort was unbelievable. I can’t believe that this wasn’t called out or have I misunderstood something?
I watched the full debate. Dessler seems to be getting a lot of his talking points from an IMF study which contains a disclaimer right up front. The claim about the number of lives lost due to pollution is particularly bad as pointed out by Dr. Alan Carlin in his critique of the Environmental Protection Agency’s CO2 endangerment finding. Carlin says they used the linear, no threshold assumption in calculating health effects. That assumption basically asserts that if 100 aspirin is a fatal dose then of 100 people taking one aspirin one will die.
Carlin was told he could never again work on anything related to climate as long as he was at the EPA. He retired and wrote the book “Environmentalism Gone Mad”.
The air pollution “deaths” impacts are the sum of reductions in life expectancy summed across populations. These life years.lost are then converted to a “premature deaths” equivalent. Here is an example from the UK:
https://www.abd.org.uk/stop-repeating-40000-air-pollution-deaths-lie-says-abd/
Public Health England write up of methodology here:
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/estimating-local-mortality-burdens-associated-with-particulate-air-pollution
Both Koonin and Dessler said CO2 stays in the air for centuries. That is totally false. Dozens of studies over the years say residence time is 5 to 10 years. Apparently neither of them are aware of the ice core evidence.
Anyone else think Dessler comes across as a pompous know-nothing?
Much of what Dessler said about how electricity systems function was woefully incomplete, misleading, or flat-out wrong.
One of Dessler’s claims is that, if we just build enough transmission, renewable resources in Region A can provide energy to consumers in Region B when the wind is not blowing and/or the sun is not shining in the latter. Obviously, if A is to supply B during a renewable energy shortfall in B, it must have enough resources to supply both its own needs and those of B. Since wind and solar generators have low capacity factors, a massive capacity overbuild is required just for A to supply itself, let alone both itself and B. (Koonin made the point that the sun shines for no more than 12 hours a day, but the situation is actually far worse than that. In the northern US states and most of Canada, for example, solar generation capacity factors are usually less than 10% in December and January.)
When the huge overbuild of renewable generation under Dessler’s plan is all running at anywhere near full output, there will be too much energy available and some of the wind and solar generators will be curtailed. The larger the installed base of renewables, the greater the frequency of curtailment and the lower the generators’ capacity factors. All the estimates of the levelized cost of electricity for renewables that I’ve seen assume they will be allowed to produce every megawatt-hour that the wind or the sun can provide, but since that won’t be true at high penetration levels, their levelized costs will be much higher than stated.
Dessler makes the absurd claim that backup generation will cost nothing because it already exists. As more renewable energy comes onto the grid, the dispatchable generators’ energy sales fall, which means fewer megawatt-hours of energy sales over which they can recover their fixed costs. Either they go out of business and reliability suffers, or they receive higher prices per megawatt-hour than they otherwise would have–negating some or all of the benefits of “free” wind and sun. (Renewables proponents perversely use this cost increase to claim that renewable generation is getting ever cheaper compared to dispatchable generation.)
Renewable generators can also increase the need for ancillary services like frequency responsive reserves, contingency reserves, and load following. They also affect dispatchable generators’ operations and costs by forcing sub-optimal operating points (lower fuel efficiency) and increased thermal cycling (which leads to lower availability and higher maintenance costs).
The effect of renewables on prices will depend on the market, the asset mix, and the weather, but the claim that they’re the cheapest form of generation is based on simply IGNORING most of the costs they impose on consumers (including extra transmission).
I knew it was just a matter of time before YouTube slapped its own commentary on the video.
They call it “Context,” and link to a politically-driven UN site that has nothing to do with the debate.