Guest post by Willis Eschenbach
The upcoming Copenhagen climate summit, officially and ponderously named “COP15 United Nations Climate Change Conference Copenhagen 2009”, is aimed at reducing the emissions of the developed world. The main players, of course, are the US and Western Europe. There is a widespread perception that if the US and Western Europe could only get our CO2 emissions under control, the problem would be solved. Nothing could be further from the truth.
To see the gaping hole in this idea, it is only necessary to look at the historical record of carbon emissions. Here is that graph:
While in 1970 the US and Western Europe combined to contribute about half of all CO2 emissions, at present this is far from true. In the past 35 years, the combined emissions of the US and Western Europe have risen only slightly. Globally, however, CO2 emissions have risen steeply, with no end in sight.
So it doesn’t matter if Europe signs on to a new Kyoto. It doesn’t matter if the US adopts Cap and Trade. Both of them together will make no significant difference. Even if both areas could roll their CO2 emissions back to 1970 levels, it would not affect the situation in the slightest.
These are meaningless attempts to hold back a rising tide of emissions. Me, I don’t think rising CO2 levels are a problem. But if you think it will be a problem, then you should definitely concentrate on adaptation strategies .. because mitigation simply isn’t going to work.
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What this is saying is the USA is pretty good (I am not a yank BTW) given it limited hydro distribution compared with Switzerland or Austriam France is mainly atomic or hydro and wind power is a crock. Maybe what we should all be doing is educating our peers and informing our politicians that supporters of the carbon scam will have no political career left when the house of cards collapses. Other ways to defeat this take over are welcome !
To the Europeans: why should the government tell me or anyone else how much we should drive, or what kind of car we should drive? My choice is an Escape SUV with 29 mpg. It can haul a fair amount of stuff including my small trailer and wood splitter. I don’t want a higher gas tax to “convince” me to give up that flexibility. I have had less efficient trucks with 4WD before, but I gave up that extra utility for the few days a year that I have no choice but to drive on snowy roads. Plus I have less acreage where I don’t need to drive off road.
On the other hand, I know a woman who drives a Hummer, usually empty except for her, and insists that it is safer. It is not safer, the majority of accidents in my area are single car and a Hummer has no better safety than another car (against a tree) and may be worse if it rolls. I look around and sometimes think that gas should perhaps be priced higher. But lots of people around where I live spend a lot on fuel since we are 60-70 miles from the good paying jobs. It is not my call to ask them to pay more for gas, it is their responsibility. If they shirk that responsibility then it needs to be instilled better, not enforced by taxation.
As for wars and foreign policy, I think it is a separate issue to be decided in a broader context. There are certainly good arguments to be made about getting international agreement before going to war including the reasons which would not include “war for oil”. But as long as there are despots and irrational crowds that want to scapegoat or persecute people on some or other basis, there will be wars. It can’t be wished away.
Dear friends, let’s not let this devolve into a “Europe vs. US” flamewar. The issue is whether the rising CO2 levels can be solved by Copenhagen or Kyoto type measures. I hold that they cannot, for the reasons I state in the original post.
This is not a call to not comment, merely a request that people don’t use this thread to discuss the safety of Hummers, wars, or foreign policy.
Thanks to all,
w.
In a stunning announcement, fresh research in the journal Science has invalidated all the computer models used by the UN IPCC and relied on by uppity bloggers.
Essentially, say researchers, “we got it wrong”.
Al Gore gave a hint of the backdown on CO2 earlier this week, but now the full research has just been published, and Doug Hoffman summarises it:
http://ilovecarbondioxide.com/2009/11/science-journal-admits-science-not.html
So, are our politicians pulling the handbrake now on Copenhagen?
E.M.Smith (03:27:14) :
Your autobiography, very succinctly telling me your personal history that I did want to know during my frequent visits to this blog, well reminds me of my childhood more than 50 years ago. My father was a small-hold farmer in a rural part of Japan, which was economically far behind of USA then, and I also vaguely remember the day when a light bulb suddenly came to my family. All of the energy source for kitchen and bath was woods then, and the water for bath had to be poured in with a bucket, which was carried many many times from a self-dug well in the garden. However, the village life was self-sufficient and farn from being unhappy.
Willis:
I agree the message of your graph: i.e. reducing CO2 emissions from developed countries cannot significantly alter the growth of anthropogenic CO2 missions. That message is important information for all who consider negotiations pertinent to the proposed Copenhagen Treaty.
However, that message has nothing to do with the reasons (both real and imagined) for the observed rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration. And discussion of those reasons is a side-track from the important message of your graph. In my opinion, such discussion should occur at another place than this thread.
Study of the carbon cycle is a useful scientific endeavour. It is science that is not settled, but it has little or no relevance to the important message of your graph. I give a brief explanation of this below.
At (17:19:35) you provide the ‘bathtub’ model of the carbon cycle which is widely used (e.g. by the IPCC) but is very flawed and, therefore, is misleading. It assumes constant input of ‘natural’ flows to the tub and constant ‘natural’ drains from the tub. Both assumptions are known to be false. For example, small changes in temperature alter both the ‘natural’ emission and sequestration of CO2 from the ocean to the air.
The argument for a stable pre-industrial atmospheric CO2 concentration is provided by ice-core data but is denied by stomata data.
Large variations of both the ‘natural’ emission and the ‘natural’ sequestration are also very probable and for a variety of reasons. For example, very small changes to ocean surface layer pH (e.g. by small variation of sulphur output from undersea volcanism) would cause large changes to the emissions and sequestrations. A reduction of ocean alkalinity of only 0.1 pH would account for all the observed change to atmospheric CO2 concentration since “pre-industrial” times. And there is no possibility of measuring such a small change in average ocean pH.
The ‘bathtub’model requires 5-year smoothing of data to make it fit with observations. Several other models of the carbon cycle fit with observations but do require any fudge-factor such as 5-year smoothing
(ref. Rorsch A, Courtney RS & Thoenes D, ‘The Interaction of Climate Change and the Carbon Dioxide Cycle’ E&E v16no2 (2005)).
I hope these points demonstrate that discussion of the carbon cycle has value but is a side-track from the important message of your graph and, therefore, such discussion should occur at another place than this thread.
Richard
@Willis
Very interesting figures regarding GDP/MJ. I agree with you that saying US energy consumption is a disgrace compared to Europe is a little bit over the top (although I am almost french (Belgian), enjoy garlic and cheese and would probably surrender rather than die :p).
Comparing quality of life is a very difficult exercise, and I think that it is where chauvinism is going crazy, killing any possible objectivity. My own view is that there is some opportunities for more efficiency without decreasing quality of life (US cars are not something that makes me dream for example 😉 ), but there is also energy uses that really increase your quality of life and are tagged as “waste” because of european endocrination. Airco/heating budgets for example are highly dependent on where you live, and the size and type of your house. If you have to pay a lot for each square meter (forcing you to build a small house -often near your neighbor), live in a temperate oceanic climate and not into any outdoor activities, it is very easy to tell you fellow american that it’s large ranch and collection of buggies and pick-up are waste. However, it represent a lifestyle and is not waste, because economies would imply changes in your way of life and, for those enjoying it, a large reduction in quality of life.
Now for your GDP figures, I think that those are heavily skewed: first there is a large dependence on location, especially latitude: heating budget is clearly different and could be overcome only if you build your house in a very special way…
But mostly, I think it reflect countries where GDP is linked to “virtual” economy, financial services and banking mostly. It is (well, it was, before the crash) quite easy to generate large GDP without any industrial production, hence not not a lot of energy (In my humble opinion, it was generating GDP from nothing, i.e. a scam of national proportion and the crash was inevitable, if not deserved, but I may be just me that do not have much sympathy for financial sevices 😉 ).
If you exclude those king of “goods” from your GDP, I think that the spectrum across countries in term of energy efficiency will be much smaller…
“E.M.Smith (03:27:14) :
I can guarantee you one thing for certain: The folks advocating for a drastic reduction in fuel usage have no idea what it is like to live without it.”
Very true. Have you been to Ethiopia? And following..
“I didn’t have it nearly as “rough” as my Dad did (or my Mom, who grew up in a poor part of England and had stories of the one lump of coal they could sometimes get for the stove… and everyone crowded up to the stove during the too short time it was lit…); they made sure I understood what it was like then. ”
Me too, but maybe a bit later in my case. Added to that, in my time, was the winter of discontent, and power strikes. Power strikes not because there was a problem with power generation, but because those that controlled that “market” turned off the power at will in the ’70’s because power “workers” wanted more money, and held the rest of the country to randsom. Thatcher “fixed’ that, and now we have Hadley CRU and the IPCC.
Willis,
The assumption that the rate of natural emissions (and absorption) is constant is a major flaw in AGW models. The oceans are by far the greatest sources and sinks and the rates are a function of the rates of SST changes. Read my presentation http://www.kidswincom.net/climate.pdf.
All this discussion of CO2 emission is enlightening. I did know that the US was essentially flat in producing CO2 over the last 40 years. And the questions as to whether these graphs are genuine emissions or include phony warmist fudge-factoring is also valid, but something I had not previously considered.
Much of the decline since 1970 is the completion and operation of 100 or so nuclear power stations since then, the tripling of auto mileage, as well as improved technology in virtually all other areas.
I did know that if the Gore bull’s company said they planted a tree, and filed the correct paperwork, that counted as carbon absorption. But if a mighty oak dropped an acorn and a sapling sprouted, who was there to file the appropriate governmental form, so it does not count. In all this discussion, the natural growth of our forests count for naught.
But this emissions discussion only addressees half the problem. What about Carbon absorption? If you look at that, you will find that the US and Canada absorb far more CO2 than they emit, both man made AND naturally.
North America is NET carbon sink. You ask how can this be? Where is the evidence? Do you mean that North Americans have solved all their Carbon emissions problems and have no more to do, even by the quixotic demands of the fiercest Warmest Druid? Yes I do.
The evidence is a series of experiments and measurements conducted at Princeton University in 1999-2000 and then completely ignored and neglected, as it ran counter to the Warmist eco-orthodoxy.
North America is largely empty, and vast tracts are undeveloped, and devoted to wilderness and forests, prairie, rangeland and farmland that absorb vast quantities of Carbon. Actually much more carbon absorption than North America produces in CO2 emissions. The whole of North America still produces some 25+% of the World’s goods and GDP that from a much proportionately smaller population; and still is a net CO2 non-emitter.
Did you know that the USA has more land set-aside as parkland and natural wilderness than all the area of the the original Thirteen States of the Union? That’s correct. Prove it for yourself. The data is there. More land is set-aside then the land area of New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia. (including lots on those States). Now our forefathers were hardly being just altruistic. This vast land set aside was not done just for Carbon fixing. The scenic vistas, of Yellowstone, Yosemite, Grand Canyon, Glacier, National Seashore, ANWAR, Everglades and other parks are but a portion of the national forests prairies and wilderness set-aside for wild animals, that also serve a second purpose as CO2 absorbers, as well a mental regenerators for our citizens and habitat for our wildlife. And it is costly; and represent a self-inflicted, but accepted, forgone income to our citizens.
What do you estimate the commercial value would be of Central Park in Manhattan were it to be devoted to land for use as skyscrapers? The same can be said for Grants’ park in Chicago and in lots of other places including the local children’s playground. So a lot of the preserved land is very valuable. Not all the parkland is far away and useless land in ANWAR in Alaska or the Rocky mountains for Glacier national park
At the latitudes of the USA and Canada, most of the prevailing winds blow West to East and our weather fronts usually migrate in that fashion. The Princeton studies showed that the prevailing winds in from for the Pacific carry more CO2 in them than the the winds exiting out over the Atlantic, and record both the pickup of CO2 in our densely populated manufacturing areas and cities; and the decline by absorption over our undeveloped areas. Despite the conventional wisdom, the continent and through its thoughtful and self-sacrificing citizens, absorbs all that Pacific inbound CO2, plus all that we generate, and more besides. In fact, more than the Amazon rain forest absorbs.
http://www.atmos.ucla.edu/~gruber/teaching/papers_to_read/fan_sci_99_comments.pdf
http://acmg.seas.harvard.edu/publications/pns2002.pdf
Where does North America send send its Bill for cleansing the atmosphere? If the UN wants to spend tens of Trillions of dollars, I think we North Americans should receive our stipend for our prudent land set-asides and forgone income, as a tax-free CO2 stipend.
Please make my million dollar annual cheque out and send it to my home of record, semi-annually, S’il vous Plait.
richardscourtney (01:38:54) wrote:
At (17:19:35) you provide the ‘bathtub’ model of the carbon cycle which is widely used (e.g. by the IPCC) but is very flawed and, therefore, is misleading. It assumes constant input of ‘natural’ flows to the tub and constant ‘natural’ drains from the tub. Both assumptions are known to be false. For example, small changes in temperature alter both the ‘natural’ emission and sequestration of CO2 from the ocean to the air
As we have a long standing – and not resolved – discussion on this topic, we still disagree with Richard… Here a short (?) reply, as it should need a whole new thread.
In my opinion, it is quite simple: humans add about 8 GtC/year as CO2. The measured increase in the atmosphere is about 4 GtC/year. That means that about halve of the increase is going somewhere else (in quantity, not in individual molecules!). Anyway it means that nature as a whole, measured over a year, is a net sink for CO2, not a source. Like in the example of the bathtube, it doesn’t matter if the natural CO2 inputs to and sinks out the atmosphere are equal to, or 10 or 1,000 times the human input: it is only the difference beween the inputs and outputs over a full seasonal cycle which matters. And the year by year difference in natural flows is negative, at least over the past 50 years. See:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/dco2_em.jpg
Thus the net addition of CO2 (as mass) by nature to the increase is nada, zero, nothing. That doesn’t mean that not huge amounts of CO2 are exchanged due to temperature changes (seasonal, year-by-year, MWP-LIA-CWP, glacials – interglacials), but the changes are rather limited: about 8 ppmv/°C for glacial/interglacial transitions and the MWP-LIA-CWP temperature swing, about 5 ppmv/°C for global seasonal average swings and about 4 ppmv/°C for year-by-year (sea surface) temperature varibility.
Anyway, the about 1°C increase in temperature since the LIA is only good for maximum 8 ppmv increase of the about 100 ppmv increase measured in ice cores, stomata data and direct atmospheric measurements…
There is little doubt that humans are responsible for the increase in CO2 of the past few centuries. All alternative explanations fail one or more observations. See a comprehensive list of arguments at:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/co2_measurements.html
But if and how much effect the human induced increase in CO2 has on temperature/climate, that is a complete separate question.
Soem addition to the GDP figures:
While these figures show how much energy is used for each country, there are indeed huge differences in how this is generated: Norway and Iceland have near 100% hydro (and geo) power, thus (near) zero CO2 emissions for their power production. Because of the low(er) costs of this power, a lot of aluminium and other power intensive works are situated there for that reason. And indeed in general with very low added value for the bulk they make.
The same for the chemical industry: while rather energy intensive (in mass, not per kg!), the GDP is measured in fractions of an eurocent. That makes that there is a huge discrepancy between low energy costs and high GDP for the services sector and opposite for industry… And that also skewes the result for countries with a lot of chemical industry (like Belgium) and near no hydropower.
Thus to make a fair balance, one need to see the real energy use + CO2 emissions per sector (industry, agriculture, transport, services, households), and compare the energy needs to the regional climate and the intrinsic (manufacturing) energy + CO2 content in imported and exported goods, as it should be more fair to attribute that to the users than to the producers.
But anyway, any reduction of CO2 emissions in the Western world will have the opposite effect, if as result of the measures the industry moves to developing countries…
Putting together the bath-tub analogy and the concept that the earth is a CO2 sink, absorbing half the antropogenic CO2, is it not possible that some (Gaia?) force is increasing the aperture of the bath plug-hole to maintain a funamental equilibrium in atmospheric CO2 levels?
In order to reduce CO2 emissions by 80% from 1990 levels by the year 2050 (“80 by 50”), the per capita emssion rate would have to be reduced from the current 1.25 tons per year to 0.12 tons per year (assuming a linear population growth over the next 40 years),
Per capita CO2 emissions have not been 0.12 tons per year since the 1860’s.
Since most of the recent growth in CO2 emissions is coming from the developing world; which will not subject itself to “80 by 50″… Any effort on the part of the developed world to achieve “80 by 50” would be pointless.
Keith Flanders (07:49:23) :
Indeed, if we should stop all emissions, the CO2 levels would go back to the initial (temperature dependent) equilibrium. And if we should maintain the emissions to a fixed level, we would see a new equilibrium emerge, where input and outputs in/out the atmosphere are again in equilibrium. These are the principles of all types of dynamic (chemical, physical) equilibria: the balance of a chemical or physical equilibrium shifts to counter a disturbance.
But as humans put more and more CO2 in the atmosphere (increasing year by year), about twice of what is absorbed by nature, the balance shifts to higher CO2 concentrations and we don’t see an new equilibrium yet. If we should reduce all CO2 emissions to 50% of current, that is 2 ppmv (~4 GtC) per year, we should see a new equilibrium at current CO2 levels. If we stop all CO2 emissions today, the CO2 level would sink rapidely at a rate of about 50% per 40 years, much faster than the IPCC model predictions, see Peter Dietze’s essay at the late John Daly’s web site:
http://www.john-daly.com/carbon.htm
Dear Mr. Engelbeen,
You base you entire assessment on historical views of what ice cores tell us. But the foremost authority of ice cores and a chairman on the IPCC ice core group until he resigned, disagrees. You see, Ice is a solvent of CO2 and under increasing pressure, as in compacted ice, it becomes an even better solvent, and then stabilizes, at some lower level.
Dr. Zbigniew Jawrowski says all the analysis of ice core air bubble atmospheres for CO2 content, unless corrected for this CO2 hydrate formation problem, produce CO2 atmospheric measurements far too low like 270-290 ppm. Scientist Georg Beck went back and looked at 18th and 19th century scientific measurements of the composition of the atmosphere, then. In contrast to the ice cores that show a uniform 280 ppm, since defined as “Natural” and Pre-industrial levels, the measurements by scientists of the 1800s and 1900s, show CO2 varying periodically with a high of 450 ppm (today it is 388 ppm) in response to the Volcano eruptions at Tambora and Krakatoa, half a century apart. The average seems to be about 345 ppm, but the Sigma includes 200 and 380 ppm. Note few if any ice cores are corrected for this hydrate formation as Dr. Zaborowski maintains is necessary, and thus produce the stabilized but depleted figure of 280 ppm.
In this case, the scientific laboratory records of over 93,000 measurements are discarded in favor of reading the equivalents of tea leaves, animal entrails, and ice core proxies. It is not as if the various teams of 18th and 19th century scientists were fools or incompetants, either. Four Nobel prize winners in chemistry have had their work discredited and ignored, in favor of ice core proxie phenomenology.
Of such ” Science” is the AGW constructed. Hoax and myth piled on hoax and myth.
Embarrasing for the modern CO2 measurements, the Scientists of the 18th and 19th centuries identified and annual variation that was unrecognized by our Moana Loa experts. This variation is recorded in Moana Loa records, and of a minor percentage change, but long went unrecognized. It speaks volumes for the accuracy and veracity of the18th and 19th century measurements.
Stas Peterson (11:08:32) :
Dear Mr. Peterson, I know the objections of Dr. Jawarowski against ice core measurements, formulated in 1992. But most of these objections were carefully examined and answered in 1996 by the work of Etheridge e.a. on three ice cores at Law Dome. Ice is not a solvent of CO2 at all. There is some liquid water at the surface of the ice in the bubbles until about -30°C (which excludes e.g. the Vostok ice core at -40°C), but no migration over the past 800,000 years of ice cores. Clathrates formed under pressure are decomposed under (up to a year) relaxation of the ice cores and measurements are done under vacuum over a cold trap (at -70°C), effectively separating any water and CO2.
As the Law Dome snow precipitation is extremely high (1.5 m ice equivalent per year) both firn and ice core measurements down to bubble closing depth could be performed: no difference in CO2 levels between the ice core bubbles and direct gas measurements of the still open air bubbles in the firn. And an overlap of about 20 years with the South Pole CO2 atmospheric measurements.
A direct question: Jaworowski says that CO2 escapes through (micro)cracks in the ice, but how can one find 180-280 ppmv in the bubbles when the outside air contains 380 ppmv? Kind of reverse osmosis?
Another point: Jaworowski doesn’t seem to understand the difference between the age of the ice layers and the age of the gas bubbles in the ice. As gas migration still occurs until the density of the ice is above a certain level, the ice is already 40-600 years old at that depth (depending of precipitation levels). But he compares the ice age, not the gas age of ice core CO2 levels with the outside Mauna Loa figures, to accuse the scientist of “arbitrarely” removing 80 years difference to match the ice core with Mauna Loa records.
More objections against what Jaworowski says, here:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/jaworowski.html
Then the historical measurements of Ernst Beck. To my regret his enormous work has one big problem: wrong places. One can find the same (with a seasonal amplitude and a N-S lag) CO2 levels in 95% of the atmosphere over all oceans, high in the mountains, in deserts, but not in the first few hundred meters over land near vegetation, factories or traffic. Of the 93,000 historical measurements, over 90,000 are worthless as taken in the middle of towns, near forests, for agricultural purposes (rice and soy fields), etc… These give enormous diurnal and day by day variations, without any resemblence to “background” or “global” CO2 levels of that time. Measurements done over the oceans or coastal areas with wind from the oceans or mountains (Ben Nevis) show much lower CO2 levels and include the ice core values.
Think about the following: when the much more precise and accurate Mauna Loa and South Pole measurements started, followed by tens of other places on earth and regular measurements in the higher atmosphere, the large variations in CO2 levels (including the Pinatubo eruption) ended suddenly. So what caused the large variations (sometimes within minutes at the same place!) found in historical measurements?
More about Beck’s historical data at:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/beck_data.html
One may have a lot of critique on certain methods and proxies used by some “climate scientists”, but ice cores and direct measurements are not proxies and subject to rigorous calibration and testing. I only could wish that e.g. temperature measurements were at the same level of quality control.
Friends:
A discussion of the carbon cycle had started and I tried to stop it. However, it seems I put parafin on the fire.
I again write in attempt to keep attention focussed on the very important point that is clearly depicted by Willis Eschenbach’s graph.
The very important point is that
ANY ATTEMPT AT EMISSIONS REDUCTION BY DEVELOPED COUNTRIES IS POINTLESS
because total emissions will continue to increase even if all the developed countries were removed from existence and, therefore, their emissions were reduced to zero.
Yes, the carbon cycle is important.
Yes, Ferdinand and I have had scientific disagreement about the carbon cycle for several years.
Yes, as Keith Flanders says, the problem with the ‘bathtub’ analogy is that it makes the improbable assumption that the ‘plughole’ (and the natural flow into the tub) has fixed size that does not vary.
All of these matters deserve investigation and debate. But, in the context of this thread, they are a distraction.
In practical terms for negotiations at Copenhagen, it matters not all if, for example, I or Ferdinand is right. And, in that context, it matters not at all if the AGW-hypothesisis right or wrong.
The only thing the negotiators need to know is that something other than emissions reductions needs to be decided. And somehow we need to tell them that.
So, can anybody suggest a way we can tell them such that they understand and accept it before it is too late?
Richard
Richard:- perhaps you are too kind, I do not believe for one second that many of the delegates would disagree with you, if you could read their mind. It is not a mistake they want to assasinate the economy of the western world, it is the plan and Obama is a main player, perhaps there are some here who get it too and find it constructive to their goals to throw in contentious and juicy red herrings to hobble your ambition of putting this wrong right?
richardscourtney (16:44:56), thanks for your most trenchant comment, viz:
To highlight this, I have calculated the average annual increase over the period. For the entire globe, the emissions have increased on average by about 120,000,000 tonnes of carbon per year.
Without the US and Western Europe, emissions have increased on average by about 103,000,000 tonnes of carbon per year. This, of course, is a huge annual increase, and it shows no sign of stopping.
So Richard is quite correct. Even if there were no emissions at all from the US and Western Europe, not even one kilo of carbon, the global total would still be skyrocketing at over a hundred million tons of increased carbon emissions per year.
And since the graph clearly shows that the EU with Kyoto has not done any better at holding down emission growth than the US without Kyoto, the idea that Congo and Cambodia and Cameroon and Costa Rica and China and all the rest will be able to hold down their emissions is clearly a pipe dream.
As I said above … if you think CO2 is a problem, you should put money into ameliorating your fancied consequences, because a significant reduction in CO2 is not going to happen, no matter what comes out of Copenhagen.
The only thing that might come out of Copenhagen is the USA and other capitalist democracies of the world getting stuck with the bill for the failed efforts to reduce global CO2 emissions.
Ferdinand Engelbeen
You now seem to concur that the “plughole” is variable, but restricted to 50% of the human emissions. Having now read Peter Dietze’s excellent essay I suggest that the variability is 100% of the human emissions, subject to a time delay of 38 years. This is supported by the graph atop this thread which shows the total human emissions in 1971 to be half what they are now. Nature doesn’t divide by two but it does take its time.
If we can tell whoever turns up at Copenhagen that, even if releasing CO2 is harmful in some way, its effects are finite and restricted to 38 years’ worth of emissions, they can put a proper perspective on the subject without admitting that were wrong in the first place!
I hope I have now created a two-ply thread to richardscourtney’s satisfaction!
Keith Flaners:
You say;
” I have now created a two-ply thread to richardscourtney’s satisfaction!”
Sorry, but I now (yes, now) leaving for overseas so I will be unable to participate until I return.
I write this so it is clear that I am not avoiding the debate.
Richard
Francis said :The scandal here is the fact that a US with a population of 300 million is using about twice as much Co2 as Europe with a population of 500 million (and that’s just the European Union countries).
The US is also 17.5 times larger in land mass than France. How do you compare the energy that citizens MUST expend when they live 2 hours from a major shopping center. Also, in northern parts of the US, winter is long and really, really cold. Like -40 celsius (which I’m sure you must know if you did live in Colorado for awhile) for 6-8 months of the year. Hard to keep energy consumption down when you are trying to survive. You absolutely cannot compare energy use of large geographical countries to Europe where everything is small and squished together. You also cannot compare countries that are in the far north with countries around the equator.
Greenhouses add CO2 into their greenhouses because CO2 is a plant NUTRIENT. If CO2 levels actually rose significantly (in terms of atmospheric levels) the plant life would respond in a significant manner. Supporters of the climate change mantra base their scientific findings on many assumptions – none of which are concrete. It is the utmost of human arrogance to suppose that we could have that much influence on mother nature. The earth is an amazing thing and climatology has the least facts and the most assumptions of any science I’ve ever seen. The truth is that scientists do not understand climate yet. They aren’t even close. There are so many variables to do with climate that it is utterly unpredictable.
“I live in France and the quality of life is higher than in the US due to the excellent health service and the lower disparity in incomes”
So, the quality of life is higher because incomes are more equal? Not sure about your claim about health care, but I think it rests on the same canard.
If everybody is poorer, does that make the quality of life higher? If everybody gets the same mediocre health care, does that make quality of life higher? Is the feeling of envy so intolerable that making an entire country poorer is required to treat it? Is crime lower in France where income is so equal? Is your car safe from being burned now? Have you ever had to squat over a hole in the floor as a “toilet” in the US the way you might in downtown Paris? I readily admit that the food is better their, in the main.
Any body wonders about how efficient the US has become in energy only has to remember back to the Carter administration. I remember when it was a big deal for houses to get insulated. I remember scratching images in the ice that formed on the *inside* of the bedroom window, and nobody had ever heard of a four cylinder engine, except in a joke, or on the Jack Benny show.