Guest essay by Eric Worrall
According to Business Insider’s Harrison Jacobs, visiting Dubai is the equivalent to experiencing what our world will be like after it has been ravaged by global warming.
If you ever wondered what life will be like when climate change makes outside unlivable, Dubai can give you a good idea
HARRISON JACOBS
DEC 17, 2018, 10:30 AM…
As I hung out in Dubai last month, it struck me that the city’s severe climate and its adaptation to that climate was a good approximation of what I imagine living with the severe effects of climate change to be.
During Dubai’s long summer, stretching from mid-April through October, temperatures make it unbearable to be outside for more than a few minutes. Temperatures are regularly around 105 degrees Fahrenheit (41 degrees Celsius) and have gone as high as 119 degrees Fahrenheit (48 degrees Celsius), with plenty of humidity.
The city’s adaptation to that climate? A proliferation of interconnected climate-controlled spaces, including more than 65 malls, residential and office buildings with entire indoor cities attached, metros, and indoor parking lots.
…
Meanwhile, for the hundreds of thousands of migrant workers in Dubai who aren’t lucky enough to live in air-conditioned megacomplexes, Dubai can be a hellscape during the summer – just as the climate might be for the developing countries that will be hardest hit by the effects of climate change.
…
If I was going to take a guess at where our hyper-consumerist world is heading in the event the world can’t get its act together on climate change, I’d say it’s going to look a lot like Dubai.
…
Read more: https://www.businessinsider.com.au/dubai-indoors-climate-change-future-2018-12
I’m not sure how the people of Dubai feel about a green journalist describing their beautiful and popular city as an unsurvivable hellscape. Last time I visited Dubai it seemed quite pleasant, amazing shops, nice beaches, polite and friendly people.
Some of the taxi drivers were a bit useless, but I wouldn’t describe my Dubai taxi experience as “unsurvivable hell” – they all tried their best. Some of the drivers had interesting stories, like the driver who used to be a Mujahideen during the Soviet occupation. But I never felt unsafe – I got the strong impression that most people relocate to Dubai to leave their old problems behind.
Dubai certainly has a warm climate – but this is not a big deal if you are used to warm climates.
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If the current predictions come true, the July temps in the UK will soar to match the unlivable hellhole that is… southern France.
If
Canada, soon to be a Frankish hellhole, is headed that way in just a couple of weeks
You mean the Brits can start growing their own vineyards again, just like they had a few hundred years ago during the Medieval Warming period? Oh, the hell of it all .. it’s just too hellish to think about.
Nothing worse than a Brit drunk on Domestic Wine
Bryan,
Do try a nice white wine from Old Tramway vineyard, a couple of miles from me.
Commemorates the Surrey Iron Railway – 1803.
Auto
The next time I find myself in the area, I certainly will.
Since I’m not a Brit, I can certainly partake of your domestic varietals and won’t be a local drunk on domestic
😉
Only Macrom voters believe the discredited warmist theory that links hyperhermia deaths to temperature. The 14,000 French who perished in 2003 must have died of hangovers , for 2003 was in he middle of the Pause climate models failed to predict and CAGW thermometers failed to register
https://tinyurl.com/y82jn2xb
I’d that the likelihood of the current predictions coming true are about equal to how many of the past prediction came true. (IE *ZERO*)
Doesn’t Dubai have the largest per capita income of any nation on Earth? Some hell-hole.
might well have
however they forgot something when developing it I gather..
That is one LARGE above ground Sanitary Sewer
Let’s hope there’s not a really big fan nearby, like a wind turb… oh.. never mind.
Southern France, Chad? Isn’t that the hellhole the Rolling Stones went to when they ran from UK taxes and whatever else they were running from?
Good enough for Keef Richards, good enough for me.
Regards and HAPPY HOLIDAYS
Bob
Yes, a marginal rate of more than 100% of your earnings, I’d run too.
In this whole climate change debate, we need to keep focus on the single overriding question:
What kind of world will our children leave for Keith Richards (and the cockroaches)?
Southern France, Chad? Isn’t that the Hell hole that Gérard Depardieu was running away from to get away from high taxes?
It wasn’t very warm there when I was there in March 1988. Has it global warmed there much since then?
Dunno but Paris has certainly warmed a bit in the last few months
It is an urban heat island caused by the burning cars.
I am being forced into a corner to endure the absolutely unendurable: a moist, foggy day in a moist, so far wet (as in snow/rain) winter, and the usual greedy feathered beggers like the red-bellied woodpecker are gorging themselves on my largesse.
I do not know how much more of this I can take. Forced to stay indoor, write chapters for a story, eat cookies, have roast beats for supper – the horror!
It’s torture, I tell you!
I need pie and wine.
Not even that much. We had 42C in France last year, I cant see the UK getting that hot even with mythical CO2 warming.
So you get lots of big skyscrapers and the best theme parks in Climate Change .. I loved Ski Dubai … sign me up.
I could do without the big skyscrapers, but sign me up for the theme parks. Love a good theme park.
Yes, of all the places you can ski, you wouldn’t think Dubai was one of them.
Dubai bobsled team in next olympics
And the parking lot just outside of that “ski slope” looks like the back lot of “Top Gear”.
Its a shame when you can’t easily spot your own Bugatti Veyron out in the parking lot. Or envy the owner of the car parked next to yours.
Absolutely beautiful place is Dubai. Only place I know where you can go buy your bread and eggs, then ride up an escalator to pick up your multi-million dollar jewelry.
AWG – You’ve not been to Harrods then?
How about Yakutsk. How long will you survive if you are caught outside in the winter?
I prefer cold to hot but it must be admitted that cold is a lot more dangerous a lot faster. We used to have the 30-30-30 rule. At -30F, in a 30 mph wind, exposed skin will freeze in 30 sec.
I believe the coldest village is Oymyakon, but among large cities it is Khabarovsk.
BUT Yakutsk has a musuem to the Coldest City on the Earth.
Earlier this year it was -68C in Yakutsk. That same day I was in Mongolia where it was -42 C downtown Ulaanbaatar – and windy.
“Temperatures are regularly around 105 degrees Fahrenheit…”
Yeah – like Illinois used to be in summer. Glad those days are gone. (Illinois is like Dubai, right?)
What’s that in Centigrade, m/s and seconds? Probably just as pointless.
-34C, 48 KM/h, 30 sec (seconds are metric seconds)
Time measurement came from base 60.
Yeah, I know, I was trying to be funny.
-34C, 48 KM/h, 34.72 seconds (seconds are in decimal seconds sometimes referred to as metric seconds)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decimal_time#Conversions
😉
wow! I’m glad decimal time never caught on. That attempt was an “everything in the past is garbage” paroxysm. We’ve been using 24 hours a day, 60 min per hour since the Babylonians. I think the French, during the French revolution, tried 10 month years also. They succeed in convincing everyone (nearly) else to use the metric system because the rest of the world was in a jumble in measurements. However, 24hrs, 60 minutes, and 60 seconds was already an international standard. It was a bit of hubris for them to think the rest of the world would dump an international standard just because the French thought their idea was better.
At -25C, in a 25m/s wind, exposed skin will freeze in 25 seconds. How does that help anyone?
We have all sorts of places that have “warm” climates. Check out a globe map and focus on the Equator. Ever been to Singapore or the Amazon basin?
They have golf tournaments in Kuala Lumpur. The players do it for the money.
How can people survive, and actually thrive, in such places? How did they survive 100 years ago, before airconditioning?
Warming has been demonized. I’m 74 and walk 9 holes of golf pushing my bag in a cart. This is in the summer, in southeast NC, and I’m not unusual.
They used to get up earlier in the morning, siesta during the warm afternoon period, and then get active again in the evening.
At this time of year Dubai is more like Paradise than that other place: 24C at 6pm
It has a lovely climate in the winter. We went for shortish walks in Sept when the temps were in the upper 30sC and into the low 40sC in the carport! We have picniced in the mountains near Hatta in 46C in middish-May! (Mad dogs and English Men/Women).
We even survived Abu Dhabi one night in late July in 1969 when the power failed, no AC, temp of 103F. I got off the ‘plane home while in Kuwait, same temp of 103F but much drier. It felt positively cool there
Harrison Jacobs fails to understand greenhouse gas theory, which indicates that most of the increase in average temperature comes from increasing minimum temperatures. Basically greenhouse gasses stop us freezing to death at night and do not cook us during the day.
The other thing Harrison Jacobs fails to understand is the magnitude of the change. We are already a deg C above “pre-industrial” temperatures, so the 2 deg C doom being predicted is only a deg C hotter than now. Even if this was reflected in peak temperature (which it will not be) that would be barely delectable by human senses.
BillP … at 6:24 am
Harrison Jacobs fails to understand greenhouse gas theory, which indicates that most of the increase in average temperature comes from increasing minimum temperatures.
BINGO!
sometimes a visual aid is all you need….
Even the IPCC admits that places that have a lot of humidity in the air will feel very little warming from CO2, because water vapor and CO2 overlap for most of their absorption frequencies.
“… increase in average temperature comes from increasing minimum temperatures.”
This effect is not limited to the equivalent forcing from changing GHG concentrations. Owing to the immutable T^4 dependency between W/m^2 and degrees K which leads to an equally immutable 1/T^3 dependency of the sensitivity on temperature, 1 W/m^2 at the poles has a far bigger effect on the temperature than 1 W/m^2 at the equator.
It’s the temperature dependence of the sensitivity that the IPCC’s self serving consensus ignores by improperly linearizing the relationship between W/m^2 and degrees K, while the actual linear relationship is between forcing and emissions.
From first principles physics, the steady state sensitivity of the temperature of arbitrary matter to incremental forcing is EXACTLY 1/(4eoT^3), where e is the emissivity, o is the SB constant and T is the temperature in degrees K. The linear sensitivity of the SB emissions at T to a change in forcing is EXACTLY 1/e, which for Earth is about 1.62 where e is about 0.62.
All the physics can support is a varying emissivity. The IPCC can’t connect the dots between a quantifiable black/gray body emitter and their pseudo-science in support of their absurdly high ECS which requires either the T^3 factor to be replaced with an unrelated constant or a value of e that’s far too small. They may try to claim that Stefan-Boltzmann LAW doesn’t apply, but they couldn’t be more wrong if they tried and they’re certainly trying hard. So hard in fact, that even many skeptics are misled by the multifarious layers of obfuscation.
Nor does he understand subjunctive mood.
‘If I was going to take a guess at where our hyper-consumerist world is heading’
Where are the editors ?!?!
The thing that Harrison Jacobs does understand is that:
If I go on vacation to Dubai, and I write a ridicules story with a Dubai tie-in, I can take a big ass undeserved (but legal), tax deduction …
I guess that for most of those migrant workers Dubai is a climate paradise, being that they are used to even higher temperatures. Everything is relative.
Too true –
Last time I went to Laos I departed a mild Perth day and landed in Vientienne where it was 32C that morning. Catching up with Lao friends I found them all rugged up in jumpers and heavy coats and all complaining how bitterly cold it was.
So true! When I lived on Guam, we were freezing at 78F!!!!!
Definitely! After 14 years in Central Texas. 60 F (15 C ) feels cold. Wearing a jacket seems needed.
duh ….
If you ever wondered what life will be like when climate change makes outside unlivable, Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station can give you a good idea
SAMUEL COGAR
DEC 20, 2018, 09:22 AM
Sounds like we have precisely nothing to worry about.
If Dubai is the worst case scenario, I can live with that.
With sufficient access to low cost energy, we can desalinate our water, grow crops in giant greenhouses, maybe make synthetic meat if the kinks get worked out, or ramp up open ocean aquaculture and eat more fish.
Actually sounds more like Israel. They’re already doing all of that stuff. Beautiful country.
Dubai is roughly at sea level…..so much for catastrophic sea level rise
Harrison Jacobs’ “About” page on his website:
“My bad opinions, half-baked insights, and occasional moments of clarity at @harrisonxjacobs.”
http://harrisonjacobs[DOT]com/contact/
I think he’s being a bit generous on that last bit.
He’s probably absolutely right on the last bit since I suspect his “occasional moments of clarity” are limited to the first.
One moment of clarity (note the singular) does not constitute moments (note the plural) as I said, he’s being a bit generous.
Have a Coke and a smile, John . . . we’re on the same side here.
🙂
Merry Christmas to you and yours!
Never doubted it.
And a very merry Christmas to you and yours as well 🙂
Maracaibo comes to mind here. 50% humidity and temps above 105 common. Not as wealthy, and the poor get by with no AC and infrequent water supplies. Even so Maracouchos are quite proud of their city and their resilient independance. Tough place to love. But now after 20 years have passed since I lived there I still miss it and dream about it in Spanish
Another one to add to my list if what climate change can do for you.
It will move all of Earth’s inhabitants to Dubai, we didn’t see that one coming did we? 🙂
I spent 4 years in Dubai, and thoroughly enjoyed it. It exuded a sense of dynamism and economic optimism among all the expats who worked there that I knew. I was once invited to meet with a parliamentary delegation from the UK, and one Labour MP asked me about the awful conditions of the workers in the construction industry. When I told her that workers in Dubai were not brought to Dubai against their will but in fact paid brokers to have a chance to work in Dubai in order to actually escape their stricken conditions in the slums or villages of India, Bangladesh and Pakistan, the MP immediately “switched off” and was no more interested since this did not meet her presumed narrative.
No it won’t.
Cities in North Dakota have have massive climate change yearly with summertime high temperatures above 105F amd winter lows of -40. This didn’t prevent Bismark, North Dakota making Forbes magazine’s list of 25 top places to retire.
While I am sure the Chamber of Commerce was thrilled with the designation, I doubt the inhabitants were equally enthused.
As Garrison Keilor said about North Dakota, it’s a place where nature makes a serious effort to kill you every winter.
105? Sounds like the two Summers I spent living in Phoenix. And my car didn’t have AC. Although, I have to admit that driving with the windows down becomes uncomfortable above about 110.
MPH ?
(8>))
Sweet Old Bob
In 1963 I bought a brand new Corvette Stingray. A buddy and I took a vacation in Arizona. We were driving from Prescott to Phoenix on a hot July day. We were on a long upgrade at about 7,000′ elevation. I decided to find out just how fast the car would go. I put the pedal to the floor and after a short bit had settled in at 112 MPH; I rolled my window up and it nudged up to 114. However, Tony still had his bare feet hanging out his window and didn’t want to be bothered with the experiment.
People hate hot weather so much that they are moving to Arizona, Nevada, and Florida?
Like me….Climate refugee from Canada to Phoenix….oh the horrors….
There’s a genre of climate communication that just makes sh!t up. It’s nothing more than fictional apocalypticism, that doesn’t even try to make an effort to find provenance in evidence-based science.
Interesting that:
Willis wonders where all his money has gone and up pops Eric with the answer
Dubai came from zero to be what is by riding on a raft of oil.
It is Totally Zero without oil.
Inside a century it will return to being zero.
hey Eric, did you not visit the Garden Of Eden while you were passing through – just a few miles to the north-west.
Or The Hanging Gardens – no need for air-con there I imagine.
What about a bit of big game hunting in the forests and jungles that spread all the way west, right across to Casablanca by accounts or a bit of fishing in the rivers and lakes that are there.
Ooops.
*WERE* there. Not now.
Oh. Why’s that?
“The Climate Changed” you say?
I say: “How?”
Would it be OK if I didn’t just get arm-waving and or an appeal to your own authority?
Something coherent and scientific. Cause & Effect, that sort of thing.
Inside a century it will return to being zero.
Seems to be a lot of corporations with their HQ’s there.
Inside a century it will return to being zero.
That rather depends on how well it diversifies what it has to offer. It’s trying to shape itself into a tourist destination and a business haven. and it seems to be having some success in doing so. So even when the “oil raft” has run it’s course, it may just continue being something more than zero if it manages to play it’s cards right.
hey Eric,
I’m not sure if you meant to be addressing Eric, or if your comment is more appropriately directed at Mr. Jacobs (the author of the piece about Dubai which Eric was quoting)
Would it be OK if I didn’t just get arm-waving and or an appeal to your own authority?
Something coherent and scientific. Cause & Effect, that sort of thing.
Yes, climate changes. has for as long as there has been climate. Referencing the Garden of Eden (some thousands of years ago, if it ever existed) The Hanging Gardens (of Babylon, some 2600 years ago), and other ancient world places doesn’t do anything to support the idea of man-caused climate change/catastrophe. There were no SUVs, coal-fired power planets or industrial factories belching out CO2 in Eden or Babylon, and yet the climate, as you say, changed. Those pushing the climate change scare are the ones that need to explain how it is the forces that caused those changes then aren’t the forces causing any supposed change now. Which, if that is what you are getting at, means Mr. Jacob and not Eric is the one you need to be addressing.
“Garden of Eden-if it ever existed.” We will never know will we, since some humongous landscaping, mentioned in most myths of the world, seems to have occurred between then and now.
“some humongous landscaping,”
LOL, that’s one way to put it.
They have used that money to educate their population and to build up an infrastructure.
When the oil money runs out, what they have built with the oil money will remain.
Including their jails.
‘When in Rome . . . .’
Auto
Hey Peta, the “Garden of Eden” wet Arabian peninsula and Northern Africa was a feature of the Holocene Optimum, back when temperatures in that part of the world at least were warmer than today. So maybe global warming wouldn’t be such a bad thing for Dubai.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327823688_Holocene_Climate_Development_of_North_Africa_and_the_Arabian_Peninsula
First and foremost Dubai was/is a free trade port. The oil is elsewhere, like Abu Dhabi.
Ah yes who could forget their history lessons about the first people arriving in the Arabian Peninsula and constructing malls and interconnected climate spaces in order to survive and build a civilization there.
“During Dubai’s long summer, stretching from mid-April through October, temperatures make it unbearable to be outside for more than a few minutes.” That basically says it all right there. I hope he didn’t chip a nail while writing this … story?
Funny, I used to be able to walk to the compound swimming pool in mid-summer. That writer has a vested interest in exaggeration methinks. It is darned hot but people have lived thereabouts for millenia.
I have been to Dubai, it seems pretty popular with the tourists.
Indeed. How many hellscapes do you know of that are popular with tourists?
Tourist: Hmmm, I could vacation in a paradise destination or in a hellscape?… Sign me up for the hellscape.
nope, sorry but I just don’t see many tourist making that choice.
How many tourists visiting the Hellscape known as Dubai arrive in their private jets?
What an ignoramus Harrison Jacobs, on every level. The epitome of the ignorance and stupidity of the alarmist cult personified.
You’ve insulted everyone! The good people of Dubai and the the rest of the thinking world with your inane ridiculous and outright incorrect statements.
That sounds familiar, like a shallow reporter visit to any assignment they did not favor. It could be any number of National Geographic reports that I used to dislike before I stopped the gift subscription.
Meh. Not nearly scary enough. Here’s climate change you can be really scared of:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86scPKqWFvc
Now THAT’S climate change.
“temperatures make it unbearable to be outside for more than a few minutes.” ?
So how did they build the buildings before they had the “safety” of buildings to protect them from the heat ?… Safe Spaces ?