Averting the climate crisis

[Marek]

The climate crisis is obviously a big issue in the world right now and I don't think we've talked about it here much. How concerned are you about climate change? Have you noticed it in the area you live? And is there anything specific you are doing to help fix the problems?

I'll tell you my point of view. Like with so many people it all came together for me after seeing Al Gore's film. I knew most of the facts already, but I hadn't seen them put together this way before. I did some further reading on the interwebs. Then in March, when I flew back from GDC in San Francisco, I happened to be in the same row as a climate scientist, who told me many stories about how serious the situation is. He also gave me a stack of New Scientist to read through, each issue having at least one alarming report on global warming. In the same row also sat a man from an organization in Portland. He told me stories from the other side, about how his organization is trying to make the state of Portland a leader in carbon emission reduction and clean energy, and how other states and countries are working on this too. While Al Gore's DVD spoke to me on a rational level, speaking to these people on that flight made the issue even more tangible and personal to me.

In Holland we've just had a CRAZY April, which had the kind of drought and temperatures that we normally only have in the middle of the summer. It was a new record, but just one in a whole string of records over the past two years. Things have been changing very noticably.

For a while now I've tried to do a lot of things to 'do my part'. I'll tell you about them because I'm not so secretly hoping you'll have done or are planning to take similar steps (whatever steps seem right to you).

What I did right away was switching to green energy and getting better lightbulbs. These are good things to do because it tells companies that consumers will pay a little bit more for green energy, and that they should produce more of those nice efficient lightbulbs. While I'm not into excessive conservation, I did install a switch so I can easily take nearly all my electronics off stand-by, which has actually also lowered my bills a little. I already walk most of the time and use public transportation for everything else, but I've begun purchasing carbon offsets for my flights (the controversy over offsets notwithstanding).

Today I began a monthly donation to the Clinton Foundation, whose Climate Initiative is responsible for 60 of the major cities in the world working together on making their cities cleaner (e.g. by jointly ordering tons of LED based streetlights, dramatically lowering the cost and encouraging more production). They were also responsible for getting Richard Branson to commit the next 10 years of profits of Virgin Atlantic and Virgin Trains to research in reneweable clean energy (est. worth 3 billion pounds) -- as well as other huge accomplishment in just the last year. I felt they deserved more support. I actually just signed up for it and it's what made me think of writing this post right now.

So getting back to my original questions, what's your stance on climate change? And has it affected decisions you've made?

[elmuerte]

There's also: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4499562022478442170

It's an other side of Gore's movie about his presentation about his book.

The only problem with the "climate change" that I see is that the human society isn't very flexible. "We" can't simple pick up our stuff and move 100km to continue living.

I believe this climate change is more hype than truth. And commercially, a hype is very interesting. And you see a lot of companies "doing the right thing". Giving you "discounts" for certain "green" things.

A lot of good money is wasted on proven bad ideas. Like a wind mill part in the ocean. It's seriously expensive and not profitable (in energy production) for a very very long time. (just like solar panels).

I think it will all vanish at some point like it never happened. Just like the previous climate crisis back in 1970.

[ysbreker]

Just like the previous climate crisis back in 1970.

And how did you think that happened? I presume you're talking about the acid rain? We (as a people) got rid of that by changing the way we live. For instance switching from leaded to unleaded fuel. That ozone layer hole we still have is not getting much bigger now that we've stopped using CFk's in our fridges and spraying cans. Who says we can't stop this current issue by making changes?

And don't bring up that 'debunking' of Gore's movie. It's just nitpicking the tiny details of his movie. It's about the message as a whole: The climate is changing. It's changing fast. And we're to blame. There is no denying that.

I understand that making a solar panel takes a lot of energy. But if you use green energy to make them doesn't that negate the fact that they cost so much energy to make in the fist place? And what's so inefficient about offshore windpower plants?

I myself do too little in for my part in this matter and I have to get me some green power and change some lightbulbs to led versions. But I am sure our climate is changing and I'm convinced it is our own doing.

[Marek]

Long reply ahead (sorry) but there was no way I could answer your reply with just a few sentences!

Firstly, I can't tell if you believe climate change is real or not? On the one hand you say the problem with climate change is people's unwillingness to relocate. Thereby you seem to acknowledge that climate change is real and could have serious consequences. (Though if you think if only people moved around a bit there wouldn't be a problem, it's a serious misjudgment of the kind of problems climate change causes.)

On the other hand you seem to disacknowledge climate change as hype. Well, it isn't something that was created by a marketing department, or some crazy meme that came out of nowhere. 100% of the scientists on Earth -- people whose jobs it is to be skeptical and look for evidence -- agree the climate is changing rapidly. 100% of the scientists on Earth also agree that it is "extremely likely" that it is due to human involvement. "Extremely likely" in science means "we actually know this to be totally true, but we are still scientists".

Climate change is a reality that's then been acknowledged by politicans, NGOs and (thankfully!) many corporations. If companies are trying to make a buck getting people to buy greener products, EXCELLENT.

The documentary you've linked has been elaborately rebutted point by point many times. One of the people featured in that film has sued the makers for incorrectly portraying his views. Trying to discredit the person Al Gore or trying to sow confusion over specific statistical details does not debunk the core message.

You are correct that wind and solar power are not as efficient as they could be, but saying they are bad ideas is incorrect. They're already good ideas, soon they will be great ideas. There's been massive investments in solar in the past 2 years, and there's an awesomely growing market, and innovations happen left and right. Thin-film solar panels are now coming online. Hopefully dye-sensitized solar cells will follow soon (1/10th the cost to produce). It's nearing its tipping point.

Denmark is already getting 22% of its energy from windmills. How is this not good? I'm honestly not familiar with plans for windmills in the ocean, but presumably creating the island in the sea is what would make it not cost-effective.

By the way, there wasn't a climate crisis in the 70s. Maybe you are thinking of the oil crisis, which "vanished" as soon as oil supply was properly restored. Ozone depletion was only a theory in the 70s. In the mid 80ies the hole above the south pole was actually discovered, and all countries then took action. By the mid 90-ies all CFCs had been phased out. So it also "vanished" but not because it was not real. On the contrary.

Elmuerte, I hope you'll get a less cynical view on this issue. Great progress is being made...

[toblix]

100% of the scientists on Earth -- people whose jobs it is to be skeptical and look for evidence -- agree the climate is changing rapidly. 100% of the scientists on Earth also agree that it is "extremely likely" that it is due to human involvement.

That's right, at least if you don't count the AAPG, but that's just, like, thirty thousand people or something.

My point is that saying 100% of the scientists on Earth agrees on this stuff is nonsense. Of course they don't.

[miffy495]

I believe that the thing that Elmuerte is referring to is when there was all the hysteria about "Global Cooling," but also could be way off. He should really pop back 'round and clarify that one. And yeah, always be careful about things like "100% of scientist think..." because they just don't. Go with vast majority or something else that doesn't make you sound crazy.

That said, living in the shadow of the Rocky Mountains as I do, the weather being fucking bipolar is nothing new. I've shrugged off jumps of 40 degrees celcius (-20 to 20) far more times than someone in a stable city would. Simply put, I haven't really noticed the climate changing as fucked up is the norm for me. Despite this I'd agree that some shit is going down and we are probably a factor. How much of a factor I'm not really willing to say, but if people can willingly change shit around to reduce their footprint, good on 'em.

What do I do? Well, I don't really have much of a footprint to reduce. I walk pretty much everywhere I go, and if I do take the train, it's wind powered in Calgary so that works out nicely. I used the high efficiency bulbs already because I hate having to worry about that crap and, being the tall one in my house, the less I have to change them the better. For me, it's really just about taking my electronics off standby more often so they stop sucking power.

[Marek]

Yeah, got carried away with the 100% there, but it's nearly true. How about "99.9% agreement" or "there's complete concensus".

I know about the AAPG and they've announced they're updating their position on climate change, as their members oppose the current stance. (These are mostly petroleum geologists we're talking about.)

As far as I know only Timothy F. Ball believes global warming isn't happening. He's been widely ousted as a fraud who uses fake scientific credentials and is quite likely paid by the oil industry. A handful of genuine scientists do have other theories about what causes climate change (e.g. comic rays, natural temperature fluctuations) but agree that climate change is happening.

[Marek]

Err, that would be cosmic rays, not comic rays. Although who knows what comic rays can do.

[Roderick]

Taking a pro-active stance on begetting a 'cleaner life' was part of the big tipping point (I make you proud, Marek) I had half a year back when I decided to also become a meat minimalist and remove myself a bit further away from the consumer society. Reducing pollution was only a natural thing to adopt as well. So I'm recycling stuff, buying food that has less wrappers around it, eating biological veggies, trying to use less water, less heating and less light, etc. I also have switches on electrical appliances to turn them off when I'm not at home. I now wash my clothes at ten degrees lower than before. The list goes on. It's little things, and together they have a small effect, especially on my moral health.

I don't think I'm getting caught up in some hype. I'm glad the issue is getting the attention it deserves. For instance, even though I was rooting for Royal to win at the French elections, I like that Sarkozy puts the environment highly on his agenda and is persuading the US to take more steps on it as well. That sort of things is necessary and can't be achieved only with antagonism. But I digress.

With all this talk about sacrificing our luxurious standards, I think a lot of people don't realise how good it feels to do the right thing. A little bit of sacrifice in our lifestyle actually feels really good and healthy. And it fits perfectly in the current philosophy of practical idealism that's in vogue in the Western world.

[toblix]

How about "99.9% agreement"

Sure.

...or "there's complete concensus".

No.

Disclaimer: I'm completely agreeing with you. I'm only pointing out that there are still people who don't agree with the consensus, and that we shouldn't ignore them. They aren't all crazy nuts.

[eljay]

I think it would be best to just stick with "the majority agree" or something similar, regardless consensus doesn't mean correctness

I think it would be moronic to presume our industries and waste products are having no impact on the environment if only by considering the sheer volume produced (how can it NOT be having an effect). How much of an effect is certainly up for debate, but frankly I think it doesn't matter how much.

Arguing the benefit of taking action is absurd, there is no downside to preventing us wasting energy, it means our sources will last longer and our infrastructures will have less strain upon them. Using renewable sources removes the concern that one day the fuel will run out, so just adapt and get moving on them, dammit.

[elmuerte]

Yes, I was referring to the "new ice age" crisis in 1970.

The climate changes constantly, but it's quite a slow process, it takes years and could go in quite some directions. And climate research is improving year by year. They are able to predict stuff much better and a long a much larger time scale. However, they are still often wrong. But maybe they're not, only time will tell. Another fine example was the hole in the ozone layer. Years after the hype they had enough research and evidence that it wasn't that bad, that the hole was always there and has always fluctuated. The human impact, even through cfk's, wasn't that big after all. Ofcourse that doesn't change the fact is was good to get rid of cfk's, simply because they are quite an health risk to humans and what not. And it's not a bad thing if people save on energy (also saves them money), on waste and recycle (in most cases it does make things cheaper), and fossil fuel (because oil is also needed for other things like plastics, and it's not very easy to replace). And a shit load of those other things, why I do dislike is, are hypocrites. Sure "don't shoot the messenger", but the whole "inconvenient truth" stuff wasn't very CO2 neutral. Apparently 'lead by example' didn't apply. There are more things like that, like the recent Pope tour in South America, one of the things the Pope was going to talk about was help for the poor. And yet, his tour costs a shit load of money that could have been spend on the poor. ... erm ... going a bit off track here ...

I think there's a point somewhere in the above text.

The problem with this hype that people are looking into short term commercial or popularity increasing solutions that are actually not viable. They are not going to invest in fundamental research required to complete the proper solution (like cold fusion), not do they want to invest controversial solutions like nuclear power. Yes nuclear power, it's quite cheap and "climate neutral". The only problem with nuclear power is the radioactive waste. All other waste can be recycled for additional gain (through, for example, the usage of an energy tower).

They rather invest in solar and wind power which is pretty much unreliable, and still not efficient enough to actually contribute as a solution.

As for the stupid offshore windmill parks. The one in Denmark costs more in maintenance than it delivers in energy. The Dutch government was looking into a similar project. The experts they hired to look into it said it was a bad idea, but the government simply ignored the research and still put into motion that project (or maybe they've canceled it again.).

There was a documentary on that whole thing by Zembla or Tegenlicht.

Can't find it right now (my internet connection isn't very reliable right now because some idiot decided it was a good thing to cut the glass fiber cable).

[Marek]

Sorry if I've lost the ability to be nuanced and simply say "the majority agree". Too much debating with people who don't believe there is climate change at all has caused massive entrenchment. So: there is consensus over the existence of climate change; there is non-unanimous (but huge) consensus that the problems are caused by human involvement.

But yeah.

Elmuerte, I now understand what you mean, and it makes a lot more sense. There is a lot of hypocricy with these issues. (Schwarzenegger turning just one of his many hummers into a hybrid comes to mind.) Although in the case of Al Gore's film, they went to great lengths to make the entire production and promotion carbon-neutral, to print the DVD box on recycled paper, and so on. I don't doubt that these things don't make the whole thing 100% clean, but it does strike me as leading by example.

It would be surpising if Denmark is building windmills that basically have an efficiency below zero. That sort of thing would never fly unless there was some kind of insane evil government subsidy. I've heard a windmill (non-offshore) in its lifetime delivers 80 times the energy it costs to build and maintain it, including transportation costs, repairs, etc. Maybe it just takes a while for a windmill to win back its investment?

I'm also pro-nuclear, but only as a temporary quick & dirty solution until other tech comes online. They're doing a big international project with nuclear fusion in France but it's sadly a very long way off.

[brkl]

Windmills take about twenty years to generate the amount of energy it takes to make them. After that it's all good.

[elmuerte]

the problem with the offshore windmill parks is that maintenance is very difficult, and they often need more of it.

[Kolzig]

The climate crisis is obviously a big issue in the world right now and I don't think we've talked about it here much. How concerned are you about climate change? Have you noticed it in the area you live?

Hell yeah, last Christmas was only a few days from being a green Christmas instead of snow white Christmas like it always is. I have never before seen everything look like summer though it was December. That was very unreal.

Also last summer was so hot that for the first time ever I really thought that the climate is truly changing.

[Spaff]

let's just say this.

I live in england, a country commonly associated with this:

my home town?

The weather here currently, and for the last few years, has easily met the same temperatures as California on my infrequnet visits, and it is commonly hotter here that southern france, italy and spain.

We are all doomed.

what have i done? Hmm well not much really.

I switched to renewable energ, but being a huge electricity burning household it was jsut far too expensive and i had to switch back, it was almost twice as much = pain. The company i work at recycles EVERYTHING and has carbon emission / green schemes - like forest planting type things. I walk to work and rarely use any form of motor transport except when drunk or lazy.

Mostly though i just enjoy the sunshine and wish i had aircon, remember how bad that is and then try and forget about it with a nice cool martini.

help us!

[andreadst]

ok, non-constructive contribution to this very serious post, but I live in belgium (country of rain, cold, grey sky, etc.) and last april really made me a climate change supporter. I almost let my car motor running all night to mark my support

[vimes]

I'm not a meteorologist, but I had the chance to study for a little while climate models in the context of a course on new technologies ethics.

After a few days spent on the job, I think that the issue with climate is that, despite the fact that we know a lot of good science about it, there's still a huge amount of things that no one understands. The main question currently is "Clouds seem to heavily influence climate. How? " and we don't have an answer for that.

Moreover, general circulation model are using

1 - simplification of underlying science because it would be too hard to compute. Hence there are a lot of discrepancies

2 - a system of grids and none of them can stand the test of scale.

Up until the 1990's most of those didn't even make a difference between day and night... but this cycle has been proved very important in understanding variations of temperature depending on earth's rotation cycle and the it's position with the sun . More than that, there is not one but three main concurrent climate models and neither of them could retro-predict the mini ice age of the middle age or the 40% of changes in temperature throughout the 20th century. They predicted that the temperature in the troposphere should have risen more that the surface but weather-balloons measured there had been little evolution. They predicted the poles should warm, but most of the areas in Antartica have witnessed significant decreases in temperature.

Despite all of that, the UN and the World Meteorlogical Organization said that a mix of the three could yield ' pretty good results' and were "believable".

I think that nobody knows what the effect of human activity on the climate has been. The three main sources of methane - which is with CO2 the other element scientists are looking at when considering Global Warming - are 1- natural wetlands 2-animal 3-industry( coal, natural gas, petroleum). So we're not sure. Not scientifically, not rationally.

All in all, we're not sure of anything when it comes to climate and the 'it fits' theory Al Gore presented in "An Inconvenient Truth" is freakin' bullshit. But maybe it's like what Terry Pratchett says in one of the Discworld Novel. Granny Weatherwax - a witch - has been called on a farm where several children got suddenly sick. Granny Weatherwax tell the parents a Goblin lives in their well and that it is poisoning the water and thus they shouldn't use it anymore. Granny's assistant tells her that it is not true, that what's happening is that the water is stabling in the well and microbes are developing. Weatherwax says she knows that, but she says the farmers wouldn't understand the microbes thing, that they need a story they can understand. They need a small lie to save themselves. So maybe in the end Global Warming is a lie in itself, but the consequences of people believing it are good.

What I know is that we need to reconsider how we consume. I live - and I guess a lot of people live - by using resources they only envision will be available for their own lifetime... some people would say that is a problem because we're fucking it up for lots of people that will come after us. I for one, am trying to improve myself on this topic; not because I think it might profit someone else, but because I still think I will live forever... so lack of natural resources and a fucked up environment would definitely be a problem.

But you could also think about the children. Please, someone, would you think about the children?!

[toblix]

This confuses me. The way you describe it only fools would believe the conclusion that there is about a 90% probability that humans are to blame for global warming (which I believe the latest big report said).

You're not even a metorologist, but you saw how useless all the science was, and here thousands of proper meteorologists still base their work on them. What the Hell?

[vimes]

One of the thing you've got to remind yourself is that everything in physics is approximation. It is good to very good approximation, but it is not 'reality', it is just a description of it.

Now, newton and classical physics are strong models because they were checked against carefully set experiments. But you can't do that with climate models : the only thing you can rely on is measuring a set of factors one thinks are important and try to find a relation; you can't try and modify each factor independently to find the relative importance of those. So the process of designing a proper model is very, very long... and maybe not reachable. But thinking what could be avoided (save lives by predicting tornadoes, prevent dust bowl, prevent hunger all over the world,etc...) some people need to make a bet on something incomplete, hoping it will be accurate enough.

And I also think that because global warming is well served by exaggeration (see Al Gore's NYC flood scenario, The Day After Tomorrow) it has become the new mean for scientist to get some broad-based support and to educate people on the matter.

[elmuerte]

don't forget financing

[Erkki]

Yeah, got carried away with the 100% there, but it's nearly true. How about "99.9% agreement" or "there's complete concensus".

Otherwise I agree with you mostly, but I don't think there's anything close to even 90% agreement.

I know a lot of local scientists here don't agree with it, but well, some of them are full of shit. Really full of shit. And it may be that just the ones who have some personal cause to be against that consensus are more vocal. I of course believe in climate change (we are also seeing all kinds of weather-related records broken in Estonia) and that it's partially caused by human activity, but I'm not really seeing that kind of consensus you are talking about anywhere. A year or so ago it seemed more like 50/50. Maybe 70/30 now... Maybe I just don't look in the right places?

Anyway, I'm still waiting for some kind of final proof before taking the certain position that it's caused by humans and not sunspots or something like that.

On the other hand, I'm all for being more green and environment friendly. I voted for the green party (electronically) in the elections, I've donated some to local environmental NGO-s, I started using more public transport. I almost don't use any paper (except TP ). etc.

[edit] then again, maybe I tried to diminsh the numbers too much because you exaggerated with 100 / 99,9%

[elmuerte]

Maybe it's both, may it's caused by CO2 _and_ sunspots, or even more things.

The problem is that the media has focused on CO2 and pinned it as the definite cause of "global warming" and thus silencing researches that are not sure about it an want to perform additional research.

What would the direct caused be of reducing CO2 output, maybe it's even worse for humanity. The thing about performing proper research is to use a controlled environment, problem with climate research is that you don't have a controlled environment. On top of that, when you're creating a solution for a problem you must also work out the change impact it could have. Small scale climate experiments are not really viable for solving this "global warming" thing.

But then again, "99.9%" have agreed that Gore's problem identification is the one and only definite answer.

[Nachimir]

Arguing the benefit of taking action is absurd, there is no downside to preventing us wasting energy, it means our sources will last longer and our infrastructures will have less strain upon them. Using renewable sources removes the concern that one day the fuel will run out, so just adapt and get moving on them, dammit.

As eljay says, there is no downside.

I have plenty of acquaintances on both sides of the debate, and though the answers are complex, I think reaching a sensible position is reasonably simple: Climate change is irrefutably occurring even as whether or not industrialisation is the cause is still debated. Not doing anything about it risks severely fucking ourselves, whereas switching to cleaner energy has immense benefits.

These benefits are many, in terms of reducing pollutants harmful to all our health (better than expending resources on cures), increasing resources available (oh so necessary for an expanding global population), and somewhat decentralising energy production (which increases security by making infrastructure inherently more resilient). Oil is not going to be much fun at all when population climbs another few billion and there are "prioritised oil users".

Among other things, I use energy saving lightbulbs, habitually turn lights off, sometimes build very low power LED lighting for specific applications, walk a lot of journeys (usually only a couple of miles tops, but occasionally up to 10 miles a day), switched my CRT for a flat panel and set the energy saving on my computers aggressively. I also tend not to eat meat, but that's not an ethical or environmental decision; it's mostly because I never was that arsed about it when I was growing up in a meat eating household and knew I wouldn't bother with it after I moved out. That said, I understand the immense energy cost of feeding and keeping cattle and that does give me a warm rush of eco-smugness.

If you look, you'll notice huge dollops of self interest in everything I do "environmentally", from physcial fitness to knowledge to reduced bills. This reflects the main thing I've learned about dealing with people professionally and the primary failing of late 20th century environmental movements: Without appealing to people's self interest, hardly anything changes. "Self interest" is the ugly, less socially acceptable but often more pragmatic way to talk about "win win".

I'm concerned about climate change because it's on planning tables in the Pentagon and MoD. Given current trends and taking all extreme heat death/algae/venus type scenarios off the table, the strategic view is that it is incredibly likely that climate change is about to screw over sizeable swathes of humanity and trigger large population shifts. Can you smell tumult? I can. When people say "Global warming? Great, it's too cold around here anyway", I do want to hit them. Short-sighted self interest will very likely kick the collective ass of such people one day; whether it's their stocks crashing or lots and lots of brown people on the other side of their quivering copy of the Daliy Mail.

There's been an amazing switch in the focus of the media and large businesses to environmentalism in the past twelve months, and what people don't seem to get is this: it's not altruism, it's survival. If anything, I think recent military adventures have demonstrated just how politically and economically untenable oil based economies are going to become, and various systems are responding to that.

The switch is based on green technology rather than 90's hippie guilt: if all of us lived the "simpler" "more natural" life advocated by that, the planet would likely be just as polluted by supporting six billion/max population of us that way.

You only have to look at some of the ugliest parts of human cultures, such as genocide, slavery, child sacrifice, female circumcision, etc., to realise that 100+ years of consumer habits ingrained into western societies aren't going to change in response to "moral" arguments based around such an abstract issue as the environment.

I lived with a hippie environmentalist until a few months ago, and couldn't stand the near-Catholic levels of guilt, self denial, and disapproval washing off her. I love the environment, spent most of my childhood outside in it, and don't like seeing it polluted. I know we can do better.

But really, fuck most environmentalists for not understanding how people and culture work.