Climate of Fear
In the end, talking up global warming and climate change suits just about everyone, doesn't it? Governments like to spout rhetoric about lowering taxes, but in reality they can't live without them, so any excuse they can come by to tax popular and common activites will suit. The Green lobby likes it, because they can say, "Told you so," and get their little whiff of power when invited to the top table. The oil companies love it, because prices skyrocket; and scientists love it because they get research grants etc etc.
We've been talking about this issue increasingly on the blog. Let me make my position clear. As Simon said the other day, we've only got 100 years of data, so any firm conclusion about climate change is a mere negotiating position. The earth has been around for millions of years, has gone through periods of extreme cold and warmth, and we're supposedly in a warm spell in the middle of an Ice Age right now.
So just because we've had a couple of dodgy summers and a few windy days is no cause for alarm. I'm prepared to admit the possibility of the climate slowly changing; such a thing is inevitable. I'm also prepared to admit that increasing levels of CO2 in the atmosphere are likely to have a warming effect - as is the hole in the ozone later (don't hear much about that these days, do you?) and increased solar activity (sun spots, flares etc).
When it comes to weather systems, we're just passengers, no matter how many supercomputers scientists throw at the problem.
On the other hand, we are going to run out of oil and the increase in consumption globally seems to be accelerating, so the oil will probably run out sooner than it would have. This is another reason that it might suit politicians to talk up global warming. As Simon said the other day, it's a sign that things are probably worse than they admit.
So we do need new technologies, and the House of Lords Committee is correct in pointing out the following (as reported in the Guardian):
What would we do without the House of Lords, eh? So often, they turn round to the government of the day and point out that they're being infantile.
It depresses me that all this hot air is being spouted about climate change, and scientists are concentrating on looking for evidence of global warming, when the real effort should be spent on looking at alternative energies. Nuclear fusion, for example, is the holy grail of energy production, and not some pie in the sky I dreamt up yesterday. Fusion potentially means the production of limitless electricity very cheaply, with no CO2 penalty. It means that in the future that everybody could be self-sufficient in energy (people in arid countries could use solar panels, and batteries produced using fusion electricity).
Another quote from the Lords to finish this:
We've been talking about this issue increasingly on the blog. Let me make my position clear. As Simon said the other day, we've only got 100 years of data, so any firm conclusion about climate change is a mere negotiating position. The earth has been around for millions of years, has gone through periods of extreme cold and warmth, and we're supposedly in a warm spell in the middle of an Ice Age right now.
So just because we've had a couple of dodgy summers and a few windy days is no cause for alarm. I'm prepared to admit the possibility of the climate slowly changing; such a thing is inevitable. I'm also prepared to admit that increasing levels of CO2 in the atmosphere are likely to have a warming effect - as is the hole in the ozone later (don't hear much about that these days, do you?) and increased solar activity (sun spots, flares etc).
When it comes to weather systems, we're just passengers, no matter how many supercomputers scientists throw at the problem.
On the other hand, we are going to run out of oil and the increase in consumption globally seems to be accelerating, so the oil will probably run out sooner than it would have. This is another reason that it might suit politicians to talk up global warming. As Simon said the other day, it's a sign that things are probably worse than they admit.
So we do need new technologies, and the House of Lords Committee is correct in pointing out the following (as reported in the Guardian):
· the Kyoto agreement to limit carbon emissions will make little difference and is likely to fail
· the science of climate change leaves "considerable uncertainty" about the future
· there are concerns about the objectivity of the international panel of scientists that has led research into climate change
What would we do without the House of Lords, eh? So often, they turn round to the government of the day and point out that they're being infantile.
It depresses me that all this hot air is being spouted about climate change, and scientists are concentrating on looking for evidence of global warming, when the real effort should be spent on looking at alternative energies. Nuclear fusion, for example, is the holy grail of energy production, and not some pie in the sky I dreamt up yesterday. Fusion potentially means the production of limitless electricity very cheaply, with no CO2 penalty. It means that in the future that everybody could be self-sufficient in energy (people in arid countries could use solar panels, and batteries produced using fusion electricity).
Another quote from the Lords to finish this:
We also want to see a far more serious effort into research and development of new carbon-free technologies ... we suggest such an effort might be compared to the scale of resources given to the US Apollo programme that put the man on the moon."
posted by Anonymous at
Wednesday, July 06, 2005
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