Following the release of a new report on climate change impacts in and around New Zealand by the prime minister’s chief science advisor last week, in my Daily Blog post today I take a look at the government’s reaction. Is it really true that Tim Groser didn’t bother reading the report before spinning out a vapid response? The evidence suggests he certainly didn’t understand what the report was saying, even if he did glance at its content… Comments over there please.
Author: Gareth
A physicist speaks: Dessler on climate sensitivity – very unlikely to be less than 2ºC
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdoln7hGZYk&w=480]
There’s been much ado about climate sensitivity — the amount of warming we expect for a doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere — in the last month or two. A couple of recent papers, and an expected slight adjustment to the likely range in the upcoming IPCC fifth report ((From 2ºC to 4.5ºC in AR4 to 1.5ºC to 4.5ºC in AR5, with the most likely value still around 3ºC)), has led to speculation that we might have less to worry about, or more time to get emissions cuts in place. It would be great if it were true, but it isn’t. In this excellent short video, Andrew Dessler, professor of atmospheric sciences at Texas A&M university, explains why atmospheric physics means it’s very unlikely that the climate sensitivity can be below 2ºC.
For lots of other reasons why the most likely value remains about 3ºC, see this Skeptical Science post.
New Zealand’s changing climate and oceans: new Gluckman report out today
The Prime Minister’s science advisor, Sir Peter Gluckman, today released a new report looking at the probable impacts of climate change in New Zealand over the next 40 years. The report, New Zealand’s Changing Climate and Oceans: The impact of human activity
and implications for the future (pdf) is:
… intended to update the public on current scientific understandings of climate change and ocean acidification. In particular, it focuses on how these changes are likely to affect New Zealand’s climate and industries at a regional level over coming years.
The timing of the report — which appears at first glance to offer a reasonable overview of our current understanding of likely local climate changes — seems a trifle odd. In a matter of months the IPCC will release the first part of its Fifth Report, covering the underlying science, and while we’ll have to wait until March next year for the Working Group 2 report on regional impacts, Gluckman and his team would have had a firmer foundation for their report with only a modest delay.
I’ll be reading the report carefully over the next few days, and will have more to say in due course. I’m particularly interested in exploring how Gluckman approaches the risks associated with local climate changes, and his take on how the wider international context will impact New Zealand.
See also: Peter Griffin, NZ Herald.
Sea level rise and the Canterbury coastline
What are the prospects for the shorelines of Pegasus Bay as sea level rises, river flows change, and wave directions change? Someone who really knows her erosion from accretion is Sonny Whitelaw, the Hurunui Council’s biodiversity ambassador ((And SF author, writer, photojournalist, and Hot Topic reader.)). She’ll be talking to the Food For Thought Hurunui group on Monday night at the Memorial Library in Amberley, kicking off at 7-30pm. This is a presentation that Sonny has already given to the Waimakariri and Hurunui Councils, and comes highly recommended — especially if you live in or near a Canterbury coastal community.
NZ PM BP: John Key and the Fellowship of the Drill – beyond parody
The growing disconnect between the NZ government’s promotion of New Zealand as a 100% Pure tourist destination, and its desire to see more offshore oil and gas exploration and increased mining for coal and minerals is certainly attracting attention around the world. Graham Readfearn’s article New Zealand pushing plans to drill Middle-earth as Hobbit filming ends is top environment story on the Guardian web site today. Readfearn riffs on the completion of filming for the last part of the Hobbit trilogy, set against a frankly astonishing promotional video by PM John Key, in which he waxes lyrical about our beautiful country, and then describes how he’s committed to ruining it. Have a look: it is — as Greenpeace NZ noted — beyond parody.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qQrBly7xMjs&w=480]
Readfearn’s not the only one to notice: climate campaigner Bill McKibben tweeted “NZ doing its best to become a junior league petrostate, talk about bad timing” to draw attention to a 350.org blog post about Key’s tasteless little video.
The foolishness of trying to build an extraction economy around fossil fuels at a time when the carbon bubble — the over-valuation of carbon reserves by oils and coal companies — is beginning to gain traction in financial markets is all too obvious. Investing in assets that will be stranded by the inevitability of action on climate change is a strategic nonsense.
Unfortunately that’s part for the course for a government locked into an outdated set of political ideas, wedded to a world-view that considers action on emissions optional. Unless they wake up and see the world changing around them, they will find themselves as stranded as the tax payer funds they plan waste by subsidising fossil fuel exploration and extraction.