Don’t be a Rodney, John Key!

IanMcEwansmall.jpgDon’t be a Rodney, John, be a Barack on climate change. That’s the central message of the new Don’t be a Rodney, John Key! blog, created to promote a letter-writing campaign to our new leader, urging him to ignore ACT’s call for inaction and recognise that this is an issue that demands clear, consistent leadership. Blogger Morgan points out:

The world is watching. On Tuesday 18 November, Barack Obama made a powerful statement that was heard around the globe: “Now is the time to confront this challenge once and for all. Delay is no longer an option. Denial is no longer an acceptable response. The stakes are too high. The consequences, too serious.”

Delay? Denial? He’s talking about Rodney!

I wholeheartedly endorse Morgan’s campaign. Write a letter or send an email to Key (details of how on the site), politely urging action. Join the Facebook group. I’m going to write to Key, Nick Smith and my constituency MP, Colin King. I hope they’ll listen.

But I’m not holding my breath.

PS: Russell Brown covers the ACT denial deal in detail here. Worth a read (h/t Carol).

PPS: Jeanette Fitzsimons has a punchy post on Key’s options over at Frogblog.

104 thoughts on “Don’t be a Rodney, John Key!”

  1. “Be like this guy (Obama)” eh?

    Well OK.

    Obama, 18 Nov:
    “storms that are growing stronger with each passing hurricane season…” –

    Real World:
    “Record inactivity continues: Past 24-months of Northern Hemisphere TC activity (ACE) lowest in 30-years”
    http://coaps.fsu.edu/~maue/tropical/

    So we should be like Mr Charisma and pull phakts out of thin air?

  3. More warmist cherry-picking Jonno. The link above clearly shows GLOBALLY no increase in hurricane intensity.
    Picking regions which have had a slight increase does not refute this, just like an increase in Atlantic sea temp, does not contradict the ARGO network, which has shown NO overall global ocean warming, and in fact a “slight cooling”.

  5. Simon Upton has an interesting take on the situation in today’s DomPost:

    http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominionpost/4779824a26342.html

    He makes some good points, including the following advice to the Nats:

    “Secondly, it should go nowhere near reopening a debate on the science. That may be ACT’s wish but the supply and confidence agreement does not promise it – the terms of reference have yet to be agreed. What fresh insights can a select committee of New Zealand politicians add to a subject that has been exhaustively canvassed elsewhere?”

  6. Re Upton’s Dompost article. This issue has never been “exhaustively canvassed”. It has been exhausively filtered through the IPCC process, whereby a bureaucracy has been charged with deciding whether the reasons for their existence are real or important.

    It is entirely appropriate that this issue be thoroughly debated, after 11 years of non-warming, and in the teeth of the worst recession in 70 years when ordinary people are finally realising how much these fanciful promises their “leaders” have been making are going to cost them.

  9. In Pre-Cambrian times there was no limestone, no coal, no oil and no
    gas. This planet has not gained any carbon since then if we neglect e
    the miniscule contribution from carbonaceous chondrites. We now have
    much limestone, dolomite, marble, which all consist of carbonate
    minerals (CaCO3 mostly), coal, oil and gas, though we have burned some
    of those resources. Just consider how much carbon, from carbon dioxide,
    is locked up in the chalk deposits visible at Dover? This chalk lies
    under the surface not only of a large part of south east England but a
    large part of France and Germany as well. That is just one limestone!
    There are thousands worldwide. Every shellbed on the beach is a
    potential limestone rock. All those rocks and resources have arisen
    directly or indirectly from carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Clearly
    there was much more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere in the past than
    there is now. The mere existence of life on this planet must
    demonstrate that slightly increased levels of carbon dioxide in the
    atmosphere cannot be harmful.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Phanerozoic_Carbon_Dioxide.png

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:All_palaeotemps.png

    Both taken from:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cretaceous

  10. Carol Stewart 12.02.08 at 3:37 pm

    >Let’s get this clear, Steve, what data are you referring to when you say there has been 11 years of non-warming?

    Did you post that book? It has not arrived.

  17. Oh.. I am sorry Roger, I was just using yours and Richard’s ‘logic’. After all, there was no ice in Antarctica 40 million years ago. Hence temperatures must have been hotter.

  18. jonno 12.03.08 at 9:02 am

    >Oh.. I am sorry Roger, I was just using yours and Richard’s ‘logic’. After all, there was no ice in Antarctica 40 million years ago. Hence temperatures must have been hotter.

    40 million years ago Antarctica was not where it is now. The position of Antarctica over the geographic pole may well be responsible in part for the climate of the last 2.5 million years.

  19. HADCRUT, RSS, GISS & UAH all show no warming for 11 years.

    This is – as far as I can tell – complete nonsense. Please educate us by supplying references, Steve – and not just to a video of yourself making counterfactual assertions.

  21. Oh… as I am using climate sceptic ‘logic’, allow me Roger to change my viewpoint….

    NO WARMING FOR 15 MILLION YEARS

    Or should I say

    NO WARMING FOR 500 MILLION YEARS

  25. Don’t be patronising, Steve.
    I just saw your YouTube video and thought it was also very dishonest to show your temperature record starting at 1998 – an anomalous year.
    Science 101 also includes viewing data honestly and in context.

  26. The global warming devout certainly didn’t refrain from pouncing on 1998 as proof of their beliefs.

    “what we’ve seen has long since left the boundaries of the normal and the expected….People are sweltering out there, How long is it going to take before people in Congress get the message?”
    -Al Gore, July 1998

    Dishonest?

  28. Personally I don’t really give a stuff about Al Gore, but what Wrathall said re: Gore should go for people saying ‘it’s really cold this month’ as well.

    Why choose 1998 as a reference anyway? Why not 1997? 1999?

  29. Mr Wrathall gets on his high horse about us not applying science 101 but he himslf ignores statistics 101, which when analysing time series data is kind of crucial. The first thing you are taught when analysing data is that simply eye balling the data while useful can be misleading and you need to test it using the appropriate statistical tests.

    Put simply in this case looking at 10 or 11 years of data gives you no meaningful conclusions about the long term trends (i.e. changing climate). There is too much noise in the data due to the “weather”.

    Because of this noise you need to include more data points until the trend becomes statistically significant. When you do this you find that the trend is (still) upwards (oh dear).

    By looking at a statistically insignificant sub set of the data you are doing what is known as cherry picking. This is at best ignorant or at worst intellectually dishonest. So which do you think this is an example of?

    Another question I have is why has Steve McIntyre that paragon of intellectual and scientific honesty and defender of statistical rigour not ‘audited’ (TM) these claims?

    Doug Clover

  31. I have never denied that there is a long-term positive temperature trend. (0.13 deg C / decade since the ’50s according to the IPCC link I posted in another thread). This is NOT catastrophic, NOT inprecedented, and the non-warming of the last decade does NOT give any evidence that positive feedbacks are accelerating any warming trend to a tipping point.

    It is for that reason (plus this 2nd Great Depression thing) that countries the world over are dumping the economic mutual suicide pact known as Kyoto. Most have been venal lip-service providors of the Clark/Key variety all along anyway.

  32. We’ve argued about your interpretation of this stuff before. 0.13C per decade is the lowest multi-decade trend (UAH satellite derived, IIRC) of any dataset. Wonder why you chose that?

    Anyway, it is still 13 times faster than the fastest rate of change in the global average seen since the current ice age cycle began four million years. Is that rate “unprecedented”? Define your period. In the last four million years (ie since we evolved), the answer is yes.

    You can continue to bang the “non-warming” drum, but as has been pointed out to you repeatedly, you’re wrong. Continuing to assert something so patently wrong just makes you look foolish.

    Positive feedbacks are certainly in play – the albedo change in the Arctic for one, methane for another. We can only hope that they don’t kick in with a vengeance.

    Tipping points? We may only find out about those after we pass them. I’d rather not, thanks.

    Countries are not “dumping Kyoto”. They’re currently at work in Poznan trying to negotiate its successor. Will they have the balls to aim for a low enough stabilisation target? I doubt it.

    Must be a lot more comfortable in your world of artificial certainty…

  33. Excuse me which of the Annex 1 countries are pulling out of the KP?

    I can think of only two that have announced an intention to do so, but not yet, and most probably not all as the diplomatic repercussions would be too severe.

    I have yet to see any evidence except this alarmism from people like Rodney that putting a global price on carbon would lead to economic destruction. NONE AT ALL. At the most the concerns raised are about timing and international competitiveness, or about the least cost transition paths. Nothing about the end of our economic civilization.

    Doug

  34. 0.13 deg C/ decade is not “my interpretation”. It’s the one the IPCC use. It’s in their 2007 report.

    “Anyway, it is still 13 times faster than the fastest rate of change in the global average seen since the current ice age cycle began four million years”(Gareth)
    Now this is just bizarre Gareth. You seem to have extended the flat line of the fraudulent “hockey stick” back 4 million years, and are claiming the temperature has been stable ALL that time? That there has never been a 50-year trend, where the temperature change has exceeded (0.13/13 = 0.01 deg C/decade). Is that what you’re claiming?

    Kyoto is dead because of the vast disconnect between the pledges made and what has actually happened. The Huge emissions rise under helen clark a case in point.

    “Over the next five years, we should also lease more of the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska for oil and gas production. And we should also tap more of our substantial natural gas reserves”-Climate hero Obama, Aug 2008

  36. Steve, this is getting boring. I said nothing about temperature being stable, I said that the current rate of global temp change was unprecedented over the last 4 million years. Warming out of an ice age is about 5C over 5,000 years, or 0.01C per decade. Note I carefully stated “global temp”: there have been larger and faster regional temperature changes (Younger Dryas in Greenland, for example), but that should be cause for concern, not make us relax!

  38. Stephen: here’s a good overview. Look at the boxed chart for the last 450k years to get an idea of the scale of the swings on the 5m year chart.

    Around about 4 million years ago tectonics closed the gap between N and S America, rather dramatically changing oceanic circulation.

  39. Nice piece by Peter Barrett in today’s DomPost, titled ‘Unlike markets, climate won’t bounce back soon’. Unlike THAT piece by Bryan Leyland, it’s located in the op-ed pages rather than in Business Day. Hmm.
    No link yet on the DomPost website .. last time a link was missing I asked them to provide one, and they did.

  40. “Warming out of an ice age is about 5C over 5,000 years, or 0.01C per decade. ” (Gareth)

    Are you seriously claiming you know that EVERY ice age in the last 4 million years has had a gentle, 0.01 deg C/decade freeze-in over 5000 years, then the reverse thaw-out? Ridiculous. No-one knows this. We simply don’t have the temporal resolution with our proxy measurements.

    However this needs to be what happened in order for your statement to be true.

    As for the Younger Dryas, there is substantial evidence of at least hemispheric, rapid temperature swings , though not always synchronious:
    “The transitions each occurred over a period of a decade or so ”
    “summit of Greenland was ~15 °C colder ”
    “In western Europe and Greenland, the Younger Dryas is a well-defined synchronous cool period.”
    “South America shows a less well defined initiation but a sharp termination”
    http://www.answers.com/topic/younger-dryas

    Had we had HADCRUT, GISS et.al then, we would certainly have observed 50 year-periods within the Younger Dryas, where global temperature changed by more than the 0.5 deg C or so we have seen since the 1950s, And certainly more than the 0.01 deg C/decade you claim was never exceeded.
    And that’s not even going back 1% of 4 million years.

  41. Are you seriously claiming you know that EVERY ice age in the last 4 million years has had a gentle, 0.01 deg C/decade freeze-in over 5000 years, then the reverse thaw-out?

    Can you not read what I wrote?

    We simply don’t have the temporal resolution with our proxy measurements.

    On centennial timescales we most certainly do. The Younger Dryas initiation, for instance, has been dated to the exact year.

    Your quotes re the Younger Dryas don’t disprove what I wrote. Regional changes can be much greater over short timescales, but global changes are generally much slower. During the last 50 years, your period of choice, the Antarctic peninsula has warmed by 2.8C, for instance, as have parts of the Arctic.

    You love your straw men, don’t you? I never claimed that 0.01C/decade was “never exceeded”, just that that was the average rate over the whole period.

    The fact remains: the current rate of global temperature range is at least an order of magnitude greater than the warming out of recent ages. That is as big a problem as the magnitude of warming, particularly from an ecosystem perspective.

  42. FACTS:

    1. There was global warming in the second half of the 20th century but the temperature peaked in 1998 and it has been cooling since. Four of the five most active solar cycles since the 1600’s were in this same warming period. Active solar cycles historically have caused warming tempertatures.

    2. Many parts of the world experienced a harsh winter in 2007-2008. The winter of 2007-2008 had the most snow cover in North America, Asia, and Siberia in over 60 years. Quite a few had record low temperatures and it snowed in Baghdad and Saudia Arabia for the first time in recorded history.

    3. China had its worst winter in 100 years. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2008_Chinese_winter_storms

    4. On Oct 15, 2008 Arctic sea ice had grown 29% larger than in the previous year. The rate of Arctic ice growth in October was the fastest ever recorded – over 112,000 square kilometers per day. http://omniclimate.wordpress.com/2008/11/05/arctic-sea-ice-extent-in-october-2008-fastest-ever-growth/

    5. According to NOAA, The average US temperature in October 2008 was 54.5 F. This was -0.3 F cooler than the 1901-2000 (20th century) average – the 44th coolest October in 114 years. The temperature trend for the period of record (1895 to present) is 0.1 degrees Fahrenheit per decade.
    http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/cag3/na.html

    6. Atmospheric CO2 continues to increase ftp://ftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/ccg/co2/trends/co2_mm_mlo.txt

    7. Solar winds are at 50 year low according to NASA, who says that the sun’s output is at the lowest level ever recorded by modern instruments (announced on 23 Sept. 2008).

    With all the evidence above, doesn’t the theory of global warming appear to be a load of bull?

  43. Despite marathon negotiations, the EU remains deadlocked over its disputed climate package. At their meeting in Brussels yesterday, the EU environment ministers were unable to agree on new compromises. The EU emissions trading scheme is the biggest problem they faced. Nightlong marathon sessions by European ambassadors, regular telephone calls between the federal Chancellery in Berlin and the Elys̩e Palace in Paris, secret meetings of the most important negotiators Рonly the 27 European environment ministers who are technically responsible for climate policy making have nothing to decide anymore.
    –Wiesbadener Kurier, 5 December 2008

    Talks on a new climate package among EU ministers ended in the Polish city of Gdansk Wednesday without a set deal. Despite compromises being made, Italy has demanded a review in 2014, which prevented a final agreement from being reached.
    –Deutsche Welle, 4 December 2008

    Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said Wednesday an agreement was “close” on a “version that will allow us to avoid a veto.” However, a Polish official in Brussels Thursday laid out a new condition, calling for the carbon trading system to be delayed for his country beyond the proposed date of 2016.
    –AFP, 4 December 2008

    German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Thursday the European Union’s efforts to lead the way on climate change would fail without a “sensible” global deal in 2009 that involved the United States. “If the United States does not participate, if we don’t agree next year on a sensible international deal, then our efforts in Europe to lead the way will of course fail.”
    –AFP, 4 December 2008

    We must ensure that our energy-intensive industry, which is driven by exports, is of course excluded from the trading of (emissions quotas) in order to make sure they are not disadvantaged on the global market. The way things stand, we cannot spoil our export chances and stand by while jobs in the chemicals, steel and other industries move to regions of the world where climate protection is less stringent than here.
    –Angela Merkel, Deutscher Bundestag, 4 December 2008

    In response to Chancellor Angela Merkel’s statement in the German Parliament this morning regarding the EU’s Climate and Energy Package, WWF Germany issued a scathing rebuke. “Chancellor Merkel is about to change from being a climate chancellor to becoming a climate problem,” WWF spokesperson Regine Guenther said. “Germany is blocking the EU’s ambitious climate targets in order to protects its non-innovative industries. As a result, Germany is endangering international attempts to protect the climate.
    –WWF Germany, 4 December 2008

    The scale of the popular movement and the force with which activists and agitators deliver their arguments is key to the success of any future international agreement to tackle climate change. We need the utopians and we need the agitators.
    –UK Secretary of State for Climate Change and Energy Propaganda, Ed Miliband, 25 November 2008

    Sadly, I think that the situation at the BBC is now a serious one with respect to their uncritical reporting of climate change. Around the world, the grand narrative of ‘global warming’ is dying, strangled by the cold realities of the economic crisis, by world politics, by the fact that an increasing number of people are seeing through the exaggerations and distortions of much of the Green movement, but, above all, because of climate itself.
    –Philip Stott, The Clamour of the Times, 4 December 2008

  44. Roger,

    Your comments are much more interesting when they’re not just cut-and-pasted from somewhere else. Your “facts” seem to be from “Bob” at Muriel Newman’s fanclub – Bob Carter, perhaps? It would be like him to use “eschatology” in the first sentence (which you left out).

    Sadly, the “FACTS” are anything but. Both parts of 1 have been repeatedly shown to be false here and elsewhere, 2) might be true, but globally winter 2007-8 was the 16th warmest in the record (0.32°C above the 20th century mean of 12.1°C).

    One the sea ice freeze-up, the NSIDC says: Ice extent for the month of November was 580,000 square kilometers (220,000 square miles) greater than November 2007 but 680,000 square kilometers (260,000 square miles) less than the 1979 to 2000 November average. Still well below average.

    The US might have had a cold month, but it’s not the whole world.

    CO2 does continue to increase, and its climate forcing continues to increase. But the 20-30 year lag in system response means we’re seeing warming due to GHG levels in the 1970-80s.

    The solar wind? Where’s the link between that and climate?

    Not much of a contribution, Roger. It’s nothing more than a few pre-digested talking points provided for the crank echo chamber to spam around climate discussions. Sad to see that you’re happy to play that PR game.

  45. Eeschatology is a pretty good word to describe the rantings and ravings of some who cannot be mentioned!

    A linear regression on somewhat illusory world temperatures since 1940 matching, somewhat poorly, the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide over the same period, coupled with a little over simplified physics taken in isolation, does not prove anything other that that some people cannot see the wood for the trees.

    The other bits that I cut and pasted rather suggest that NZ will be left out on a limb if we do more that pay lip service to ETS. In view of the European propensity to use any excuse available to restrict our trade I am inclined to the view that paying lip service to ETS is probably prudent. But let it just rest at lip service.

  47. We can agree(!), in part at least, about the need for an ETS. I have long argued that whatever the merit of the science, we need to act to limit emissions in our own economic self-interest. I would extend that to say that we need to be seen to be playing the game (and platitudes about “leadership” were nothing more than that) in order to reduce our risk. If Key & Co are setting us up to be “fast followers”, they increase that risk significantly.

    “Over simplified physics”? Ahem. The radiative properties of carbon dioxide are well known, well measured, and have their roots in quantum physics.

    As to woods and trees, I would suggest that it’s those who deny the reality of warming who are having the vision problems. There is so much evidence that it takes a sort of heroic perversity to ignore it.

  48. >“Over simplified physics”? Ahem. The radiative properties of carbon dioxide are well known, well measured, and have their roots in quantum physics.

    There is a bit more to it than a closed box experiment.

    What evidence? You have your closed box CO2 experiment, a poor correlation between temperature and CO2 since about 1940 and a bunch of numerical models all producing different ‘scenarios’ none of which have been shown to have any predictive value whatever.

  49. Gareth, you clearly said “(0.13 deg/decade) is still 13 times faster than the fastest rate of change in the global average seen since the current ice age cycle began four million years.”
    When it it is pointed out that claiming that 0.1 deg/decade has never been exceeded over the last 4 million years is absurd, you shift the goal posts and spin:
    “I never claimed that 0.01C/decade was “never exceeded”, just that that was the average rate over the whole period.”
    In other words, you are comparing a few decades of warming in the 20th century with an “average” rate over thousands of years derived from proxies and claiming that the observed warming was “unprecedented”.
    What a beautiful illustration of the smoke and mirrors that warmists use to railroad us all into economic self-harming.

  50. What a beautiful illustration of the smoke and mirrors that warmists use to railroad us all into economic self-harming.

    What a beautiful illustration of how far you are prepared to go to:
    a) deliberately misinterpret what I say
    b) ignore the real data
    …in order to fit everything into your own political construct.

    It’s a pity, because as I have argued many times (it’s in the book), whether we have a “left wing” or “right wing” or “pink with blue polka dots” approach to a solution is much less important than having a stab at a solution in the first place.

    Suggesting that there isn’t a problem because of your political views or economic interest is just stupid.

  51. >It’s a pity, because as I have argued many times (it’s in the book), whether we have a “left wing” or “right wing” or “pink with blue polka dots” approach to a solution is much less important than having a stab at a solution in the first place.

    That is where you are totally wrong. When you can reasonably estimate the probabilities and the costs you can multiply them and go for the lowest cost-probability multiple. If you cannot properly estimate the costs or the probabilities the only rational course of action is to do nothing. That is what we should be doing now, nothing except work on the costs and probabilities.

  52. That’s where you totally ignore the work that’s been done. A reasonable assessment of the science suggests there’s a serious problem to address, and all major economic modelling efforts suggests that the cost of action is far less than the cost of inaction. Doing nothing is not a credible option.

    Governments operate in a world where they take huge decisions based on imperfect modelling and imperfect information – economic policy, for instance, or the invasion of a Middle Eastern country. We have more than enough information to act on the climate problem, and many countries and businesses already are.

  53. That economist fellow whose name I do not recall grossly underestimated the discount rate. Had he used a plausible rate, somewhere between the rate at which you borrow from the bank and the rate at which the bank charges you, the stupidity of his analysis would have been obvious to all.

    Of course decisions are made on imperfect information, all the time. For example an open pit slope is cut at angle that the cost of slope failure multiplied by the probability of it equals the cost of flattening the slope in terms of the extra dirt to be shifted.
    Calculations of this type are the norm in the real world in which, clearly, you do not live.

  54. Stern’s calculations have been repeated by others – without making the same discount rate assumption – and the basic conclusion stands. Early action is cheapest.

    Real world? Ignoring risks puts you in La-la Land, Roger.

  55. There are half a dozen standard equations for calculating the value of work etc at some time in the future. Basically at the interest rates at which we operate our economy we are throwing money down the drain if the anticipated event is more that 20 to 25 years in the future. If the probability of that event is low, as is a negative outcome from climatic warming, it is even more senseless than it otherwise would be.

    The world did not suffer a catastrophe when the climate was warm enough to grow grapes in northern England and for the norsemen to farm in Greenland. If there was no disaster then there will be no disaster if or when the climate warms sufficiently to match those climatic optima.

    When you cannot determine the risk of an event and you cannot estimate the cost of that event the sensible thing is to do nothing. This is the situation we are in.

  56. If the probability of that event is low, as is a negative outcome from climatic warming, it is even more senseless than it otherwise would be.

    This is only true if you ignore the evidence, and the work done over the last 10 – 15 years. The probability of a “negative outcome” from climate change is not low – it’s a certainty. The extent of the damage is arguable, and can be affected by the actions we choose to take on emissions reductions and the adaptations we put in place to cope with the changes.

    As I said before, all credible cost-benefit studies show that the costs of action are far smaller than the costs of inaction, and the longer we wait to start the higher the cost of action becomes.

    I suggest you do a bit more research on what’s currently being grown in Greenland, and the state of the English wine industry. You might be impressed at how well both are doing – providing even more confirmation that we’re warming, and quickly.

  57. >Carol Stewart 12.05.08 at 10:47 am

    >Nice piece by Peter Barrett in today’s DomPost, titled ‘Unlike markets, climate won’t bounce back soon’.

    Barrett is the deputy director of the NZ Climate Change Research Institute ant Victoria University of Wellington and his employment
    and the institute’s funding and future depend heavily on the claim of man-made warming.

    We would never accept similar comments in the business world, especially the stock market, made by someone with such clear
    vested interest so why is it okay to spend millions of dollars of tax-payers’ money on Barrett’s word?

  58. >As I said before, all credible cost-benefit studies show that the costs of action are far smaller than the costs of inaction, and the longer we wait to start the higher the cost of action becomes.

    Stern and Garnaut are not credible. They have both been rubbished.

    Here is the equation to use:

    Uniform Series Present Worth Factor.

    P=R[i(1+i)^n/(1=i)n-1]

    Plot the results in a spread sheet using a realistic discount rate, say 6%.

    The equation comes from Economic Decision Making for Engineers and Managers by Frank P S Lu.

  59. >This is only true if you ignore the evidence, and the work done over the last 10 – 15 years. The probability of a “negative outcome” from climate change is not low – it’s a certainty.

    The ONLY evidence is historical and that evidence does not support your case. That means that the probability of a negative outcome is low.

  60. Roger, this is like talking to a brick wall. You choose to ignore all the evidence, all the work done, in favour some simplistic certainty you find reassuring. Well, I’m sorry, but the rest of the world has moved on. Pity you can’t.

    so why is it okay to spend millions of dollars of tax-payers’ money on Barrett’s word?

    Because it’s not just Barrett’s word. As his piece says, it’s “the word” of all the major science academies, based on the entirety of current earth science studies. Good enough for me.

  61. Gareth, before you waste trillions of dollars having a “stab at a solution” you need to actually show that there is a problem that needs to be solved. Instead your claims of “unprecedented” warming fall to pieces.

    And look what brilliant “stabs” we’ve had so far:
    -NZ Kyoto forest chainsaw massacre
    – The biofuel-mandate driven subsidisation of tropical rainforest destruction (for palm oil)
    – The corn ethanol boondoggle producing food inflation, food riots, and contributing to 3rd world malnutrition.
    – Electricity price inflation in NZ due to shutting off economical sources.
    – The massive fraud of the Clean Development Mechanism -taxed in China to fund coal-fired stations.
    etc etc

    Roger is right. Doing nothing is better than doing stupid stuff.

  62. your claims of “unprecedented” warming fall to pieces.

    Point to an earlier interglacial where there was a rapid (century-scale) 38% increase in CO2 levels. Can’t do it? Thought not. What’s happening is certainly unprecedented. The current rate of global temp increase is far faster than any but the most severe regional (not global) change we can see in the paleoclimate record of the last few million years. You choose to ignore that. Your loss.

    Don’t expect me to defend government incompetence in dealing with the issue. But you do seem to have a very black and white view of the issues you raise – perhaps more black than white. I would argue that the majority of the electricity price inflation in NZ arose as a result of the ill-advised Bradford reforms, and significant changes in the patterns of energy use. I expect Bryan Lyland might agree.. 😉

  66. >Why do you think I wrote the book?

    I will have a look at it and see if I can find any. My first impression is that it is all rant and conclusions drawn from very little. Perhaps you could give me the number of the page where you have hidden the evidence.

  67. My first impression is that it is all rant and conclusions drawn from very little.

    Thanks for that considered review. Come back to me when you’ve read it.

  74. Yep. At the moment Roger’s barely worth responding to. If he could cut down the belligerence and respond to substantive comments a dialogue might become possible.

  76. “Point to an earlier interglacial where there was a rapid (century-scale) 38% increase in CO2 levels. Can’t do it? Thought not. “(Gareth)

    Another clumsy attempt at goalpost-shifting. You claimed that late 20th century TEMPERATURE increase was unprecedented. Now you are talking about CO2 increase.
    NEWSFLASH: CO2 on its own causes no global disaster. It is the purported UNPRECEDENTED CO2 -induced warming that you must prove. You can’t and you know it.

  77. You claimed that late 20th century TEMPERATURE increase was unprecedented. Now you are talking about CO2 increase.

    Both are unprecedented – and you don’t get one without the other.

    NEWSFLASH: CO2 on its own causes no global disaster.

    Haven’t heard of ocean acidification, Steve? Even if CO2 had no additional warming effect, adding more to the atmosphere would continue to add to the ocean carbon load, causing sever problems for oceanic ecosystems. A good enough reason to de-carbonise the economy all on its own.

    It is the purported UNPRECEDENTED CO2 -induced warming that you must prove. You can’t and you know it.

    I repeat: the current rate of global warming is unprecedented in at least the last 4 million years. I’m happy to concede that there have been larger, perhaps faster, changes regionally in that time, but not on a global scale. If we carry on adding CO2 to the atmosphere, that warming will continue, and it will cause huge issues for humanity to deal with.

    So let’s turn this round. You want us to do nothing on climate change – make no cuts in emissions. The science doesn’t support your position, so in order to persuade us to take your preferred path, you need to provide compelling evidence why we should ignore the best evidence we have, and take your word.

    Where’s your compelling evidence, Steve?

    I won’t be holding my breath.

  79. >Haven’t heard of ocean acidification, Steve? Even if CO2 had no additional warming effect, adding more to the atmosphere would continue to add to the ocean carbon load, causing sever problems for oceanic ecosystems. A good enough reason to de-carbonise the economy all on its own.

    The ocean de-gasses as it warms and absorbs carbon dioxide as it cools. Try changing the temperature of a bottle of soda water and see for yourself.

    Furthermore there are huge buffering effects in the ocean as any chemist with half a clue will tell you.

    The deep ocean already gas enough dissolved carbon dioxide to dissolve carbonate shells. But that is very deep. Show me the evidence that the stability field of calcium carbonate is getting progressively shallower. When it reaches the edge of the continental shelf we might have something to worry about. Until then it is just so much hot air.

    >Where’s your compelling evidence, Steve?

    Where is yours? All I see in your book is a rant about what we should be doing in response to something that has not been demonstrated. All you can say is “the science is proved”. Well it is not!!!!!!!!

  80. jonno 12.09.08 at 4:08 pm

    > Hey look Gareth…

    >There has been no global warming for the last 500 million years! I love the sceptic logic.

    Just how idiotic and puerile can you get?

  81. >If we carry on adding CO2 to the atmosphere, that warming will continue, and it will cause huge issues for humanity to deal with.

    It will. It will. It will. It will. It will. It will. It will. It will. ad nauseam.

    Sorry mate you have to do more that just say that.

  82. Carol Stewart 12.09.08 at 2:17 pm

    > Bring back Malcolm! The gentleman sceptic..

    Can you dig up a gentleman believer for us?

    jonno and [snipped: keep it polite please, Roger – GR] fragment hardly qualify.

  84. See Roge, you just prove my point, you are so sophomoric.

    “ad nauseam.”

    No that is just you.

    No global warming for 500 million years! I thought you would agree of all people Roger. It’s similar logic to no warming for 10 years that you spout out.

    I am glad that you think that this type of logic is “idiotic and puerile”

  85. Until then it is just so much hot air.

    Once again, Roger, you simply don the blinkers when you don’t like the view. Ocean acidification is measurable and substantial, and may be happening faster than expected.

    All I see in your book is a rant about what we should be doing in response to something that has not been demonstrated. All you can say is “the science is proved”. Well it is not!!!!!!!!

    A commendably concise but woefully inaccurate summary of the book, I’m afraid. As for “proof” – beyond reasonable doubt is good enough for me.

  86. jonno 12.09.08 at 4:39 pm

    >See Roge, you just prove my point, you are so sophomoric.

    > “ad nauseam.”

    > No that is just you.

    > No global warming for 500 million years! I thought you would agree of all people Roger. It’s similar logic to no warming for 10 years that you spout out.

    >I am glad that you think that this type of logic is “idiotic and puerile”

    Surely I have made the point ad nauseam that as far as I am concerned trends of 10, 20, 50, or even 100 years are, at bottom, meaningless.

  87. There are 1.3 billion cubic km of seawater out there. Even if every bit of fossil fuel that could be extracted at positive EROI was burnt it wouldn’t substantially alter pH.

    Good idea though to try to change the subject from your massive failure to demonstrate unprecedented catastrophic warming.

  88. >Once again, Roger, you simply don the blinkers when you don’t like the view. Ocean acidification is measurable and substantial, and may be happening faster than expected.

    MAY BE ………….. How are our mussel and oyster farms doing?

  89. Even if every bit of fossil fuel that could be extracted at positive EROI was burnt it wouldn’t substantially alter pH.

    So how do you explain the measured change? Magic?

  90. >So how do you explain the measured change? Magic?

    Just within the expected and normal range for which there is insufficient data to determine at the moment.

  92. There are 1.3 billion cubic km of seawater out there. Even if every bit of fossil fuel that could be extracted at positive EROI was burnt it wouldn’t substantially alter pH.

    Got a calculation for that? Back of the envelope would be fine.

  93. “Can you dig up a gentleman believer for us?”

    I can almost hear your apopleptic splutters as you read this, Roger, but a good candidate for ‘gentleman believer’ would be Gareth, on the grounds that he is good-humoured, courteous, patient and generous. His speedy concession to Malcolm on the sea-ice bet was a lesson in grace and good sportsmanship.

  99. Vincent Gray had a short letter to the ED in the Dompost this morning in response to Peter Barrett’s piece. In it he claimed no warming since 1995. Hmm so far warming stopped in 1997, 2003, 2005 and now 1995. Ye gods they can’t work out something this simple. Perhaps they should get to together and sort this out. Oh that’s right the Heartland Institute is going to do this.

    Doug

  101. Since 1860 there has been a far better correlation between the sunspot cycle and temperature than there has been between carbon dioxide and temperature. Drawing emailed to Carol Stewart.

  102. Stupidity of the fart tax.

    Start with carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
    Carbon converted to grass with the aid of sunlight.
    Carbon (grass) converted to meat, bone and milk in cows, also excreta.
    Meat and milk diverted to human biomass while bone is returned to the soil as blood and bone meal.
    Carbon (grass) also converted to carbon dioxide and methane.
    Methane converted to carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

    In this part of the cycle there net transfer of carbon from the atmosphere to the soil in the form of excreta and bone meal.

    The milk and meat are converted to meat and bone in the human biomass which also releases carbon dioxide and methane to the atmosphere.

    Unfortunately, if you believe that carbon dioxide is bad stuff, carbon dioxide is returned to the atmosphere when human bodies are cremated. Those of you who believe that carbon dioxide is bad had better be sure that you are not cremated. Burial at sea would be good but better would be the processing of your hard parts into bone meal and your soft parts into compost. Here is your chance to make a contribution to the world that matches your loudly expressed views.

    Following the trail we can see that all the carbon in this cycle comes from the atmosphere but some of it is returned to the soil and fixed, temporarily at least. Do you bit and ensure that your carbon does not go up the smokestack!

  103. Roger, you seem to have begun using this place to post random musings that have, at best, a tangential relationship to either Gareth’s original post or the evolving discussions. Have you ever considered getting your own blog for these and doing us the courtesy of staying on topic when you post here?

Leave a Reply