Tired of the debate? Environmental scientist David Keith discusses a cheap, effective, shocking solution to climate change: What if we injected a huge cloud of ash into the atmosphere, to deflect sunlight and heat? As an emergency measure to slow a melting ice cap, it could work. Keith discusses why it’s a good idea, why it’s a terrible one — and who, despite the cost, might be tempted to use it.

He calls this and similar strategies: geoengineering, and why these kinds of strategies also pose a moral hazard for the environmental lobby. However, he insists that this line of thinking is not only necessary but inevitable against the near-zero progress we have had in the last 50-year-long debate on climate change.

Scientists are grappling with a warming phenomena observed on other planets in our Solar System and are at a rush to explain it (since there aren’t any gas-guzzling SUVs on those planets last they checked).

National Geographic reported about the findings of Habibullo Abdussamatov on Mars:

Habibullo Abdussamatov, head of space research at St. Petersburg’s Pulkovo Astronomical Observatory in Russia, says the Mars data is evidence that the current global warming on Earth is being caused by changes in the sun.

“The long-term increase in solar irradiance is heating both Earth and Mars,” he said.

Although some scientists are quick to point to other reasons for martian weather changes:

Since there is no known life on Mars it suggests rapid changes in planetary climates could be natural phenomena.

The mechanism at work on Mars appears, however, to be different from that on Earth. One of the researchers, Lori Fenton, believes variations in radiation and temperature across the surface of the Red Planet are generating strong winds.

But Mars isn’t the only planet warming up, as Live Science reports:

Others have pointed out anomalous warming on other worlds in our solar system.

Benny Peiser, a social anthropologist at Liverpool John Moores University who monitors studies and news reports of asteroids, global warming and other potentially apocalyptic topics, recently quoted in his daily electronic newsletter the following from a blog called Strata-Sphere:

“Global warming on Neptune’s moon Triton as well as Jupiter and Pluto, and now Mars has some [scientists] scratching their heads over what could possibly be in common with the warming of all these planets … Could there be something in common with all the planets in our solar system that might cause them all to warm at the same time?”

Peiser included quotes from recent news articles that take up other aspects of the idea.

“I think it is an intriguing coincidence that warming trends have been observed on a number of very diverse planetary bodies in our solar system,” Peiser said in an email interview. “Perhaps this is just a fluke.”

This of course flies in the face of the common assumption that the scientific has a “consensus” about global warming. A quick look below the surface shows that scientists are more divided about the issue than in agreement. From Chris Gupta:

The media rarely help, of course. When Newsweek featured global warming in a 1988 issue, it was claimed that all scientists agreed. Periodically thereafter it was revealed that although there had been lingering doubts beforehand, now all scientists did indeed agree. Even Mr. Gore qualified his statement on ABC only a few minutes after he made it, clarifying things in an important way. When Mr. Stephanopoulos confronted Mr. Gore with the fact that the best estimates of rising sea levels are far less dire than he suggests in his movie, Mr. Gore defended his claims by noting that scientists “don’t have any models that give them a high level of confidence” one way or the other and went on to claim–in his defense–that scientists “don’t know. . . . They just don’t know.”

So, presumably, those scientists do not belong to the “consensus.” Yet their research is forced, whether the evidence supports it or not, into Mr. Gore’s preferred global-warming template–namely, shrill alarmism. To believe it requires that one ignore the truly inconvenient facts. To take the issue of rising sea levels, these include: that the Arctic was as warm or warmer in 1940; that icebergs have been known since time immemorial; that the evidence so far suggests that the Greenland ice sheet is actually growing on average. A likely result of all this is increased pressure pushing ice off the coastal perimeter of that country, which is depicted so ominously in Mr. Gore’s movie. In the absence of factual context, these images are perhaps dire or alarming.

Nonetheless, the presumed consensus precludes alternative ideas to the global warming phenomenon, such as the solar theory propounded by scientists like Abdussamatov above and other theories. More from Chris Gupta:

Never mind that the current trends in climate are nothing new to this planet and have been repeated over and over again in a very identifiable cyclic pattern for many many millions of years. What Gore and Clinton are not talking about is the evidence that climate, volcanism, tectonic activity, cratering, and magnetic reversals may all be correlated. The evidence amassed from geological history shows irrefutably that there is a 14.1 million year cycle to the appearance of large craters on this planet, to tectonic movement, to sea level changes, and to magnetic reversals. The magnetic reversals coincide (every 28 million years) with the mass extinctions evidenced in the fossil record of the earth…just like a clicking clock (or bomb). And all of this coincides with the passage of our solar system through the galactic plane and again as we reach the furthest point away from the plane when we reverse direction and head the other way (the 14.1 million year cycle). All the planets in our solar system are presently showing signs of increased temperature. Our solar system (and the earth with it) is presently passing through the galactic plane.

What to make of all this then?

Something odd on Glenn Beck a couple of months ago, Gov. Schwarzenegger vetoes a bill to teach global warming in California schools just as Alaska records its coldest(??) summer on record.

Meanwhile more odd things on Fox News earlier this year, temperature stations around the world are registering temperature drops:

What the hell is going on?

Founder of CNN talks on Charlie Rose:

Notable comments:

• It will be catastrophic.
• We’ll be eight degrees hotter in 30 or 40 years
• None of the crops will grow.
• Most of the people will have died and the rest of us will be cannibals.
• Civilization will have broken down.
• The few people left will be living in a failed state.
• Living conditions will be intolerable.
• The droughts will be so bad there’ll be no more corn grown.
• We’ve got to stabilize the population.

Talk about reductio ad absurdum anyone?

First, a retaste of the popular documentary:

Now, more of Glenn Beck on his analysis of the fear mongering done by climate change lobbyists:

And a great treat, sentiments from the global warming messenger himself: Al Gore:

In a leadership conference broadcast over C-Span, a student freshman asks a poignant question of popular author, Michael Crichton: “why do you say environmentalism is a religion?”

Crichton explains his view on the many parallels between the climate change movement as it stands today and the functions and characteristics of what is considered organized religion.

In this video CNN’s Glenn Beck takes on the fear mongering of the global warming movement in his special “Exposed: The Climate of Fear”. Glenn Beck is very popular on CNN and this video is very easy to watch and entertaining. But it is informative as well. It does a good job of refuting Al Gore’s “Inconvenient Truth” and has several PhD scientists speaking on the subject to prove that there is no “consensus”. If you can only show one short video to a friend or relative to try to convince them that warming is not man’s fault this would probably be it.

Along with the climate change movement comes the movement for renewable energies, one of which is Ethanol–produced from corn and sugar plantations. It’s a natural alternative to petroleum and is a cleaner and cheaper fuel. The push for ethanol and similar alternative fuels is one of the fiercest lobbies especially in US politics.

Should it be? Here’s John Stossel on an ABC News Video that lays down the facts on ethanol against the near-religious clamor:

From Charles Choi’s article in Live Science:

Critical points of contention over ethanol regard whether or not creating it requires more energy than consuming it gives off. Although a great deal of energy that goes into ethanol comes from the sun, much human effort is also required when it comes to processing raw plant material to make ethanol. And there are the efforts that go along with farming and pesticide and fertilizer use.

Read the rest of his thoughts here.

Consider also the net benefits of ethanol, as against the need to allocate farmland to produce it–thus competing with food production resource. Before one cries panacea, take a second look.

This alert comes from CO2Science.Org

In a paper published in the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, four British scientists report that “agriculture accounts for 80-90% of all freshwater used by humans,” that “most of that is in crop production,” and that “in many areas, this water use is unsustainable.” As a result, they say that “farmers in many countries are now faced with legislative restrictions on use of water,” noting that the Chinese government “has set a target of a reduction of 20% in water use in agriculture by the year 2020,” such that “if food security for the region is not to be threatened, this must be achieved without a loss in production.” So how is this global food and water crisis to be met and overcome?

Some interesting info I encountered, which I bet 95% of people are ignorant about regarding the climate change facts. This is regarding the famous Kyoto Protocol or Kyoto Treaty.

In case you aren’t up to speed about the Kyoto Protocol, from wikipedia:

The Kyoto Protocol is a protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC or FCCC), an international environmental treaty produced at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), informally known as the Earth Summit, held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, from 3–14 June 1992. The treaty is intended to achieve “stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system.”

The treaty was negotiated in Kyoto, Japan in December 1997, opened for signature on 16 March 1998, and closed on 15 March 1999. The agreement came into force on 16 February 2005 following ratification by Russia on 18 November 2004. As of May 2008, a total of 181 countries and 1 regional economic integration organization (the EEC) have ratified the agreement (representing over 61.6% of emissions from Annex I countries).

The rather trivial bit I researched is that the Kyoto Treaty, negotiated in 1997, used 1990 as its base year for measuring increases or decreases in CO2 emissions amongst countries. This doesn’t strike a raw nerve? Well, not until you delve deeper into the facts and see why 1990 is significant.

Well as it turns out, between 1990 – 1995, for various reasons CO2 emissions had been declining, especially amongst Kyoto Treaty ratifying countries. The following excerpt from Climate Skeptic:

CO2 Emissions Changes, 1990-1995

 

EU	-2.2%
Former Communist	-26.1%
Germany	-10.7%
UK	-6.9%
Japan	7.2%
US	6.4%

In the above, the categories are not mutually exclusive.  Germany and UK are also in the EU numbers, and Germany is included in the former communist number as well.  Note that all numbers exclude offsets and credits.

As you can see, led by the collapse of the former communist economies and the shuttering of inefficient Soviet industries, in addition to the substitution of British gas for coal, the European negotiators knew they had tremendous CO2 reductions already in their pocket, IF 1990 was chosen as a base year.  They could begin Kyoto already looking like heroes, despite the fact that the reductions from 1990-1997 were almost all due to economic and political happenings unrelated to CO2 abatement programs.

You can also check the statistics for yourself to see how the countries stacked up against each other. What’s even more interesting than the use of 1990 as a base date to benefit Kyoto Treaty ratifiers, is the performance of those same countries AFTER the treaty. This is echoed both by Climate Skeptic and Tom Nelson’s blog:

Between 1997 and 2004, carbon dioxide emissions rose as follows:

Emissions worldwide increased 18.0%;

Emissions from countries that ratified the protocol increased 21.1%;

Emissions from non-ratifiers of the protocol increased 10.0%;

Emissions from the US (a non-ratifier) increased 6.6%;

Emissions from the US increased less than 75% of ratifying countries.

With respect to the last point, the following are the percentage rises in emissions for a list of selected countries which have ratified the protocol (or which were exempted from targets): Maldives, 252%; China, 55%; Luxembourg, 43%; Iran, 39%; Norway, 24%; Russia, 16%; Italy, 16%; Finland, 15%; Mexico, 11%; Japan, 11%; Canada, 8.8%.

 

Not only did the Kyoto folks set the base date unfairly, but all of them fared worse than non-ratifiers AFTER the treaty was signed.

Weird?