An Inconvenient Truth...

[fuji]

Moraff, if you don't like Kyoto, but you ARE willing to take tough steps to reduce pollution, what would those tough steps be? Also, isn't it a little late to be walking away from a treaty we've already ratified? I think Kyoto has problems too; but not living up to your word and being an unreliable treaty partner is also problematic.

Just pointing out the issues with Kyoto is probably not good enough. ALL approaches have issues. Why is Kyoto worse than some other alternative? (What's the alternative?)

 

[Chivas Regal]

Kyoto. like all things new, could very well be the precurser to better policy.

I think there are people supporting both sides of this issue that don't understand, or care about the other side. For example, where do you think all of the pollution comes from?? Do you not think it contributes to the warming, especially if the ultraviolet rays cannot escape?

I will be very interested to revisit this post when we hit 45 degrees this summer with the humidex. We won't be worried about the homeless or elderly in the winter anymore. We will be protecting them from our summers.

Water is the new oil. As we move further into this century, it will become our most precious commodity. I venture it will be traded on the stock exchange, just like crude.

 

[Mao Tse Tongue]

Actually, I don't believe in "Global Warming" whatsoever. It's just the latest "the end is nigh" BS from the scientists out there. The fact of that matter is that scientists would be ignored by the public at large (out of shear ignorance more than anything on their part) if it weren't for the latest "the sky is falling" theory. If it's not the next ice age, it's global warming, or some huge asteroid smashing into the earth doing us all in. Or a nice plague - like the bird flu. Seems the scientists are still crossing their fingers hoping for that one to come true so that they can have their 15 minutes in front of the cameras.

Yea, that global warming "fad" is just about scientists getting their Andy Warhol moment. Those 10,000 scientists in agreement on global warming have all put their reputations on the line for their 15 minutes of fame. Yesiree. Next stop Entertainment Tonight.

This is an arena--science--where peer-reviewed scientists normally agree on fuck all. But the independent wankers here on TERB are smarter than all of them, and the overwhelming consensus. Hmm.

There's no debate. It's over. In Europe they don't even debate it by and large. They talk about what to do. In North America, where big oil bankrolls the deniers, they're still chattering away as Rome warms up. Follow the money. It's all about money.

Let's check back on this thread in a year.

 

[mmouse]

Well said.

 

[james t kirk]

Yea, that global warming "fad" is just about scientists getting their Andy Warhol moment. Those 10,000 scientists in agreement on global warming have all put their reputations on the line for their 15 minutes of fame. Yesiree. Next stop Entertainment Tonight.

This is an arena--science--where peer-reviewed scientists normally agree on fuck all. But the independent wankers here on TERB are smarter than all of them, and the overwhelming consensus. Hmm.

There's no debate. It's over. In Europe they don't even debate it by and large. They talk about what to do. In North America, where big oil bankrolls the deniers, they're still chattering away as Rome warms up. Follow the money. It's all about money.

Let's check back on this thread in a year.

Funny you didn't quote or acknowledge any part of my post where I stated that I am all for very stringent pollution controls, far in excess of what's already out there, just the part where I said I don't give any credance to the theory of "Global Warming".

Sorry, still don't believe in Global Warming. Point being your quoted "10,000 scientists"

There just are NOT 10,000 scientists in the WORLD whose area of expertise is climate. The figure of 10,000 scientists you quote if anything convinces me further that they ARE jumping on the bandwagon and off to Rio for that next global climate conference (and the escorts - let's not forget the escorts). And please, no-one cares about some scientist's reputation. Said scientist could claim that Martians colonized earth and no-one would care.

And hell will freeze over before I listen to Europeans (especially the French and Germans and Italians) on any issue other than food. The Euro-weenies ought better be more concerned about their own countries going right down the girgler due to a collapse in their respective economies due to their socialist policies that they frankly can no longer support- France leading the way down (As we have seen several times recently in the last couple of years.)

 

[Moraff]

Moraff, if you don't like Kyoto, but you ARE willing to take tough steps to reduce pollution, what would those tough steps be? Also, isn't it a little late to be walking away from a treaty we've already ratified? I think Kyoto has problems too; but not living up to your word and being an unreliable treaty partner is also problematic.

Just pointing out the issues with Kyoto is probably not good enough. ALL approaches have issues. Why is Kyoto worse than some other alternative? (What's the alternative?)

I made a couple mentions of steps to take in the post you are commenting on. I have already taken steps to reduce my impact on the planet (mainly from a financial point of view), in fact I had the One-Tonne Challenge won the day it came out. I - drive a small 4 cyl car, bought our house because it's location allowed both my wife and I to walk/take the bus to work, insulated the roof well beyond the current standards and am working on the rest of the insulation as time and money permit, converted almost all my lights to compact flourescents, swapped the gas mower for an electric, collect rainwater to use for irrigation, in the summer we only have an air conditioner for the bedroom so that we can sleep properly, in the winter we have a programmable thermostat that dials the temperature down to 16 when we're sleeping and 20 when awake and gets turned down to about 10 when we are away for a couple days or more, and have wrapped all my hot water pipes and tank w/insulation. So yes I think I'm doing my part to improve conditions, in fact according to the government's info I'm doing better than the average person.

Kyoto will not improve our global climate to any great degree because a) it is not global, every business we force out of Canada that reopens in China, Mexico etc just makes the problem worse, not better. Just cause Canada may be better doesn't automatically mean we have improved the world b) The only way Canada could meet it's agreements w/o buying "credits" from other countries would be to shut down 100% of it's manufacturing and transportation. c) Buying credits from developing countries is merely "I've got mine and you can't have yours" mentality. About the only good thing I see from buying credits is that it will allow developing countries to skip all the steps we went thru getting where we are. Instead of laying miles and miles of copper and then fibre optic cable they can jump right to cell phones for example.


Suggestions:
- as mentioned: expand Drive Clean to include all vehicles on the road and work on improving it's accuracy
- as mentioned: apply tariffs to imported goods from countries with pollution controls less than ours to ensure our manufacturers can sell the goods they have made with cleaner methods
- pressure cities to change their zoning methods so that we have a mix of at least residential and commercial so that people can walk to the store/work
- consider doing what London, England has done and limit the number of cars that can drive into downtown -> more public transit
- more toll roads and HOV lanes, again to encourage public transit and car pooling. Also HOV should be at least 3 people, not 2 IMO
- higher costs to buy energy over a certain level -> encourage conservation and improving the R-value of homes and businesses
- tax credits for those who live in the same city they work in

After the big blackout a few years back the malls were using reduced lighting and I never found it to be that bad. Now they're back to full lighting, what a waste

 

[Moraff]

Yea, that global warming "fad" is just about scientists getting their Andy Warhol moment. Those 10,000 scientists in agreement on global warming have all put their reputations on the line for their 15 minutes of fame. Yesiree. Next stop Entertainment Tonight.

Yup just like the Mad Cow Disease scare almost destroyed an entire industry because the media hyped it up and scientists crawled all over themselves to get on record as to how bad it was going to be. And it was what 2 cows?

SARS - another big ball of hot air. SARS was supposed to be so hypercontagious yet a SARS infected-nurse was able to ride a crowded GO Train back and forth to work without infecting a single person. Hell! People were in more danger of getting a common cold than SARS.

Now don't get me wrong, eventually we are going to be hit with a pandemic, the Influenza thing back in 1918? tells us that. But by and large no one is going to believe it when it comes because we cannot trust the media and scientists to give us rational facts 'cause rational facts don't sell papers and garner grant money.

There used to be notion of "Balance of Nature". Basically the theory went that if you left Nature alone it would remain the same. The Ancient Greeks believed it, no proof of course, but it sounded nice. But untrue. Nature is constantly out of balance. We cannot keep the Earth "just the way it is" 'cause that's not natural. And we don't have the intelligence to know how to do it anyways.

Here's a thought for y'all, green plants love CO2 so if there's more CO2 in the air, the plants are going to grow bigger, better, faster. Well in eating all that CO2 they keep the carbon and give us back the O2. So more CO2 means bigger crops and if the earth gets a little warmer then that means a) we get longer growing seasons and b) Canada gets to farm a little more north than before, offsetting the areas closer to the equator that are getting too hot.

This is an arena--science--where peer-reviewed scientists normally agree on fuck all. But the independent wankers here on TERB are smarter than all of them, and the overwhelming consensus. Hmm.

There's no debate. It's over. In Europe they don't even debate it by and large. They talk about what to do. In North America, where big oil bankrolls the deniers, they're still chattering away as Rome warms up. Follow the money. It's all about money.

Let's check back on this thread in a year.

Kindly keep the discussion civil please, us "independant wankers" haven't been calling you "sheep who get all their facts from the newspapers" have we?

And if big oil is bankrolling my "denial" (as you put it, I prefer "not accepting blindly") where's my check?

 

[Meister]

If you want to reduce greenhouse gases you can start by making things locally instead of shipping every friggin thing around the world just because it is 1.3 cents per piece cheaper to do so. That should bring the oil consumption down in a hurry.

 

[Moraff]

Just doing a little surfing, do you know what the expected effect Kyoto would have on the earth, assuming the US had joined?

The answer: by the year 2100 Kyoto would have reduced the earth's temperature by .08 to .28 degrees C. That's it {from Nature 22}

 

[papasmerf]

Dq

you never responded to my answer to your question

 

[fuji]

I made a couple mentions of steps to take in the post you are commenting on.

You talked about some things that you personally have done, but to be honest, what you personally do doesn't matter that much. Most of our emissions come from heavy industry. What is your alternative to Kyoto for the total problem? You've listed many problems with the Kyoto protocol, but you haven't presented ANY convincing alternative.

In the realm of social policy you can ALWAYS find a lot of problems with any policy. The challenge is to come up with a better one. So what's better than Kyoto?

every business we force out of Canada that reopens in China, Mexico etc just makes the problem worse .... w/o buying "credits" from other countries

You'll have to explain this a little better. I'm not an expert on Kyoto, but it seems to me from what you've just written than you've contradicted yourself. First you called the treaty non-global, but then you went on to talk about trading credits with developing countries. How is that not global?

only good thing I see from buying credits is that it will allow developing countries to skip all the steps we went thru getting where we are.

Isn't that exactly what makes Kyoto global?

- as mentioned: expand Drive Clean to include all vehicles on the road and work on improving it's accuracy
- as mentioned: apply tariffs to imported goods from countries with pollution controls less than ours to ensure our manufacturers can sell the goods they have made with cleaner methods
- pressure cities to change their zoning methods so that we have a mix of at least residential and commercial so that people can walk to the store/work
- consider doing what London, England has done and limit the number of cars that can drive into downtown -> more public transit
- more toll roads and HOV lanes, again to encourage public transit and car pooling. Also HOV should be at least 3 people, not 2 IMO
- higher costs to buy energy over a certain level -> encourage conservation and improving the R-value of homes and businesses
- tax credits for those who live in the same city they work in

These are mostly aimed at consumers, who produce only a minority of the emissions (directly). Most of the emissions come from heavy industry. What do you propose there, as an alternative to Kyoto?

What is the impact of Kyoto on countries that do not fulfill their part of the bargain? Does Kyoto permit the imposition of tarriffs or other sanctions to level the playing field? Or is that the subject of the 2nd round? It does seem to me like we want a treaty like Kyoto that specifies remedies for those nations that continue to pollute. Kyoto nations as a block should impose tarrifs on nations like Canada and the US that refuse to play along, I think.

Some of your proposals are good indirectly: If people drive less, they'll buy fewer cars, and that means less heavy industry (or more efficient use of it).

More to the point, your proposals for specific methods of reducing emissions aren't incompatible with Kyoto: Why don't we just do these things as part of our strategy for meeting our Kyoto obligations?

 

[Moraff]

You talked about some things that you personally have done, but to be honest, what you personally do doesn't matter that much. Most of our emissions come from heavy industry. What is your alternative to Kyoto for the total problem? You've listed many problems with the Kyoto protocol, but you haven't presented ANY convincing alternative.

In the realm of social policy you can ALWAYS find a lot of problems with any policy. The challenge is to come up with a better one. So what's better than Kyoto?

Fair enough question. I'm not sure there is a way to do it to be perfectly honest. The major problem is that for there to be a global solution there has to be a global buy-in. That means every single country has to agree to follow the same standards. Take ship registration for example, different countries have different standards ships have to meet in order to be licensed to sail. That's why you find very very few ships registered in Canada and the US as their safety standards are so high. The result is ships that never should be sailing are breaking up/leaking cargo on a regular basis. Same thing with CO2 reduction, if there's even one country out there who doesn't play along, then industry will relocate to that country since it would be cheaper to pay to ship stuff around the world than to build factories to the standards that would be required to reduce emissions.

You'll have to explain this a little better. I'm not an expert on Kyoto, but it seems to me from what you've just written than you've contradicted yourself. First you called the treaty non-global, but then you went on to talk about trading credits with developing countries. How is that not global?

It's not global because not every country is playing the game.

Under Kyoto Canada has agreed to cut it's CO2 emissions by a certain amount. If Canada chooses (or more likely, is unable to) not to meet those lower limits they can purchase CO2 credits from other countries that have emission levels lower than the limits set. This costs extra money that has to be paid somehow, either through our taxes, or by charging the manufacturers who then have to raise their prices for goods and we still end up paying.

China conversely, is not part of Kyoto and has no need to regulate the emissions it generates so it can produce items more cheaply than we can.

By forcing our companies to hew to more stringent pollution controls than China we force them to close and relocate to places like China because they can't compete with the cheaper product being produced there. (And if they just close and don't relocate there, then the companies already in China just make more to fill the new void in the market)

If we adopt the position of imposing tariffs equivalent to the difference in the amount it costs our companies to produce the lower pollution good and the lower priced, higher pollution good from other countries then it gives a level playing field. If the polluting company in another country wishes to avoid paying the tariffs they have to improve their emissions. Then we can set Canada's standards to a useful level and other countries either follow suit, or don't get our business. I have a feeling the US would be willing to follow that sort of deal since it protects their business interests. And if the US went along with it, it pretty much guarentees that other countries would have to follow along or risk losing a huge chunk of their markets.

What is the impact of Kyoto on countries that do not fulfill their part of the bargain? Does Kyoto permit the imposition of tarriffs or other sanctions to level the playing field? Or is that the subject of the 2nd round? It does seem to me like we want a treaty like Kyoto that specifies remedies for those nations that continue to pollute. Kyoto nations as a block should impose tarrifs on nations like Canada and the US that refuse to play along, I think.

I don't know, but I don't think Kyoto gives much in the way of power to force other countries to do anything. My understanding is that it's mostly an "I agree to play" deal and if someone doesn't want to play (ie US, China, Mexico, Russia ....) there isn't much to be done other than to give them a good frowning.

Some of your proposals are good indirectly: If people drive less, they'll buy fewer cars, and that means less heavy industry (or more efficient use of it).

More to the point, your proposals for specific methods of reducing emissions aren't incompatible with Kyoto: Why don't we just do these things as part of our strategy for meeting our Kyoto obligations?

Mainly because they will ruin our economy while improving economies of countries that are not attempting to minimize their impact on the earth. That, and I have a problem with being able to buy credits from lesser developed countries. As I said earlier, that is just an "I've got mine and you can't have yours" attitude and means that those countries cannot develop into productive members of the global economy.

 

[papasmerf]

What can I say. My dad was the same.

But times have changed and the loss of jobs
have denied men the opportunity to behave
with dignity and honor.

Life can be cruel and health, tragedy and
economic losses can ruin a man's goals.
My dad lived in a world where a working
man could support a family. When America
was a job engine.

That isn't necessarily true today.

Don

I disagree with you. The game has changed but the rules are still the same. You honor your family by striving to do your best for them. You give them 100% everyday and never loose sight of the prize, your family.

 

[Chivas Regal]

China conversely, is not part of Kyoto and has no need to regulate the emissions it generates so it can produce items more cheaply than we can.

By forcing our companies to hew to more stringent pollution controls than China we force them to close and relocate to places like China because they can't compete with the cheaper product being produced there. (And if they just close and don't relocate there, then the companies already in China just make more to fill the new void in the market)

If we adopt the position of imposing tariffs equivalent to the difference in the amount it costs our companies to produce the lower pollution good and the lower priced, higher pollution good from other countries then it gives a level playing field. If the polluting company in another country wishes to avoid paying the tariffs they have to improve their emissions. Then we can set Canada's standards to a useful level and other countries either follow suit, or don't get our business. I have a feeling the US would be willing to follow that sort of deal since it protects their business interests. And if the US went along with it, it pretty much guarentees that other countries would have to follow along or risk losing a huge chunk of their markets.

Mainly because they will ruin our economy while improving economies of countries that are not attempting to minimize their impact on the earth. That, and I have a problem with being able to buy credits from lesser developed countries. As I said earlier, that is just an "I've got mine and you can't have yours" attitude and means that those countries cannot develop into productive members of the global economy.

China, and India like most developing countries have challenges of their own. Having been there and seeing the living conditions, and the air in the cities, the smog here is more than tolerable. That being said, it is still not good for your health. In China and India for example the fecal count in their waterways is throught the roof. Their lack of concern regarding exhaust fumes from vehicles is discusting, take a cab anywhere and you will know what I am talking about.
The developed world has a responsibility to help these developing nations get off to a good start. Unfortunately, due to cost pressures, short cuts are taken. And as one part of the econmy shuts down, new opportunities with new jobs arrive.

Just out of curiosity, as anyone heard of HAARP?

 

[Meister]

The developed world has a responsibility to help these developing nations get off to a good start. Unfortunately, due to cost pressures, short cuts are taken.

I think we are helping them already a great deal by buying all their goods and services:

China has 320,000 millionaire households
India has 83,000 millionaires

If those countries don't have the discipline to funnel some of that wealth back into cleaning up the environment and spread the wealth among its workforce then I find this extremely reckless.

 

[Moraff]

Just out of curiosity, as anyone heard of HAARP?

This HAARP you mean?

http://www.haarp.alaska.edu/

Interesting concept

 

[Chivas Regal]

This HAARP you mean?

http://www.haarp.alaska.edu/

Interesting concept

Yes, but try this link instead http://www.earthpulse.com/src/category.asp?catid=1. Not the government propaganda site.

 

[papasmerf]

Of course. But, then again, we both had fathers
that cared about us. Are you to blame the children
of those that didn't/don't meet that standard?

We were very, very lucky, pops.

We were lucky. Now if you look at the sucessful familes tody, you will see the same ethic. We can not be the ethics police

 

[Moraff]

Yes, but try this link instead http://www.earthpulse.com/src/category.asp?catid=1. Not the government propaganda site.

Okay, I read through much of the site and now my head hurts <grin>.

I'll admit that I don't know a whole heck of a lot about RF effects, but I think we probably get more radiation from our local environment cell phones, house wiring, computer, power lines .....) than what HAARP would be doing. (Since the power of RF drops off by the square or the cube (can't remember) of the distance from the source. I was a lot more disturbed by the fact that they used to explode nukes up there just to see what would happen. No wonder most people thing "mad scientist" is one word


And I didn't understand the bit about making an ELF barrier, if you cut out the speaker and replace it with copper wire aren't you making a short circuit? Perhaps someone here with a better electrical background could put this in laymen's terms for me? Wouldn't tinfoil wrapped around you work just as well?

Mind control? Wouldn't the military have a bigger budget if that were the case?

All and all an interesting science as I've always been a bit of a fan of Tesla, even if I don't understand everything.