Climate Files 56 / Answering Skeptics
Dead coral and sea shells washed up on beach, Mexico, 2007.
We know that CO2 causes climate change, but how? Believe it or not, credit card debt can help explain how CO2 causes global warming, even if the graphics show CO2 kind of non-synchronized with temperatures, at times. Hear Richard Alley talk about CO2 causing global warming at the AGU Annual Meeting. (Full video with graphics is here)
Also hear Stephen Colbert talk about mountaintop removal with Dr. Margaret Palmer, and the latest crock of the week, the claim of a petition with 32,000 signatures on it from scientists. It’s a hoax, of course. From Peter Sinclair of the Greenman’s Climate Crock video series. Sinclair is a longtime advocate of environmental awareness and energy alternatives and he runs Greenman Studio from his home in Midland, Michigan.
Richard Alley is an American geologist and Evan Pugh Professor of Geosciences at the Pennsylvania State University. He has authored more than 170 refereed scientific publications about the relationships between Earth’s cryosphere and global climate change, and is recognized by the Institute for Scientific Information as a “highly cited researcher.” (wikipedia)
More information on how to speak to deniers and skeptics that should be useful to everyone is here and here.
New climate change meetings/conferences after COP15:
In Abu Dhabi, the World Future Energy Summit.
Another climate change meeting is coming up on January 24th. Read about it here.
“…key groups of developing countries will meet to try to explore ways to get to agree a legally binding final agreement. As the dust settles on the stormy Danish meeting, environment ministers from the so-called “Basic countries” – Brazil, South Africa, India and China – will meet on January 24 in New Delhi. No formal agenda has been set, but observers expect the emerging geopolitical alliance between the four large developing countries who brokered the final “deal” with the US in Denmark will define a common position on emission reductions and climate aid money, and seek ways to convince other countries to sign up to the Copenhagen accord that emerged last month.”
You have to wonder what the carbon footprint is of all these meetings, especially given what they accomplish.
Transportation emissions information from Science Insider:
“. . . . projections spelled out in a new report reviewing the issue by the Pew Center on Global Climate Change suggests that by 2050 the total amount of carbon pollution from these sources could increase tenfold, depending on population, economics, and technology trends. Were that to happen, emissions would be as high as the entire transportation sector, which takes up 14% of global greenhouse emissions, currently dominated by pollution from cars and trucks.
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Music dedicated to all skeptics and deniers at the end: Pants on the Ground, by ‘General’ Larry Platt.
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Climate Files 55 / Drop the Nuke Bias
Being antinuclear is like a religion to many environmentalists. But solving climate change will be a compromise of what is possible and needed. We are not going to get a green utopian world to emerge and solve climate change with windmills. Even environmentalists want to be able to charge their cell phones and laptops. Should we throw it all away, or find out a realistic way to power it all once the coal plants are gone? We should be supporting nuclear plants over CCS any day. The last thing we want to do is spend billions locking in coal for another 50 years, something that could kill us all.
The Clean Air Act is under attack by Republicans with new legislation trying to block EPA again again. You can help save it by contacting your Reps. here.
Some news discussed in this episode includes information on and quotes from the books Storms of My Grandchildren by James Hansen and the Vanishing Face of Gaia by James Lovelock. Hansen’s letter to Obama is here (PDF). The UK must raise its CO2 emissions target to a 42% cut, says a new report. Read why our endless consumerism needs to be replaced with sustainable living here. The story about Bell Labs greening the internet by 2015 is here. There is a lot more in this episode including an audio description of what a thorium reactor is and how it works.
Read another interview with Stewart Brand, whose interview is played in this episode, here at e360.
More info on thorium reactors:
- How a Liquid Fluoride Thorium Reactor (LFTR) works
- Energy from Thorium blog
- Uranium is so Last Century
Contact CF using the contact form at the top or email CF at news @ climatefilesradio (dot) com
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Music at end: Nuclear Power Plant by Zen Eyes
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Climate Files 54 / Sound the Alarm
MOVING on with news and politics about global warming in the new year. Let’s forget COP15 even happened. Look ahead, what else can we do? Today Climate Files includes a recent short interview with climate scientist James Hansen largely about his book Storms of my Grandchildren.
Remember: sounding the alarm is not alarmism — it’s realism and a hope that people will listen and act on climate change. It’s our job to educate, because not everyone knows about climate change, and they may not “believe in it” for all the wrong reasons. An email exchange regarding a denier’s claims is something everyone can do (and I read mine). We have to keep educating the deniers and maybe one of these days they’ll give up the Dark Side.
News covered in this episode includes:
U.S. Car Fleet Shrinks For First Time in 50 Years, Report Says. It might be bad for business, but it’s good for the climate when people drive less and own less vehicles. Sorry, GM.
Climate Pledge Tracker Compares Nations’ CO2 Emissions Limits. You can see the new climate pledge tracker site here.
EPA is working with the Spruce No. 1 mine on their new permit, but there are a lot of problems and the mine may threaten water and over 2,000 acres of forest. Bad news, but it’s not likely to be approved. Read more here.
Storing CO2 in basalt is a new idea but not a very practical one, at least not now. Read the article here at Futurism Now. The study I mentioned is actually two studies. Here is an excerpt from FN news:
A July 2008 study by the same researchers found that 208 billion metric tons could be stored in the offshore basalt formations of the U.S. Northwest’s Juan de Fuca tectonic plate — that is as much as 150 years’ worth of U.S. emissions. . . . . In a study released Monday, ABI Research predicted that new CCS projects will keep 146 million tons of carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. Their estimates are based on markets for carbon emissions allowances encouraging firms to seek out technologies like CCS to limit their emissions.
The problem with that claim is that the U.S. emits about 7.1 billion metric tons carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) of greenhouse gases per year, (my estimate of 5.7 billion metric tons in the podcast was low) and that means only about 34 years of U.S. emissions could be forced into basalt, if the procedure even works.
The CIA is sharing data with climate scientists. Australia is baking hot this summer! All of this and more is discussed in this episode.
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