RUSSIAN SCIENTISTS SAY THE GREENIES WHO ARE PEDDLING PANIC ABOUT SIBERIA ARE IGNORAMUSES

If anybody knows anything about Siberia, the Russians do and the Russian experts say that the latest scare about Siberia emanating from British Greenies is just a fraud. I pointed out some of the illogic in the original scare on 13th

Last week, the British press (the Guardian, The Times, and The Daily Telegraph) warned of "swamp terrorism" from Siberia. Citing experts, the newspapers claimed that the permafrost covering Siberian swamps is rapidly thawing due to climatic warming. They said that billions of tons of methane could be released into the air causing an ecological disaster.

Academician Vladimir Melnikov spoke to RIA Novosti about the problem. Melnikov is the director of the world's only Institute of the Earth's Cryosphere. The Russian Academy of Sciences' Institute is located in the Siberian city of Tyumen and investigates the ways in which ground water becomes ice and permafrost. "This is just another scare story, this time about the Siberian swamps." This was Melnikov's first reaction when asked by RIA Novosti to comment on claims by The Daily Telegraph that thawing Siberian permafrost could cause an ecological crisis.

Russia is situated in one of the coldest parts of the planet. As much as 60% of its territory is covered with permafrost, which extends to the border with China in the south. "It is, however, a mistake to speak of the Siberian swamps as being all permafrost," he said. "This is not so, because ordinary swamps cover vast areas." Melnikov said that the swamp zone in Western Siberia was growing, but then added, "This ecological structure is balanced and is not about to harm people with gas discharges."

He pointed out an interesting consequence of the growth of the swamp zone: As the water-covered surface increases, it gives off more evaporation, and this process generates cold. "So, in a way, the swamps are compensating for global warming. There is simply no way that all the permafrost will melt," the scientist said.

He also refuted claims that the swamps are rapidly thawing and forming small lakes. "Both scientific findings and experience suggest that small lakes result from irregularities when laying oil and gas pipes and other engineering systems," Melnikov said. "But the scale on which new formations are appearing is small, and they do not pose any threat."

When asked if methane might erupt from the swamps and seriously pollute the atmosphere, Melnikov said, "The swamps are accumulating tremendous amounts of methane. This is an energy reserve for future generations, who will find a way to release it. Swamps are governed by the laws of nature, and we would need an exceptional reason to alter the natural course of things. A rise in temperature of one degree Celsius in the Siberian region in the 20th century cannot cause the permafrost to suddenly melt."

He pointed out that the greatest man-made menace is not methane, but CO2, which is the principal greenhouse gas. "Through ignorance many people talk a lot about the 'methane threat' from the swamps, but say very little about their ability to retain and deposit CO2, thus doing a tremendous service to nature and mankind," he said.

Yuri Izrael, director of the Institute of Climatology and Ecology of the Russian Academy of Sciences, agrees that a catastrophic release of methane from the Siberian swamps is impossible. He says that the whole notion is misconceived. "The boundaries of the Russian permafrost zone remain virtually unchanged. At the same time, the permafrost is several hundred meters deep. For methane, other gases and hydrates to escape to the surface, it would have to melt at tremendous depths, which is impossible.

In Yakutia, for example, the permafrost thaws by up to one and a half meters during summer. This is a normal phenomenon. In the 20th century, the temperature in Siberia rose by one degree Celsius, which was only 0.4 degrees more than in the Mediterranean (which rose by 0.6 degrees Celsius). But even if, as predicted, by the end of the 21st century temperatures have risen by three degrees, this will not be a catastrophe. The swamps are covered in vegetation. Bushes and moss grow above, and peat, which is an excellent insulator, is found below. Only a massive rise in temperature, which is unlikely in the foreseeable future, could alter the situation," Izrael said.

The Russian Academy of Sciences has found that the annual temperature of soils (with seasonable variations) has been remaining stable despite the increased average annual air temperature caused by climate change. If anything, the depth of seasonal melting has decreased slightly. "Unscrupulous scientists are exaggerating and peddling fears about permafrost thawing and swamp methane becoming aggressive," said Professor Nikolai Alexeyevsky, Doctor of Geography and head of the land hydrology department at Moscow State University. "Siberia has vast natural resources, oil and gas above all. The article aims to set public opinion against Western Siberia and discourage investment in its industry, oil and gas. They are saying, 'Swamp methane poses a global threat, so don't touch Siberia.' They are deliberately trying to cause panic."

Alexeyevsky says that permafrost has a natural cycle of change, and that it advanced and retreated in the pre-industrial era as well. "It is likely that the next attack will be on rice paddies in China and India, which also release enormous quantities of methane. And this onslaught will likewise pursue economic and political, rather than environmental, aims: Namely, to reduce the production of rice, which is the staple food of these successfully developing nations," he said. "I would think otherwise if I were not analyzing the trends. The issue is seen from one specific self-interested angle, the aim of which is to discredit methane, as they managed to do in the past with freons and perfectly sound refrigeration freon-based technologies." He then added that corporations spent vast sums pursuing their own agendas, and involved unprincipled individuals in their campaigns.

From RIA Novosti, 22 August 2005





"Peak Oil:" Welcome to the media's new version of shark attacks

Post lifted from the Freakonomics blog

The cover story of the New York Times Sunday Magazine written by Peter Maass is about "Peak Oil." The idea behind "peak oil" is that the world has been on a path of increasing oil production for many years, and now we are about to peak and go into a situation where there are dwindling reserves, leading to triple-digit prices for a barrel of oil, an unparalleled worldwide depression, and as one web page puts it, "Civilization as we know it is coming to an end soon."

One might think that doomsday proponents would be chastened by the long history of people of their ilk being wrong: Nostradamus, Malthus, Paul Ehrlich, etc. Clearly they are not.

What most of these doomsday scenarios have gotten wrong is the fundamental idea of economics: people respond to incentives. If the price of a good goes up, people demand less of it, the companies that make it figure out how to make more of it, and everyone tries to figure out how to produce substitutes for it. Add to that the march of technological innovation (like the green revolution, birth control, etc.). The end result: markets figure out how to deal with problems of supply and demand.

Which is exactly the situation with oil right now. I don't know much about world oil reserves. I'm not even necessarily arguing with their facts about how much the output from existing oil fields is going to decline, or that world demand for oil is increasing. But these changes in supply and demand are slow and gradual -- a few percent each year. Markets have a way with dealing with situations like this: prices rise a little bit. That is not a catastrophe, it is a message that some things that used to be worth doing at low oil prices are no longer worth doing. Some people will switch from SUVs to hybrids, for instance. Maybe we'll be willing to build some nuclear power plants, or it will become worth it to put solar panels on more houses.

The NY Times article totally flubs the economics time and again. Here is one example from the article: The author writes:

The consequences of an actual shortfall of supply would be immense. If consumption begins to exceed production by even a small amount, the price of a barrel of oil could soar to triple-digit levels. This, in turn, could bring on a global recession, a result of exorbitant prices for transport fuels and for products that rely on petrochemicals -- which is to say, almost every product on the market. The impact on the American way of life would be profound: cars cannot be propelled by roof-borne windmills. The suburban and exurban lifestyles, hinged to two-car families and constant trips to work, school and Wal-Mart, might become unaffordable or, if gas rationing is imposed, impossible. Carpools would be the least imposing of many inconveniences; the cost of home heating would soar -- assuming, of course, that climate-controlled habitats do not become just a fond memory.

If oil prices rise, consumers of oil will be (a little) worse off. But, we are talking about needing to cut demand by a few percent a year. That doesn't mean putting windmills on cars, it means cutting out a few low value trips. It doesn't mean abandoning North Dakota, it means keeping the thermostat a degree or two cooler in the winter.

A little later, the author writes

The onset of triple-digit prices might seem a blessing for the Saudis -- they would receive greater amounts of money for their increasingly scarce oil. But one popular misunderstanding about the Saudis -- and about OPEC in general -- is that high prices, no matter how high, are to their benefit. Although oil costing more than $60 a barrel hasn't caused a global recession, that could still happen: it can take a while for high prices to have their ruinous impact. And the higher above $60 that prices rise, the more likely a recession will become. High oil prices are inflationary; they raise the cost of virtually everything -- from gasoline to jet fuel to plastics and fertilizers -- and that means people buy less and travel less, which means a drop-off in economic activity. So after a brief windfall for producers, oil prices would slide as recession sets in and once-voracious economies slow down, using less oil. Prices have collapsed before, and not so long ago: in 1998, oil fell to $10 a barrel after an untimely increase in OPEC production and a reduction in demand from Asia, which was suffering through a financial crash.


Oops, there goes the whole peak oil argument. When the price rises, demand falls, and oil prices slide. What happened to the "end of the world as we know it?" Now we are back to $10 a barrel oil. Without realizing it, the author just invoked basic economics to invalidate the entire premise of the article!


Just for good measure, he goes on to write:

High prices can have another unfortunate effect for producers. When crude costs $10 a barrel or even $30 a barrel, alternative fuels are prohibitively expensive. For example, Canada has vast amounts of tar sands that can be rendered into heavy oil, but the cost of doing so is quite high. Yet those tar sands and other alternatives, like bioethanol, hydrogen fuel cells and liquid fuel from natural gas or coal, become economically viable as the going rate for a barrel rises past, say, $40 or more, especially if consuming governments choose to offer their own incentives or subsidies. So even if high prices don't cause a recession, the Saudis risk losing market share to rivals into whose nonfundamentalist hands Americans would much prefer to channel their energy dollars.

As he notes, high prices lead people to develop substitutes. Which is exactly why we don't need to panic over peak oil in the first place.

So why do I compare peak oil to shark attacks? It is because shark attacks mostly stay about constant, but fear of them goes up sharply when the media decides to report on them. The same thing, I bet, will now happen with peak oil. I expect tons of copycat journalism stoking the fears of consumers about oil induced catastrophe, even though nothing fundamental has changed in the oil outlook in the last decade.

(For those of you interested in more economic perspectives on peak oil, check out these three posts by Jim Hamilton of econbrowser: here, here, and here. And thanks to Alex from marginalrevolution for pointing me to Hamilton's posts.)





NO DOUBT THE GREENIES WILL FIND FAULT WITH THIS TOO

There's no such thing as a happy Greenie

A new plant gene identified by scientists could help to allay fears over the safety of genetically modified crops. Research at the University of Tennessee suggests that the naturally antibiotic-resistant gene from the simple thale cress could provide a strong alternative to the way GM plants are created.

GM plants are usually made with an antibiotic resistance marker obtained from bacteria. Until now, the potential for reverse migration of the resistance marker into bacterial cells has raised safety issues, with fears that eating GM plants could increase human immunity to antibiotics. The research indicates that resistance markers from plants should not lead to reverse migration, due to differences in cell structure and machinery.

The finding was greeted with cautious optimism by critics of GM crops, but Gundula Azeez, policy manager with the Soil Association, said the issue was just one of many concerns.

Source

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Many people would like to be kind to others so Leftists exploit that with their nonsense about equality. Most people want a clean, green environment so Greenies exploit that by inventing all sorts of far-fetched threats to the environment. But for both, the real motive is to promote themselves as wiser and better than everyone else, truth regardless.

Global warming has taken the place of Communism as an absurdity that "liberals" will defend to the death regardless of the evidence showing its folly. Evidence never has mattered to real Leftists

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