Earth hour roundup

Comments from various sources:

1). Al Gore certainly didn't shut the lights off

2). I could not help but chuckle at the irony of earth hour's method of getting their message across. By turning off lights around the world they showed people exactly what they want. They want to turn the light out on human civilization. The wish to stop progress, to pull back humans' desire to better our world. Instead of light that allows us to see truth clearly they choose darkness, to hide their true intentions.

3). I will be thinking about the 1.8 billion people on Earth who have no access to electricity, and how insane they must think we are.

4). Earth Hour is a good demonstration of what will happen very soon if energy policy continues to be strangled by futile attempts to control the weather/climate using the harmless, essential, naturally occurring, aerial plant food gas CO2.

5). With reference to the absurd Dearth Hour, JunkScience.com is wondering how many stories we can collect of people injured falling over the cat/furniture in the enviro-induced darkness. Candle fires from unsafe lighting? Anything you or your readers may have heard about can be returned to this email address or preferably posted under this topic on the forum. (It's a self-register arrangement & you can post immediately following registration).

6). An email from Greenland with illustrative picture below: Does it sometimes seem like everything you read, see or do has the word “Green” attached to it? When you are living in Greenland you can't ignore it! But the Earth Hour made a difference here. See www.glar.gl. No more global warming.



7). Comment by Australian cartoonist ZEG:








Keep Your Lights on!

By Alan Caruba

Does it sometimes seem like everything you read, see or do has the word “Green” attached to it? We have a Green President and a Green Congress. More and more products and services tout themselves as Green. We are paying more and more with greenbacks—dollars—that are in danger of losing what value they once had.

Green was not always the great, amorphous dream of achieving oneness with Mother Earth. People still talk about being “Green with envy” or “Turning Green” just before a projectile vomit attack.

We have reached this nauseating time in our society as the result of a vast environmental movement, truly worldwide, that are masters of propaganda and possessed of the millions necessary to brainwash a lot of people into accepting an endless assault on all the advancements in science, engineering, and technology we accept as part of our everyday lives.

So, naturally, the World Wildlife Fund has come up with “Earth Hour”, an event in which at 8:30PM, Saturday night, in everyone’s respective time zone, people will be asked to turn off their lights and, presumably, the use of all electricity to increase awareness of “energy conservation.”

Two questions: What does this have to do with wildlife? And why should anyone bother? What need is there to “conserve energy?” One either uses it or does not. You can’t “conserve” it. You can use more or less of it, but you cannot save it up for later. Electricity is always “now.”

Is the Earth running out of coal? Hardly, the Chinese can’t build coal-fired plants fast enough to generate the electricity to grow their economy. In India, they’re launched on a huge program to build nuclear plants for the same reason. A nation without adequate electricity is strictly Third World.

Nor is the Earth running out of oil. The rumor is that there are vast amounts in the Arctic and both the U.S. and Russia are making nasty noises at one another to ensure that neither one or the other gains control of it. Brazil just struck oil way offshore of its beautiful beaches and you don’t hear them complaining about it.

The U.S., of course, has vast untapped reserves of oil offshore and an estimated 3 to 4.3 BILLION barrels of it in the Bakken Formation under North Dakota and Montana. There’s oil under Utah as well. We’re not running out of oil in the United States. We just can’t drill for it thanks to Congress and the White House.

We can’t build coal-fired plants either because the Greens keep telling us that coal is “dirty.” The electricity it provides—just over half of all that’s used nationwide—isn’t dirty. Soon, though, they’re won’t be enough of it because our Green President thinks that solar and wind can provide it. It can’t and it won’t. Ever.

There’s just one way to “conserve” energy. Don’t use it. Don’t turn on the light. Don’t turn on the computer. Don’t turn on the television. Unplug your refrigerator, your heating and cooling system. Don’t wash and dry your clothes in a machine. Don’t use it.

Otherwise, the next moron that talks about conserving energy should be stuffed in a barrel and allowed to float over the Niagara Falls which, during Earth Hour, will not be lighted.

We will all be treated to the idiotic sight of a darkened Empire State Building and other similar structures around the world such as the Eiffel Tower, the Golden Gate Bridge, Las Vegas strip, the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, the London Eye Ferris wheel, and the Pyramids of Egypt.

For a whole hour they will go dark to remind us to “conserve energy” that does not need conserving. It needs to be expanded into parts of the world where there is no electricity and, as a result, there is no economy which is another way of saying there is a lot of poverty, sickness, and early death.

SOURCE






The C of E (Church of the Environment) is still dribbling

Most of the Anglican episcopacy may not believe in God but they sure believe in Warmism. They are the Pharisees of today. Note the indented straw-man argument

We may all be damned -- in this world and the next -- by our environmental misdeeds and heedlessness, according to a stern warning from the head of the worldwide Anglican Communion, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, last week.

Mankind is rebuffing the divine love of God and, by its refusal to face "doomsday" environmental damage, it is choking, drowning and starving God's creation, Williams said. He ties it all in to salvation season, when thoughts of Easter and forgiveness from sin loom large, saying

...to suggest that God might intervene to protect us from the corporate folly of our practices is as un-Christian and un-biblical as to suggest that he protects us from the results of our individual folly or sin.

Would you agree? Even if we step up our conservation efforts one by one, are we responsible, even eternally, for our group/national actions? What would be "enough" to stay high and dry in heaven?

SOURCE







Climate sensitivity has been grossly overestimated due to a mix up between cause and effect

by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.

I’ve been receiving a steady stream of e-mails asking when our latest work on feedbacks in the climate system will be published. Since I’ve been trying to fit the material from three (previously rejected) papers into one unified paper, it has taken a bit longer than expected…but we are now very close to submission.

We’ve tentatively decided to submit to Journal of Geophysical Research (JGR) rather than any of the American Meteorological Society (AMS) journals. This is because it appears that JGR editors are somewhat less concerned about a paper’s scientific conclusions supporting the policy goals of the IPCC — regulating greenhouse gas emissions. Indeed, JGR’s instructions to reviewers is to not reject a paper simply because the reviewer does not agree with the paper’s scientific conclusions. More on that later.

As those who have been following our work already know, our main conclusion is that climate sensitivity has been grossly overestimated due to a mix up between cause and effect when researchers have observed how global cloud cover varies with temperature.

To use my favorite example, when researchers have observed that global cloud cover decreases with warming, they have assumed that the warming caused the cloud cover to dissipate. This would be a positive feedback since such a response by clouds would let more sunlight in and enhance the warming.

But what they have ignored is the possibility that causation is actually working in the opposite direction: That the decrease in cloud cover caused the warming…not the other way around. And as shown by Spencer and Braswell (2008 J. Climate), this can mask the true existence of negative feedback.

All 20 of the IPCC climate models now have positive cloud feedbacks, which amplify the small about of warming from extra carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. But if cloud feedbacks in the climate system are negative, then the climate system does not particularly care how much you drive your SUV. This is an issue of obvious importance to global warming research. Even the IPCC has admitted that cloud feedbacks remain the largest source of uncertainty in predicting global warming.

Significantly, our new work provides a method for identifying which direction of causation is occurring (forcing or feedback), and for obtaining a more accurate estimate of feedback in the presence of clouds forcing a temperature change. The method involves a new way of analyzing graphs of time filtered satellite observations of the Earth (or even of climate model output).

Well…at least I thought it was new way of analyzing graphs. It turns out that we have simply rediscovered a method used in other physical sciences: phase space analysis. This methodology was first introduced by Willard Gibbs in 1901.

We found that by connecting successively plotted points in graphs of how the global average temperature varies over time versus how global average radiative balance varies over time, one sees two different kinds of structures emerge: linear striations, which are the result of feedback, and spirals which are the result of internal radiative forcing by clouds.

But such a methodology is not new. To quote from Wikipedia on the subject of ‘phase space’: “Often this succession of plotted points is analogous to the system’s state evolving over time. In the end, the phase diagram…can easily elucidate qualities of the system that might not be obvious otherwise.”

Using a simple climate model we show that these two features that show up in the graphs are a direct result of the two directions of causation: temperature causing clouds to change (revealed by ‘feedback stripes’), and clouds causing temperature to change (revealed by ‘radiative forcing spirals’).

The fact that others have found phase space analysis to be a useful methodology is a good thing. It should lend some credibility to our interpretation. Phase space analysis is what has helped us better understand chaos, along with its Lorenz attractor, strange attractor, etc.

And the fact that we find the exact same structures in the output of the IPCC climate models means that the modelers can not claim our interpretation has no physical basis.

And now we can also use some additional buzzwords in the new article…which seems to help from the standpoint of reviewers thinking you know what you are talking about. The new paper title is, “Phase Space Analysis of Forcing and Feedback in Models and Satellite Observations of Climate Variability”. It just rolls of the tongue, doesn’t it?

I am confident the work will get published…. eventually. But even if it didn’t, our original published paper on the issue has laid the groundwork… it would just take awhile before the research community understands the implications of that work.

What amazes me is the resistance there has been to ‘thinking out of the box’ when trying to estimate the sensitivity of the climate system. Especially when it has been considered to be ‘thinking in the box’ by other sciences for over a century now.

And it is truly unfortunate that the AMS, home of Lorenz’s first published work on chaos in 1963, has decided that political correctness is more important than the advancement of science.

SOURCE






The coming nuclear renaissance

by Jeff Jacoby

THIRTY YEARS AGO this month, an accident at the Three Mile Island nuclear plant in Pennsylvania inflamed public opposition to nuclear power. The mishap -- a loss of coolant that caused the reactor core to overheat -- caused no known deaths or diseases, and it exposed area residents to only a negligible amount of radiation. But it fueled an anti-nuclear frenzy that soon brought the expansion of the industry to a halt. Dozens of planned reactors were cancelled. In the years since Three Mile Island, not a single nuclear plant has been ordered and built in the United States.

Yet far from being washed up, atomic power seems poised for a renaissance. Consider:

* According to a new Gallup poll, 59 percent of Americans favor nuclear energy -- a new high -- and 27 percent say they strongly favor it. The attitude is bipartisan, with majorities of both Republicans and Democrats supporting nuclear power.

* Other surveys have found even higher levels of support. According to a 2008 Zogby poll, 67 percent of Americans favor the construction of new nuclear facilities, and are much more likely to back a nuclear-powered electric plant over one fueled by natural gas, coal, or oil.

* In the recent presidential campaign, both candidates expressed support for nuclear power. John McCain made a point of praising the French, who derive nearly 80 percent of their electricity from nuclear plants. Though more measured, Barack Obama agreed that "we should explore nuclear power as part of the mix," as he put it in an early Iowa debate.

* While Obama has said little about nuclear power since becoming president, his energy secretary has been unequivocal. "The nuclear industry has to be part of our energy mix," physicist Steven Chu said during his confirmation hearings. "It's 20 percent of our [total] electricity production today, but it's 70 percent of the carbon-free electricity we produce."

* Accenture, the consulting giant, reports growing worldwide support for nuclear energy. In a survey it conducted of more than 10,000 people in 20 nations, 69 percent of respondents wanted their countries to begin or expand the use of nuclear power. Pro-nuclear sentiment was strongest in India (67 percent), China (62 percent), and the United States (57 percent).

* In recent months, Italy and Sweden have reversed anti-nuclear policies; both are now developing plans to construct new plants. Meanwhile, dozens of nuclear reactors are already under construction in other countries, including China, Russia, and Finland. "Among those contemplating building their first ones," reports The Economist, "are Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, Indonesia, and Belarus."

* In the last two years, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission has received 17 applications for 26 nuclear reactors. Proposals for six additional reactors are pending.

There is no small irony in this turnabout. Nuclear power used to be the environmentalist's ultimate pariah, thanks to overblown claims about the dangers of reactor meltdowns and nuclear waste. But now the green movement has a new pariah -- fossil fuels and their carbon-dioxide emissions. To many environmentalists alarmed about global warming, nuclear power has an irresistible appeal: It releases no greenhouse gases. Indeed -- another irony -- nuclear power plants don't even release as much radiation as do coal-fired electric plants, since coal ash is more radioactive than nuclear waste.

As a result, some of the world's most ardent Greens have come around to embracing nuclear power.

"Only nuclear power can now halt global warming," wrote James Lovelock, the father of the celebrated Gaia theory, which regards the Earth and life on the planet as one complex, interacting "organism," in 2004. In Wired magazine the following year, a much-discussed article -- "Nuclear Now!" -- made the case that only "clean, green atomic energy can stop global warming."

To be sure, the problems with nuclear energy have not vanished. To build a nuclear plant is an expensive undertaking, the disposal of spent fuel rods remains politically contentious, and at least some environmental activists will continue to do what they can to exacerbate fear of nuclear power's dangers.

But 30 years after Three Mile Island, the nuclear future looks brighter than it has in a long time. Right now, 104 commercial reactors generate 20 percent of America's electricity. As the war against the atom continues to wind down, expect to see those numbers go up.

SOURCE (See the original for links)





British eco-migrants flee to New Zealand

The 60s all over again. Way back then lots of Brits and Americans moved to NZ to escape "The Bomb". Mostly they eventually went back to Britain and the USA. The present lot of agonizers will likely do the same in time as the prophecies of doom fail. Amusing that they are moving to a country where the government in unusually unsympathetic to Warmism, though!

NEW ZEALAND is seeing its first influx of British eco-migrants, environmental refugees who have quit the UK because they fear the long-term impacts of climate change.

The country’s islands, renowned for their temperate climate, clean environment and low population, have often been put forward by greens as potential “lifeboats” for a world suffering serious warming.

Recently, James Lovelock, the scientist and creator of the Gaia theory, said in his new book, The Vanishing Face of Gaia, that New Zealand could be one of the world’s last havens as climate change fundamentally changes the planet.

Such effects are expected to take years or decades to happen but some families are already trying to anticipate them. Among them are Lizzy and Mike Larmer-Cottle who have moved their family from London to Albany, half an hour north of Auckland on North Island, surrounded by rolling hills and beaches.

Britain’s recent climate of summer droughts and warm, wet winters was becoming alarming, said Lizzy. She added: “England was just having more and more flooding — if that continues, half of it is going to be underwater.”

The couple stress there were other factors too, such as lower traffic, less pollution and cheaper property. Before moving to New Zealand their sons Milo, 10, and Theo, 12, had, for example, never been able to ride their bikes on local roads.

They are, however, part of a rising tide of Britons heading for the New Zealand. Statistics NZ, which collects data for the country’s government, said more than 18,000 British residents moved there last year alone.

Among recent arrivals was John Zamick who also believes climate change will tip Britain into long-term environmental decline. The businessman, who now co-directs a biodiesel company in Nelson, a town on South Island, points to East Anglia, where rainfall is now so low it is classed as semi-arid, while its coasts are threatened by rising sea levels.

What such eco-migrants have in common is not so much a fear of Britain becoming warmer but that climate change could destabilise the global economy, causing shortages of food.

At the Copenhagen climate science conference earlier this month, scientists set out the latest research on how climate change could affect crops. This showed that, as heat and water shortages took hold, many equatorial regions in Africa and Asia would become unable to grow enough food, creating global shortages of staples like wheat and rice.

Zamick said New Zealand's low population density, agricultural independence and availability of farmland were all prime attractions, along with its English-speaking population.

Americans have also spotted New Zealand’s potential. Adam Fier and his wife Misbah Sadat moved their family from Maryland in the United States to New Zealand late last month. Fier, a computer security expert who used to work at Nasa, told the Washington Post the decision was made because of his two girls. “I am not going to predict how the climate might change and how it might affect New Zealand,” Fier said. “But quite honestly, I feel in 100 years, one of my daughters is still going to be alive and this planet is going to be a mess.”

Scientists agree that New Zealand is likely to be more resilient to any global warming than many other countries — but that could lead to problems with immigration. Dr Vicky Pope, head of climate change advice at Britain’s Met Office, said: “A lot of countries in temperate zones could come under pressure to take eco-migrants.”

Immigration specialists say climate is an increasingly important issue for Britons trying to emigrate. Liam Clifford, a director of the British-based GlobalVisas, described how clients increasingly wanted to move to “a temperate country that will escape extreme climate.”

James Hardy shared such views. He used to live in lush Buckinghamshire but became increasingly concerned at how he and his family might cope on such a crowded island if the global climate underwent sharp changes. Three years ago he moved to New Zealand with his wife and their three children. “New Zealand has land, New Zealand has wind, New Zealand has a far more sustainable climate,” he said.

SOURCE

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