More Warmist pseudo science: "CO2 unleashes more warming than thought"

They assume what they have to prove: That CO2 is the cause of warming. And they are supposed to be paleoclimatologists -- yet paleoclimate data indicate that CO2 rises FOLLOWED temperature rises -- so could not be the cause of the temperature rises. The study is no more than a grovel to the established faith. It is not science

Carbon dioxide indirectly causes up to 50 percent more global warming than originally thought, a finding that raises questions over targets for stabilising carbon emissions over the long term, a study said on Sunday. In a paper published in the journal Nature Geoscience, British scientists said a tool commonly used in climate modelling may have badly underlooked the sensitivity of key natural processes to the warming caused by CO2. As a result, calculations for man-made global warming on the basis of carbon emissions may be underpitched by between 30 and 50 percent, they said.

The study was coincidentally published on the eve of a 12-day UN conference in Copenhagen aimed at providing a durable solution to the greenhouse-gas problem. The authors stressed that the more-than-expected warming would unfold over a matter of hundreds of years, rather than this century. The findings do not mean that the predictions for temperature rise by 2100, established notably by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), should be rewritten, they said. "We don't want to be overly alarmist here," said lead author Dan Lunt of Britain's University of Bristol. "But if people are thinking about stabilising CO2 at a certain atmospheric level, or putting together a treaty, or having a debate about what the levels should be, it really is important to know what the long-term consequences of those emissions are going to be, because CO2 hangs around for so long."

Lunt and colleagues decided to test a widely-used climate model on an epoch called the mid-Pliocene warm period, about three million years ago, when Earth heated up in response to natural processes. Cores drilled from ocean sediment provide a good idea about atmospheric carbon levels and temperature at the time. What the team found, though, was that the CO2 levels in the Pliocene -- around 400 parts per million (ppm) -- were not consistent with the warming, which was around three degrees Celsius (5.4 degrees Fahrenheit) higher than today.

The difference could only [ONLY??] be fully explained by the long-term loss of icesheets and and changes in vegetation, says the paper. These changes cause Earth's surface to absorb more solar radiation, which causes more warming, and so on.

When applied to what awaits us this century, the adjusted model suggests that nothing significantly different will happen compared to what has already been estimated. "In that time scale, we don't think the Greenland icesheet is going to melt completely or that East Antarctica will melt. That was what we saw in the model for three million years ago, but it is unlikely to take place in the next century," said Lunt.

Where it poses a dilemma, though, is how to fix a target for stabilising CO2 emissions so that future generations, centuries from now, are not hit by this long-term warming mechanism. A popular goal is to limit warming since pre-industrial times to 2 C (3.6 F), a figure that in mainstream climate models typically equates to about 450 ppm. At present, Earth's CO2 concentrations are at around 387 ppm.

Lunt says that today's level may already be too high in this context. "Our work says that at 400 parts per million, you are looking at more than two degrees C [3.6 F]. "To stabilise at two degrees C, you would have to aim for something like 380 ppm. But remember, this is the sort of level that applies if you want a long-term commitment that goes on for centuries, for generations to come."

SOURCE





Cap and Trade: An expensive Federal license will be required to sell your home

We encourage you to read the provisions of the Cap and Trade Bill that has passed the House of Representatives and being considered by the Senate. We are ready to join the next march on Washington! This Congress and whoever on their staffs that write this junk are truly out to destroy the middle class of the USA....

Thinking about selling your house - A look at H.R. 2454 (Cap and trade bill) This is unbelievable! Only the beginning from this administration! Home owners take note & tell your friends and relatives who are home owners!

Beginning 1 year after enactment of the Cap and Trade Act, you won't be able to sell your home unless you retrofit it to comply with the energy and water efficiency standards of this Act. H.R. 2454, the "Cap & Trade" bill passed by the House of Representatives, if also passed by the Senate, will be the largest tax increase any of us has ever experienced.

The Congressional Budget Office (supposedly non-partisan) estimates that in just a few years the average cost to every family of four will be $6,800 per year.

* No one is excluded. However, once the lower classes feel the pinch in their wallets, you can be sure these voters get a tax refund (even if they pay no taxes at all) to offset this new cost. Thus, you Mr. and Mrs. Middle Class America will have to pay even more since additional tax dollars will be needed to bail out everyone else.

But wait. This awful bill (that no one in Congress has actually read) has many more surprises in it. Probably the worst one is this:

* A year from now you won't be able to sell your house. Yes, you read that right. The caveat is (there always is a caveat) that if you have enough money to make required major upgrades to your home, then you can sell it. But, if not, then forget it. Even pre-fabricated homes ("mobile homes") are included.

* In effect, this bill prevents you from selling your home without the permission of the EPA administrator.

* To get this permission, you will have to have the energy efficiency of your home measured.

* Then the government will tell you what your new energy efficiency requirement is and you will be forced to make modifications to your home under the retrofit provisions of this Act to comply with the new energy and water efficiency requirements.

* Then you will have to get your home measured again and get a license (called a "label" in the Act) that must be posted on your property to show what your efficiency rating is; sort of like the Energy Star efficiency rating label on your refrigerator or air conditioner.

* If you don't get a high enough rating, you can't sell. And, the EPA administrator is authorized to raise the standards every year, even above the automatic energy efficiency increases built into the Act.

The EPA administrator, appointed by the President, will run the Cap & Trade program (AKA the "American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009") and is authorized to make any future changes to the regulations and standards he alone determines to be in the government's best interest. Requirements are set low initially so the bill will pass Congress; then the Administrator can set much tougher new standards every year.

* The Act itself contains annual required increases in energy efficiency for private and commercial residences and buildings.

* However, the EPA administrator can set higher standards at any time.

Details

Sect. 202: Building Retrofit Program mandates a national retrofit program to increase the energy efficiency of all existing homes across America .

Beginning 1 year after enactment of the Act, you won't be able to sell your home unless you retrofit it to comply with the energy and water efficiency standards of this Act.

You had better sell soon, because the standards will be raised each year and will be really hard (i.e., ex$pen$ive) to meet in a few years. Oh, goody! The Act allows the government to give you a grant of several thousand dollars to comply with the retrofit program requirements if you meet certain energy efficiency levels. But, wait, the State can set additional requirements on who qualifies to receive the grants.

You should expect requirements such as "can't have an income of more than $50K per year", "home selling price can't be more than $125K", or anything else to target the upper middle class (and that's YOU) and prevent them from qualifying for the grants. Most of us won't get a dime and will have to pay the entire cost of the retrofit out of our own pockets. More transfer of wealth, more "change you can believe in."

Sect. 204: Building Energy Performance Labeling Program establishes a labeling program that for each individual residence will identify the achieved energy efficiency performance for "at least 90 percent of the residential market within 5 years after the date of the enactment of this Act."

This means that within 5 years 90% of all residential homes in the U.S. must be measured and labeled. The EPA administrator will get $50M each year to enforce the labeling program. The Secretary of the Department of Energy will get an additional $20M each year to help enforce the labeling program. Some of this money will, of course, be spent on coming up with tougher standards each year.

Oh, the label will be like a license for your car. You will be required to post the label in a conspicuous location in your home and will not be allowed to sell your home without having this label. And, just like your car license, you will probably be required to get a new label every so often - maybe every year. But, the government estimates the cost of measuring the energy efficiency of your home should only cost about $200 each time.

Remember what they said about the auto smog inspections when they first started: that in California it would only cost $15. That was when the program started. Now the cost is about $50 for the inspection and certificate; a 333% increase. Expect the same from the home labeling program.

Sect. 304: Greater Energy Efficiency in Building Codes establishes new energy efficiency guidelines for the National Building Code and mandates at 304(d), Application of National Code to State and Local Jurisdictions, that 1 year after enactment of this Act, all state and local jurisdictions must adopt the National Building Code energy efficiency provisions or must obtain a certification from the federal government that their state and/or local codes have been brought into full compliance with the National Building Code energy efficiency standards.

SOURCE






Taxpayer Robbery Gate

Aside from ideologues, hydrocarbon haters, Gaia worshipers, profiteers and power-grabbing politicians, most of the sentient world now realizes that the hysteria over global warming disasters is based on dubious to fraudulent temperature data, analyses, models, reports and peer reviews.

Climate Research Unit emails, HARRY_READ_ME.txt computer memos, and blatant tampering with Australian, Russian, UK and US temperature data make the scandal impossible to ignore or explain away. They certainly helped Copenhagen descend into an expensive, carbon-emitting gabfest, and cause China and India to reject any deal that would force them to curtail their energy generation, economic growth and poverty reduction programs.

Senator Barbara Boxer is an exception. Not only does she ignore the obvious. She is doing her best to divert attention from the scandal, circle the alarmist wagons, cover up the fraud, obstruct justice – and ram through yet another legislative power grab. “This isn’t Climategate,” the California Democrat insists. “It’s email theft gate.” The problem isn’t the fraud; it’s that a hacker or whistleblower revealed the fraud.

Wrong, Senator. It’s not theft gate. It’s Taxpayer Robbery Gate. We, the taxpayers, We the people – paid for this “research.” We paid billions of dollars for it – and providing the data, computer codes and analytical methods is a condition of the employment and research grants for these scientists. The work belongs to us. We own it.

We the People, our elected representatives and our climate realist scientists have a right to examine this supposed evidence of planetary disaster, to ensure that it’s driven by science, and not ideology. That it’s complete, accurate – and honest. That it backs up the alarmist scientists’ call for draconian, life-altering restrictions on energy use. That the CRU Cabal did not alter, lose, ignore, toss or destroy “inconvenient” data and evidence that might get in the way of their agendas and predetermined results.

Not only were we stonewalled for years, while these UK and US scientists refused to divulge their data, computer codes and methodologies. Not only did the scientists who wrote these emails and did this bogus research refuse to let taxpayers, other scientists and even members of Congress (and Parliament) see their raw data and analyses. Not only did they prevent debate and replace peer review with a perverted system that allowed only a small network of like-minded colleagues to examine – and applaud – their work. They also excluded, denounced and vilified anyone who asked hard questions or challenged their actions. In short, we were robbed! They took our money, and defrauded us.

Even worse, the Taxpayer Robbery Gate scientists are working hand-in-glove to pressure the United States, Great Britain and world into spending trillions of dollars fighting “catastrophic manmade climate change” … slashing our energy use, living standards and employment base … enacting unaccountable global government … redistributing wealth and technology … restricting our liberties and civil rights … and keeping millions of families deprived of energy and in permanent destitution.

This is the same California Senator who berated an Air Force general for calling her Ma’am. Who treated scientist, physician and author Michael Crichton like a child molester, for daring to disagree with her on global warming and suggest that double-blind climate studies would guard against errors and fraud. Who displays an un-American intolerance for any witnesses before her committee who question her views.

The Boxer-White House effort makes the Watergate cover-up and obstruction of justice look like a juvenile offense. It’s paving the way for cap-tax-and-trade laws that would nationalize the entire US economy – by the same divisive, dictatorial elements that are nationalizing our banking and healthcare systems. They understand, even if the general populace still does not, that by controlling carbon they will control our lives. And if they need fraudulent science and Nixon-era tactics to achieve their goal, so be it.

Just imagine the Boxer, White House and media outcry and denunciations if these emails and fraudulent actions had involved oil companies and climate disaster “deniers.” But of course, if Boxer & Co. didn’t have double standards, they wouldn’t have any standards.

“We’re honest. We have nothing to hide,” the accused scientists keep saying. That’s wonderful. We’re glad to hear that. But then why don’t they just come clean. Stop hiding everything. Open all their emails. Cooperate with investigators. Honor FOIA requests. Share their data and computer codes. Stop attacking scientists who disagree with them. Put all climate studies, for and against manmade global warming disaster claims, in professional journals – subject to real peer review. Debate their critics. In short, help clean up the mess they created. Or suffer the consequences.

This bogus science and cover-up operation is behind every US, EU and UN proposal to restrict and control our energy, economy, living standards and most fundamental liberties – in the name of preventing alleged global warming disasters.

We need to get to the bottom of this mess. We need a full and complete investigation, by an independent, incorruptible team of knowledgeable scientists, modelers, lawyers and statisticians. We need to start over on the global warming science and Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – with honest scientists who do everything in the open. We need to bring honesty, transparency, robust debate and accountability back to the legislative and public policy process.

SOURCE





Defund Taxpayer Supported Science Fraud

Trofim Lysenko was Stalin’s favorite scientist because he liked his meshing of evolution and Marxism. Comrade Lysenko “proved” that there is no such thing as a gene. A lot of money was dumped into the “research” of this crackpot, and woe to those who declared that the emperor had no clothes. Lysenko’s gene-free view of science led to claims that wheat plants could produce rye. Any disagreement was labeled as “political sabotage” -- similar to the contemporary global warming “elite” who libel and banish those who do not worship at their altar.

It turns out that Lysenko’s spiritual children are the global warming alarmists in today’s scientific establishment. The recent dumping of their emails on the internet exposed the fact that their “research” was as invalid as Lysenko’s. As an aside, it seems that the emails were posted from a server in Tomsk, a Russian secret police city. If the Ruskies did the deed, the best guess is that this major oil producer was alarmed by the West’s efforts to commit economic suicide by forcing a cutback in petroleum consumption.

The emails were parked on computers at the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia in England. But the scandal is not just a British booboo. America’s leading climate Casandras were also part of the scam.

Perhaps you have heard of the now-infamous “hockey stick” graph that supposedly proved the Industrial Revolution, which massively improved the lives of millions of people, was the cause of global warming? The “hockey stick” was a fraudulent representation of data which showed a straight line of constant temperatures with a sharp uptick at the end. That uptick is allegedly the time that industrialization supposedly started generating global warming. Well, it turns out the “hockey stick” graph was as valid as a three-dollar bill.

Those of us active in defending the right to keep and bear arms don’t find it surprising that when politicians fund research, you get political science, not real science. Dr. Arthur Kellerman is the Trofim Lysenko of research on guns and public health. He grabbed some of our money that was funneled by the drunken spenders in Congress through the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta.

In exchange for our hard-earned money, Kellerman came up with a study that “proved” that someone with a gun in their house is 43 times more likely to be killed than a disarmed householder. Kellerman’s “research” made a few questionable assumptions to ensure that his conclusions arrived at the proper outcome. For example, he stipulated that a successful self-defense use of a gun had to result in the death of a home invader. Cute. Real scientists such as Dr. Gary Kleck of Florida State University find that of the more than 2 million times a year that Americans use a gun in self-defense, they only fire their gun two to three percent of the time.

Kellerman’s methodology is equivalent to the “hockey stick” tricked up by Penn State’s Dr. Michael Mann. One way Mann “found” that global warming did not begin until the last 150 years was to overlook the centuries during the Middle Ages that were warmer than now (where they were growing vegetables in what is now Greenland’s tundra, for example). Like Kellerman, Mann simply ignored data that didn’t support his theory.

The chaps at East Anglia did the same thing that Kellerman did until he got caught. Their modus operandi is “don’t let the public see the data they paid for.” The British Lysenkos destroyed a lot of their data and otherwise refused to comply with British Freedom of Information laws. Kellerman withheld his data for years until Congress forced the Centers for Disease Control to tell him to cough it up.

Is it not time we cut off the looting of our pocketbooks with this kind of fraud?

SOURCE





"Earth-Friendly" Elements are Mined Destructively -- and are dependant on China

Some of the greenest technologies of the age, from electric cars to efficient light bulbs to very large wind turbines, are made possible by an unusual group of elements called rare earths. The world’s dependence on these substances is rising fast. Just one problem: These elements come almost entirely from China, from some of the most environmentally damaging mines in the country, in an industry dominated by criminal gangs.

Western capitals have suddenly grown worried over China’s near monopoly, which gives it a potential stranglehold on technologies of the future. In Washington, Congress is fretting about the United States military’s dependence on Chinese rare earths, and has just ordered a study of potential alternatives.

Here in Guyun Village, a small community in southeastern China fringed by lush bamboo groves and banana trees, the environmental damage can be seen in the red-brown scars of barren clay that run down narrow valleys and the dead lands below, where emerald rice fields once grew. Miners scrape off the topsoil and shovel golden-flecked clay into dirt pits, using acids to extract the rare earths. The acids ultimately wash into streams and rivers, destroying rice paddies and fish farms and tainting water supplies.

On a recent rainy afternoon, Zeng Guohui, a 41-year-old laborer, walked to an abandoned mine where he used to shovel ore, and pointed out still-barren expanses of dirt and mud. The mine exhausted the local deposit of heavy rare earths in three years, but a decade after the mine closed, no one has tried to revive the downstream rice fields. Small mines producing heavy rare earths like dysprosium and terbium still operate on nearby hills. “There are constant protests because it damages the farmland — people are always demanding compensation,” Mr. Zeng said.

“In many places, the mining is abused,” said Wang Caifeng, the top rare-earths industry regulator at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology in China. “This has caused great harm to the ecology and environment.”

There are 17 rare-earth elements — some of which, despite the name, are not particularly rare — but two heavy rare earths, dysprosium and terbium, are in especially short supply, mainly because they have emerged as the miracle ingredients of green energy products. Tiny quantities of dysprosium can make magnets in electric motors lighter by 90 percent, while terbium can help cut the electricity usage of lights by 80 percent. Dysprosium prices have climbed nearly sevenfold since 2003, to $53 a pound. Terbium prices quadrupled from 2003 to 2008, peaking at $407 a pound, before slumping in the global economic crisis to $205 a pound.

China mines more than 99 percent of the world’s dysprosium and terbium. Most of China’s production comes from about 200 mines here in northern Guangdong and in neighboring Jiangxi Province. China is also the world’s dominant producer of lighter rare earth elements, valuable to a wide range of industries. But these are in less short supply, and the mining is more regulated.

Half the heavy rare earth mines have licenses and the other half are illegal, industry executives said. But even the legal mines, like the one where Mr. Zeng worked, often pose environmental hazards.

A close-knit group of mainland Chinese gangs with a capacity for murder dominates much of the mining and has ties to local officials, said Stephen G. Vickers, the former head of criminal intelligence for the Hong Kong police who is now the chief executive of International Risk, a global security company.

Mr. Zeng defended the industry, saying that he had cousins who owned rare-earth mines and were legitimate businessmen who paid compensation to farmers.

The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued a draft plan last April to halt all exports of heavy rare earths, partly on environmental grounds and partly to force other countries to buy manufactured products from China. When the plan was reported on Sept. 1, Western governments and companies strongly objected and Ms. Wang announced on Sept. 3 that China would not halt exports and would revise its overall plan. But the ministry subsequently cut the annual export quota for all rare earths by 12 percent, the fourth steep cut in as many years.

Congress responded to the Chinese moves by ordering the Defense Department to conduct a comprehensive review, by April 1, of the American military’s dependence on imported rare earths for devices like night-vision gear and rangefinders.

Western users of heavy rare earths say that they have no way of figuring out what proportion of the minerals they buy from China comes from responsibly operated mines. Licensed and illegal mines alike sell to itinerant traders. They buy the valuable material with sacks of cash, then sell it to processing centers in and around Guangzhou that separate the rare earths from each other. Companies that buy these rare earths, including a few in Japan and the West, turn them into refined metal powders. “I don’t know if part of that feed, internal in China, came from an illegal mine and went in a legal separator,” said David Kennedy, the president of Great Western Technologies in Troy, Mich., which imports Chinese rare earths and turns them into powders that are sold worldwide.

Smuggling is another issue. Mr. Kennedy said that he bought only rare earths covered by Chinese export licenses. But up to half of China’s exports of heavy rare earths leave the country illegally, other industry executives said. Zhang Peichen, deputy director of the government-backed Baotou Rare Earth Research Institute, said that smugglers mix rare earths with steel and then export the steel composites, making the smuggling hard to detect. The process is eventually reversed, frequently in Japan, and the rare earths are recovered. Chinese customs officials have stepped up their scrutiny of steel exports to try to stop this trick, one trader said.

According to the Baotou institute, heavy rare-earth deposits in the hills here will be exhausted in 15 years. Companies want to expand production outside China, but most rare-earth deposits, unlike those in southern China, are accompanied by radioactive uranium and thorium that complicate mining.

Multinational corporations are starting to review their dependence on heavy rare earths. Toyota said that it bought auto parts that include rare earths, but did not participate in the purchases of materials by its suppliers. Osram, a large lighting manufacturer that is part of Siemens of Germany, said it used the lowest feasible amount of rare earths.

The biggest user of heavy rare earths in the years ahead could be large wind turbines, which need much lighter magnets for the five-ton generators at the top of ever-taller towers. Vestas, a Danish company that has become the world’s biggest wind turbine manufacturer, said that prototypes for its next generation used dysprosium, and that the company was studying the sustainability of the supply. Goldwind, the biggest Chinese turbine maker, has switched from conventional magnets to rare-earth magnets.

Executives in the $1.3 billion rare-earths mining industry say that less environmentally damaging mining is needed, given the importance of their product for green energy technologies. Developers hope to open mines in Canada, South Africa and Australia, but all are years from large-scale production and will produce sizable quantities of light rare earths. Their output of heavy rare earths will most likely be snapped up to meet rising demand from the wind turbine industry.

“This industry wants to save the world,” said Nicholas Curtis, the executive chairman of the Lynas Corporation of Australia, in a speech to an industry gathering in Hong Kong in late November. “We can’t do it and leave a product that is glowing in the dark somewhere else, killing people.”

SOURCE





Australia's proposed Warmist laws: Grocery industry attacks fraudulent government cost estimates

THE grocery industry has sided with the Coalition's claim the Rudd government's emissions trading scheme will be a big tax.

Environment Minister Peter Garrett said yesterday that claims by the Australian Food and Grocery Council that food prices would be pushed up by 5 per cent overstated the reality by seven times. "The Treasury modelling found that in 2013, the average price impact of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme on food bills will be around $68 a year -- less than 1 per cent of household food bills," Mr Garrett said.

However, the council chief executive Kate Carnell said this was not realistic, given the role of electricity in the processed food supply chain. "The average shopping basket is about $200 a week, so the government's modelling suggests a barely 0.5 per cent increase off the back of increases in electricity prices of 20 to 40 per cent. That is not even vaguely credible in a manufacturing industry," she said.

Her estimate of a 5 per cent rise was based on internal modelling by food companies. She said the modelling had been presented to Coles Myer and Woolworths. "They didn't suggest we were off the money," she said.

Mr Garrett said that throughout the debate on climate change, "various industries have paid for modelling designed to suit their lobbying purposes".

A spokesman noted that Woolworths had rejected the council's claim of a 5 per cent rise when it was first presented in August. The company had put out a release in response, declaring its support for theemissions trading scheme, and noting that the exclusion of agriculture would reduce what was only ever going to be a "slight price rise". Woolworths is a signatory of the Copenhagen Communique on Climate Change, a document developed by global corporations and endorsing ambitious emission reduction targets. [Woolworths is obsessively "Green" in many ways]

However, the grocery council's renewed attack on the scheme highlights the Coalition's support base among industries which believe they will be adversely affected. Ms Carnell said baking, dairy and tinned processed food, such as canned spaghetti, were the most energy intensive parts of the food industry.

SOURCE

***************************************

For more postings from me, see DISSECTING LEFTISM, TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL and EYE ON BRITAIN. My Home Pages are here or here or here. Email me (John Ray) here. For readers in China or for times when blogger.com is playing up, there are mirrors of this site here and here

*****************************************