Fueled by its booming economy, China last month surpassed the United States as the world’s largest emitter of carbon dioxide, which scientists say is the main culprit in global warming.
Critics have a point about the need to focus attention on fast-developing countries: India and China must be part of any climate change solution for it to be meaningful.
The United States, as the world’s richest economy and most technologically advanced nation, still has a duty to lead on this global problem.
Posted by Randy Scholfield
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45 Comments
So far our leadership has led us to outsource the “smoke house industry”, what right do we now have to try and regulate what we have wrought?
If they are incapable of producing a safe toothpaste or medicine, I’m betting the environment isn’t going to be on the top of their list of things to do!
Fortunately, according to Republicans, there is no such thing as global warming or pollution. China can do what it wants…no harm done!
I am not a big fan of Global Warming theory but the Chinese need to be told to quit polluting the air. So do the Mexicans.
Let the same old silly ‘Global Warming/Climate Change/End of Mankind’ discussion begin.
Cosmos may only use 6 hyperlinks per post. Insulting the integrity and intellectual capacity of anyone who disagrees with him as the self-appointed blog representative of the entire scientific community is discouraged.
As to anyone foolish enough to engage him in discussion. It’s your own fault for getting into that mess. You are on your own.
China holds the mortgage on your homes…once again…they can do whatever they want.
Another cosmos basher? Say it isnt so. Could they be one in the same? ‘Cause the only person here who regularly trashed cosmos is the blank one.
Big eye roll.
It would take the planting of 100,000 trees to offset the carbon footprint of “Live Earth” — or “Private jets for climate change”http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/07/AR2007070701201_pf.html
By the way, China has no control over the US simply because of China held US bonds.If we get mad at China, we stop paying.
However, the point is well taken that China will never agree to any controls in the short run.
In the long run, China will ignore any limits that China pretends to agree with.
“In the long run, China will ignore any limits that China pretends to agree with.”
Damn, that sounds like bushco. Try this.
“In the long run, Bush will ignore any limits that BUSH pretends to agree with.”
Not only bad grammar, but accurate too!
CO2 is a long-lived greenhouse gas, which means that you also have to look at who emitted it in the PAST.
The U.S., with only about 5% of Earth’s population, has contributed about 30% of the CO2 that is causing global warming.
China… AND India… AND Southeast Asia have all together contributed only about 12% of the CO2.
Cosmos
So you support some kind of analogy with affirmative action type laws?Substitute “past descrimination” for “past pollution” and the argument sounds just as dumb.
China and India will NOT cut back on economic growth.
China and India WILL take manufacturing and production jobs that “green” countries can no longer support, due to environmental laws.
The “outsourcing” will be the fault of liberals like Al Gore.
Paul F. Rosell,
“or “Private jets for climate change” ”
‘So, Al Gore, what’s the one thing we can all do to tackle climate change?’http://environment.independent.co.uk/climate_change/article2742779.ece“Many of the performers are playing in the arenas closest to them. Many have, as a result of this concert, created new patterns in their touring that sharply reduce CO2. Others have long set that standard on their own. At least one of the acts here at Wembley will be arriving by Tube. Many of the events include the price of mass transportation tickets in the price of the ticket. There are special arrangements made for cyclists who arrive at the concerts.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/07/AR2007070701201_pf.html“But, [John Buckley of Carbon Footprint] added, “if you can reach 2 billion people and raise awareness, that’s pretty fantastic.” “
farmgirl
Bad grammer?
Did you hear about the Freshman at Harvard who came from Kansas?
“Where are the bathrooms at” asked the Freshman.
“Sir, here at Harvard, we don’t end our sentences with prepositions.”
“Ok” says the Freshman, “Where are the bathrooms at, @@@hole”
Rosell,
It’s more profitable to use less energy, and cause less emissions.
There are more concentrations of CO2 emissions in Europe than there are in the U.S. because of their smaller land size.
The formula assigned by the IPCC discriminates against large area countries like the U.S. where there is a huge population to land ratio difference.
Anyone that has sucked in fumes in European cities knows this to be a fact.
“Anyone that has sucked in fumes in European cities knows this to be a fact.”
The stupid, old argument made by JM. Yawn.
Here’s your map of the U.S., Europe, etc.,http://www.wri.org/climate/pubs_description.cfm?pid=3982
Again, cosmos assigning me with another nic, how interesting. Who was I the other day, someone named TT?
cosmos just shows the map and not the prejudicial formula behind it.
cosmos gets into a lot of his fascist regime of IPCC nazi-tactics by putting out only data that has key omissions that Climate Change is only a predicted of what could happen and not what will happen. The Climate Modelers do not consider a huge number of climate factors so are inherently flawed.
Watch next, cosmos will use the old tired trick used by GW alarmists by hyper linking to himself or other non-scientific summaries that spew more political hype than science.
Watch ya wanna bet that cosmos will link to his own posts next as some sort of proof? :)
Golbal warning or cooling is not in our control. The carbon models is just an excuse to past more taxes by politicians and their like. Same for so called carbon credits which is a bunch of nonsense. CO2 hipe is just that.
Republican,
I didn’t say you were JM, just that you used his argument.
The data sources (U.S. DOE and EIA) are available at a link on the page I gave earlier, or herehttp://www.wri.org/climate/pubs_content_text.cfm?cid=2639
Instead of attacking me, and the IPCC — why don’t you post credible scientific proof that human-added GHG’s are NOT causing a significant amount of the recent observed warming?
Answer: Because you can’t.
CosmosIf it is more profitable to use less energy, as you say, then that will happen on its own.We dont need government controls.
101 – if we internalized ALL costs of energy consumption then it would be cheaper to use less. However, we externalize many of those costs.
Since human induced “global warming” is utter nonsense and even the few actual scientists involved with the IPCC report now stating it was nonsense…
It now seems to be Sun based cycles since Mars is now losing polar ice and Neptune is several degrees warmer. Dont know of any SUV issues on Mars…although I guess it could be the 2 rovers currently using up all the solar energy in their panels.
We shouldnt be doing anything other than the current pollution reductions for clean air. The CO2 crap is just that…crap.
Mostly the problem is the ongoing reversion of Environmentalism into a Religion and becoming a “Belief Based” system rather than a “Fact Based” system. And some countries are discussing listing it as a Religion and moving on.
“and even the few actual scientists involved with the IPCC report now stating it was nonsense…
mrbill will now provide his proof that the many 100’s of scientists worldwide listed in the annex at,http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/wg1-report.html
have changed their minds.
Crickets chirping… chirp… chirp…
yes, 0.05 C per decade is the prediction. That’s in one hundredths of a degree Celsius increments for those mathematically challenged.
Of course when pressed the IPCC can’t say that this trend will persist with any accuracy, because they just don’t know. I bet if you asked a Climate scientist to lay down $1,000,000 dollars of his own money to bet that the 0.05C per decade will continue 20 years from now, they won’t do it.
That’s what I call a lack of confidence in one’s so-called ’settled’ science. Lot of talk, but won’t back it up when their cash is on the line. :)
Republican LIES again,
“yes, 0.05 C per decade is the prediction.”
http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/wg1-report.htmlPage 12 of SPM,”Model experiments show that even if all radiative forcing agents were held constant at year 2000 levels, a further warming trend would occur in the next two decades at a rate of about 0.1°C per decade, due mainly to the slow response of the oceans. About twice as much warming (0.2°C per decade) would be expected if emissions are within the range of the SRES scenarios.”
And that ignores natural postive feedbacks, which could increase the warming trend.
Why doesn’t Republican post credible scientific proof that human-added GHG’s are NOT causing a significant amount of the recent observed warming?
Answer: Because he can’t.
Oh noes! that’s 1 degree rise in a century at 0.1 C
Everybody panic!
Al Gore and other environmentalist will look the other way.
Republican,
Thank you for agreeing that “all radiative forcing agents” should be “held constant at year 2000 levels”.
It isn’t that I agree or disagree with global warming theory. It’s that I just don’t care. I’m tired of hearing about it. If the dummies in Washington, or locally for that matter, think they’re going to raise taxes to pay for something that even the scientific community doesn’t agree on, they can be replaced with a brand new bunch of dummies.
“Republican,
Thank you for agreeing that “all radiative forcing agents” should be “held constant at year 2000 levels”.”
Posted by: cosmos | July 08, 2007 at 03:01 PM
I never agreed to that, because all radiative forcing agents are not man-made. Unless you can come up with a Climate Machine cosmos, tell me how you are going to control all emissions from all sources.
Ridiculous.
One would HOPE that China would implement modern sources and infrastructures as they modernize. The fact that the state is in charge of that there as opposed to greedy companies only in search of profit makes this a LITTLE more likely.
“I never agreed to that, because all radiative forcing agents are not man-made.”Posted by: Republican | July 08, 2007 at 06:02 PM
“Oh noes! that’s 1 degree rise in a century at 0.1 C”Posted by: Republican | July 08, 2007 at 02:30 PM
http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/wg1-report.htmlPage 12 of SPM,”Model experiments show that **even if all radiative forcing agents were held constant at year 2000 levels**, a further warming trend would occur in the next two decades at a rate of **about 0.1°C per decade**, due mainly to the slow response of the oceans.
About twice as much warming (0.2°C per decade) would be expected if emissions are within the range of the SRES scenarios.”
And that ignores natural postive feedbacks, which could increase the warming trend.
Why doesn’t Republican post credible scientific proof that human-added GHG’s are NOT causing a significant amount of the recent observed warming?
Answer: Because he can’t.
We need to have the balls to stand up to China and tell them that we have had just about all their bullshit we are gonna put up with. They are either going to learn to trade fairly in the free market and quit doing piracy and currency rigging or we will simply tariff the piss out of them until they comply with fair trade.
Why doesn’t cosmos post credible scientific proof that human-added GHG’s cannot be effectively modeled to cause a significant amount of the recent observed warming?
Answer: Because he can’t.
All he has is one way linear data, all he has is partial data, all he has is incomplete data and most of the Climate system is far from understood or as cosmos states “finished science.”
Republican,
“Why doesn’t cosmos post credible scientific proof that human-added GHG’s cannot be effectively modeled to cause a significant amount of the recent observed warming?”
I ALREADY have. Where’s YOUR credible scientific proof that they don’t?
Figure SPM.4 in Summary for Policymakers athttp://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/wg1-report.html
andhttp://blogs.kansas.com/weblog/2007/07/open-thread-5.html#comment-75275378“But so far, the models predictions, using natural AND anthropogenic forcings, match the observed temperatures.’Climate myths: We can’t trust computer models’http://environment.newscientist.com/channel/earth/climate-change/dn11649
But Republican is a troll, so he post LIES about the IPCC, climate models, me, and others.”
http://blogs.kansas.com/weblog/2007/07/open-thread-5.html#comment-75277024“But so far, the models predictions, using natural AND anthropogenic forcings, match the observed temperatures.”
and post below that.
I’ve posted before that the climate models are flawed.”Posted by: cosmos | July 08, 2007 at 02:44 PM
From cosmos link on climate models:
“Most modellers accept that despite constant improvements over more than half a century, there are problems.
They acknowledge, for instance, that one of the largest uncertainties in their models is how clouds will respond to climate change. Their predictions, which they prefer to call scenarios, usually come with generous error bars.
In an effort to be more rigorous, the most recent report of the IPCC has quantified degrees of doubt, defining terms like “likely” and “very likely” in terms of percentage probability.”
Not very convincing eh?
As I said, roulette and they don’t even let the wheel spin around all the way.
Republican,
I’ve explained BEFORE *WHY* I thought climate models were “flawed”.
For example, on MAY 17 this year,http://blogs.kansas.com/weblog/2007/05/open_thread_16.html#comment-69818898
There are too many unknown natural positive feedbacks to make accurate future climate predictions.
Republican seems to lack the tiny mental capacity required to understand that fact.
http://environment.newscientist.com/channel/earth/climate-change/dn11649“The validity of models can be tested against climate history. If they can predict the past (which the best models are pretty good at) they are probably on the right track for predicting the future – and indeed have successfully done so.”
Most people would find Figure SPM.4 in the Summary for Policymakers athttp://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/wg1-report.html “very convincing”.
But since Kansas “values” LIAR, and troll Republican has zero proof for his incorrect opinions… he cannot.
“There are too many unknown natural positive feedbacks to make accurate future climate predictions.”Posted by: cosmos | July 08, 2007 at 11:36 PM
Res Ipsa Loquitur
:)
Earth will warm as predicted by the climate models, similar to the past in Figure SPM.4 in the Summary for Policymakers athttp://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/wg1-report.html
… EXCEPT warming may happen at a faster, unpredictable rate, depending on NATURAL positive feedbacks such as:
‘Polar amplification of climate change through releaseof greenhouse gases from thawing permafrost’http://www.cosis.net/abstracts/EGU06/04353/EGU06-J-04353.pdf
‘Arctic Ice Retreating More Quickly Than Computer Models Project’http://www.ucar.edu/news/releases/2007/seaice.shtml
‘Soil may spoil UK’s climate efforts’http://environment.newscientist.com/channel/earth/climate-change/dn7964
‘Southern Ocean already losing ability to absorb CO2′http://environment.newscientist.com/article/dn11876-southern-ocean-already-losing-ability-to-absorb-cosub2sub.html “Corinne Le Quéré at the University of East Anglia in the UK, and colleagues say their study suggests that climate feedback loops – whereby more CO2 in the atmosphere causes warming which in turn releases even more CO2 from the oceans – are happening between 20 and 40 years before they were expected.”
The rate of decrease of phytoplankton,’NASA Research Reveals Climate Warming Reduces Ocean Food Supply’http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2006/dec/HQ_06364_Ocean_Food_Chain.html
And there may be other, still unknown positive feedbacks.
We need to have the balls to stand up to China and tell them that we have had just about all their bullshit we are gonna put up with. They are either going to learn to trade fairly in the free market and quit doing piracy and currency rigging or we will simply tariff the piss out of them until they comply with fair trade.
Posted by: Kev | July 08, 2007 at 07:51 PM
i agree, but let’s start personal. Quit buying their stuff. Buy local. Buy American. Buy European, maybe in that order? Just quit buying their stuff.
“One would HOPE that China would implement modern sources and infrastructures as they modernize. The fact that the state is in charge of that there as opposed to greedy companies only in search of profit makes this a LITTLE more likely.”
Without getting involved in either side in the ongoing cosmos/Republican saga (yeesh!!!) -
JR: the fact that the State is in charge makes doing so LESS likely, not more. Modern, more efficient structures when building is profitable, and thus an incentive to use the most efficient technologies to be competitive in the marketplace. The State does not have to worry about competing in the marketplace, so there is no need to worry about being efficient.
You don’t think the Chinese state gives a rat’s a$$ about its people, or the environment, do you? Surely you’re not that naive.
GMC70,
The State is interested… but they may not meet the goals they’re setting.
”Green’ building techniques from U.S. get test in China’http://www.ajc.com/business/content/printedition/2007/07/06/bizchina0706a.html
‘China’s Greenest BuildingA showcase for energy efficiency and sustainable design breaks new ground in the heart of Beijing.’http://www.nrdc.org/international/chinagbldg/intro.asp“Since becoming operational in 2005, the 130,000-square-foot building has used 73 percent less energy and 60 percent less water than a conventional office.”
Link has interesting photos, such as a garden on the roof.
cosmos – public relations. To counter the new coal-fired plant going on line each week, if I understand it correctly.
The Chinese state cares about holding and enhancing it’s political power. Period. ANYTHING else is just a means to an end.
GMC70,
It’s probably a mixture of PR, and other factors.
* They’ve got health, and other problems from their coal-fired power plants.
* Coal plants are a long-term investment. Higher energy efficiency, renewables, etc. are a better, more profitable strategy — but change takes time/effort.
* Becoming a larger CO2 emitter than the U.S. gives them a bad “rep” (even though our per capita rate has been/is higher). That could hurt their market, and GDP.
Also, today,’Wen urges greater China effort to fight pollution’http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/PEK41632.htm“BEIJING, July 9 (Reuters) – Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao has called on the nation to redouble its efforts to tackle pollution and global warming, according to a statement posted on the government’s Web site on Monday.”