Time is Running Out on Climate Change

[Rohirrim]

We have known since the 1800s that carbon dioxide traps heat in the atmosphere. The right amount keeps the climate conducive to human life. But add too much, as we are doing now, and temperatures will inevitably rise too high. This is not the result of natural variability, as some argue. The earth is currently in the part of its long-term orbit cycle where temperatures would normally be cooling. But they are rising — and it’s because we are forcing them higher with fossil fuel emissions.

The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has risen from 280 parts per million to 393 p.p.m. over the last 150 years. The tar sands contain enough carbon — 240 gigatons — to add 120 p.p.m. Tar shale, a close cousin of tar sands found mainly in the United States, contains at least an additional 300 gigatons of carbon. If we turn to these dirtiest of fuels, instead of finding ways to phase out our addiction to fossil fuels, there is no hope of keeping carbon concentrations below 500 p.p.m. — a level that would, as earth’s history shows, leave our children a climate system that is out of their control.

We need to start reducing emissions significantly, not create new ways to increase them. We should impose a gradually rising carbon fee, collected from fossil fuel companies, then distribute 100 percent of the collections to all Americans on a per-capita basis every month. The government would not get a penny. This market-based approach would stimulate innovation, jobs and economic growth, avoid enlarging government or having it pick winners or losers. Most Americans, except the heaviest energy users, would get more back than they paid in increased prices. Not only that, the reduction in oil use resulting from the carbon price would be nearly six times as great as the oil supply from the proposed pipeline from Canada, rendering the pipeline superfluous, according to economic models driven by a slowly rising carbon price.

But instead of placing a rising fee on carbon emissions to make fossil fuels pay their true costs, leveling the energy playing field, the world’s governments are forcing the public to subsidize fossil fuels with hundreds of billions of dollars per year. This encourages a frantic stampede to extract every fossil fuel through mountaintop removal, longwall mining, hydraulic fracturing, tar sands and tar shale extraction, and deep ocean and Arctic drilling. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/10/op...mate.html?_r=1

[W*GS]

It's ironic that the same people who demand action now, while it's only somewhat painful, on the national debt, before it gets really bad, are the same ones who deny utterly the existence of anthropogenic climate change.

The reality is that AGW is a result of basic physics and chemistry, and thus subject to natural laws that we cannot overturn, whereas the debt problem is merely a matter of made-up numbers that can be changed without violating reality.

[Rigs11]

Originally Posted by W*GS

It's ironic that the same people who demand action now, while it's only somewhat painful, on the national debt, before it gets really bad, are the same ones who deny utterly the existence of anthropogenic climate change.

The reality is that AGW is a result of basic physics and chemistry, and thus subject to natural laws that we cannot overturn, whereas the debt problem is merely a matter of made-up numbers that can be changed without violating reality.

Yep.when it comes to the debt they always use the argument "I don't want my children and grandchildren to carry this debt burden".I guess it's ok of they have to deal with global warming consequences though.

[myMind]

Originally Posted by W*GS

It's ironic that the same people who demand action now, while it's only somewhat painful, on the national debt, before it gets really bad, are the same ones who deny utterly the existence of anthropogenic climate change.

The reality is that AGW is a result of basic physics and chemistry, and thus subject to natural laws that we cannot overturn, whereas the debt problem is merely a matter of made-up numbers that can be changed without violating reality.

Very true. If wall street and the economy were to magically vanish over night, we would all still wake up the next day and begin to adapt to our new lives. If the atmosphere were to dissapear over night we would all suffocate in our sleep. Which one seems more important?

[cutthemdown]

Originally Posted by fixedMind

Very true. If wall street and the economy were to magically vanish over night, we would all still wake up the next day and begin to adapt to our new lives. If the atmosphere were to dissapear over night we would all suffocate in our sleep. Which one seems more important?

So now the atmosphere is going to vanish?

[cutthemdown]

Give me a break if you tax energy, and give it to consumers, all energy will do is charge that much more for it. The only way to make it work is to say each American only gets a certain amount of energy per month. Electricity, natural gas, gasoline would be rationed.

In the end they tax energy, they ration energy, energy gets more expensive, but you actually get less of it. That is the liberal plan in a nutshell.

[Bob]

Originally Posted by Rohirrim

We have known since the 1800s that carbon dioxide traps heat in the atmosphere. The right amount keeps the climate conducive to human life. But add too much, as we are doing now, and temperatures will inevitably rise too high. This is not the result of natural variability, as some argue. The earth is currently in the part of its long-term orbit cycle where temperatures would normally be cooling. But they are rising — and it’s because we are forcing them higher with fossil fuel emissions.

The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has risen from 280 parts per million to 393 p.p.m. over the last 150 years. The tar sands contain enough carbon — 240 gigatons — to add 120 p.p.m. Tar shale, a close cousin of tar sands found mainly in the United States, contains at least an additional 300 gigatons of carbon. If we turn to these dirtiest of fuels, instead of finding ways to phase out our addiction to fossil fuels, there is no hope of keeping carbon concentrations below 500 p.p.m. — a level that would, as earth’s history shows, leave our children a climate system that is out of their control.

We need to start reducing emissions significantly, not create new ways to increase them. We should impose a gradually rising carbon fee, collected from fossil fuel companies, then distribute 100 percent of the collections to all Americans on a per-capita basis every month. The government would not get a penny. This market-based approach would stimulate innovation, jobs and economic growth, avoid enlarging government or having it pick winners or losers. Most Americans, except the heaviest energy users, would get more back than they paid in increased prices. Not only that, the reduction in oil use resulting from the carbon price would be nearly six times as great as the oil supply from the proposed pipeline from Canada, rendering the pipeline superfluous, according to economic models driven by a slowly rising carbon price.

But instead of placing a rising fee on carbon emissions to make fossil fuels pay their true costs, leveling the energy playing field, the world’s governments are forcing the public to subsidize fossil fuels with hundreds of billions of dollars per year. This encourages a frantic stampede to extract every fossil fuel through mountaintop removal, longwall mining, hydraulic fracturing, tar sands and tar shale extraction, and deep ocean and Arctic drilling. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/10/op...mate.html?_r=1

Its simply an elborate redistribution of wealth plan...resulting in less production and less wealth for everyone -- no thanks.

[myMind]

Originally Posted by cutthemdown

So now the atmosphere is going to vanish?

...the metaphor was to emphasize importance.

[Boomhauer]

Originally Posted by Rohirrim

1) We have known since the 1800s that carbon dioxide traps heat in the atmosphere.
2) The right amount keeps the climate conducive to human life. But add too much, as we are doing now, and temperatures will inevitably rise too high. ...The earth is currently in the part of its long-term orbit cycle where temperatures would normally be cooling. But they are rising — and it’s because we are forcing them higher with fossil fuel emissions.
...
3) If we turn to these dirtiest of fuels, instead of finding ways to phase out our addiction to fossil fuels, there is no hope of keeping carbon concentrations below 500 p.p.m. — a level that would, as earth’s history shows, leave our children a climate system that is out of their control.
...
4) We should impose a gradually rising carbon fee, collected from fossil fuel companies, then distribute 100 percent of the collections to all Americans on a per-capita basis every month. ...
5) This market-based approach would stimulate innovation, jobs and economic growth, avoid enlarging government or having it pick winners or losers.
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/10/op...mate.html?_r=1

An interesting, and inaccurate, Op-ed from a propaganda publisher - Opinion peice in NYTimes. Do you have anything to say or add, or just cut/paste what you agree with or have been told is relevant?

Re1) True, but only important scientifically, not practically.
Re2) False. Temps are almost entirely dependent on H2O levels and irradiance while CO2 levels are dependent on temps. Human activity adding CO2 has almost zero impact on global temps and is a fraction of a percent of the CO2 added by the environment. This pseudoscientific argument / CO2 hysteria is a false premise to which bad ideas are stacked.
Re3) False, as noted above.
Re4) And the shoe drops. Raise the cost of items through taxes, than distribute the money as seen fit. In this case "on a per-capita basis".
Re5) Blatant lie - Gov action choosing "winners and losers" and burdening the economy, but claiming it will stimulate "innovation, jobs and economic growth" without gov action.

Start with a lie, add social doctrine and close with another lie as excuse. All comes down to a means to attempt implementation of a social doctrine with no qualms about mass scamming to excuse it and the negative effects it will have on others, the country, mankind or the planet. Just myopic zealots waiving their hands to support what is inevitable failure.

[Boomhauer]

Many parallels can be drawn between CO2 hysteria, the terrorism industrial complex and the banking bailout.

1) Like CO2 hysteria, the terrorism industrial complex is soley a social philosophy agenda - in this case tyranny, pure and simple. The excuse given is safety, which begs the question if the cure is more damaging than the disease. Actions taken, and excused in the name of safety, have been not only the nullification of civil, human and unalienable rights, but the methodical assault on them.
A secondary excuse, like the one given for CO2 hysteria, is "stimulate innovation, jobs and economic growth, [S]avoid enlarging government[/S] or having it pick winners or losers." Specifically, spend tax dollars on 'necessary security measures' to which politicians can decide, depending on 'donations', which companies, products and policies are winners or losers. This is the same as the green agenda choosing which companies, products and policies are best.

2) Like CO2 hysteria and the terrorism industrial complex, fear is/was the primary driver for the banking bailout - in this case claiming the economy would collapse unless the people were robbed to pay the banks. In truth, banks built a house of cards while profiting at every step. When it collapsed the taxpayers took the hit for the losses and provided seed money for the banks to build a new house of cards. Once this one collapses, inevitably, I'm sure the same excuses will be given to rob the people.
Again, the secondary excuse "This [S]market-based approach[/S] would stimulate innovation, jobs and economic growth, [S]avoid enlarging government[/S] or having it pick winners or losers." was given, but in truth it was to minimize job losses among banksters while abandoning the rest of the workforce (unemployment has dropped, not because of job creation, but as the unemployed move into 'permanently unemployed' column seen as the decline and flatline of total employment percent). Likewise politicians, depending on their own financial incentive, selected which banks to save, which to sink, what shotgun weddings to arrange and which institutions to nationalize - aka choosing winners and losers.

[W*GS]

Boomhauer, is it time, again, for your sorry ass to be totally reamed with what you don't know about AGW?

Apparently so.

[W*GS]

Originally Posted by Boomhauer

Re2) False. Temps are almost entirely dependent on H2O levels and irradiance while CO2 levels are dependent on temps. Human activity adding CO2 has almost zero impact on global temps and is a fraction of a percent of the CO2 added by the environment. This pseudoscientific argument / CO2 hysteria is a false premise to which bad ideas are stacked.

You're so full of ****.

Consider what happens in a CO2-free atmosphere. The H2O precipitates out, quickly, and then all the water on the CO2-free planet starts to freeze.

H2O is a feedback, son, not a forcing.

It's painfully obvious that all the references I've provided regarding CO2 as a major driver of the climate system have gone entirely over your head. That's why you prattle utter bull**** like the above.

You've been so pwned on the subject that I cannot imagine why you would come back for more, unless you're some sort of sick pervy **** who gets off on being pulverized in a scientific argument.

[W*GS]

Originally Posted by Bob

Its simply an elborate redistribution of wealth plan...resulting in less production and less wealth for everyone -- no thanks.

As opposed to sending billions to overseas providers of fossil fuels, engaging in wars to no end protecting our access to said fuels, distorting our economy and our foreign policy (seeing the US President sucking up to the tyrant scum who run Saudi Arabia ought to make you puke), and leaving destruction and death in the wake...

Yeah, that's way ****ing better.

[Pony Boy]

Originally Posted by W*GS

The reality is that AGW is a result of basic physics and chemistry.

I thought it was from dinosaur farts.

[W*GS]

Originally Posted by Pony Boy

I thought it was from dinosaur farts.

That's what Faux News told you, and you lapped it up worse than a $2 whore.

[myMind]

Originally Posted by Boomhauer

Temps are almost entirely dependent on H2O levels and irradiance while CO2 levels are dependent on temps. Human activity adding CO2 has almost zero impact on global temps and is a fraction of a percent of the CO2 added by the environment. This pseudoscientific argument / CO2 hysteria is a false premise to which bad ideas are stacked.

[Boomhauer]

Originally Posted by W*GS

Consider what happens in a CO2-free atmosphere. The H2O precipitates out, quickly, and then all the water on the CO2-free planet starts to freeze...

Interesting theory, but are you suggesting H2O isn't a greenhouse gas, isn't the dominant greenhouse gas and if frozen doesn't sublimate in proportion to sunlight?
Further, are you suggesting CO2 levels aren't directly tied to sea level temps, permafrost latitude and rate of photosynthesis, thus wholey driven by temps instead of temps being driven by CO2?

W*GS, I pwn your cut/past poser ass. Always have (go ahead and review) and will (go ahead and whine).

[myMind]

Originally Posted by Boomhauer

Interesting theory, but are you suggesting H2O isn't a greenhouse gas, isn't the dominant greenhouse gas and if frozen doesn't sublimate in proportion to sunlight?
Further, are you suggesting CO2 levels aren't directly tied to sea level temps, permafrost latitude and rate of photosynthesis, thus wholey driven by temps instead of temps being driven by CO2?

W*GS, I pwn your cut/past poser ass. Always have (go ahead and review) and will (go ahead and whine).

Temperature is controlled by water vapor levels, water vapor levels are regulated by the amount of CO2. If we put more CO2 into the atmosphere, the level of water vapor increases proportionatly. The more vapor, the more heat is trapped and the warmer the planet gets.

[Pony Boy]

Originally Posted by W*GS

That's what Faux News told you, and you lapped it up worse than a $2 whore.

No, it was from one of your fact finding sites treehugger.com written by Alex Davies. Alex first came to TreeHugger as an intern in 2009, and has since then refused to leave. After four years at Macalester College in Minnesota and some time abroad, he is back in his native New York. Alex also writes for Discovery.com.

Dinosaur Farts Contributed to Global Warming, Study Suggests

http://www.treehugger.com/climate-ch...-suggests.html

[Bronco_Beerslug]

You deniers on the Right ought to watch Frozen Planet and any other of dozens of shows that show you visually what's happening in our world.

Science is only a b*tch for those that can't understand logic and common sense.

[Arkie]

Originally Posted by Rohirrim

We have known since the 1800s that carbon dioxide traps heat in the atmosphere. The right amount keeps the climate conducive to human life. But add too much, as we are doing now, and temperatures will inevitably rise too high. This is not the result of natural variability, as some argue. The earth is currently in the part of its long-term orbit cycle where temperatures would normally be cooling. But they are rising — and it’s because we are forcing them higher with fossil fuel emissions.

The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has risen from 280 parts per million to 393 p.p.m. over the last 150 years. The tar sands contain enough carbon — 240 gigatons — to add 120 p.p.m. Tar shale, a close cousin of tar sands found mainly in the United States, contains at least an additional 300 gigatons of carbon. If we turn to these dirtiest of fuels, instead of finding ways to phase out our addiction to fossil fuels, there is no hope of keeping carbon concentrations below 500 p.p.m. — a level that would, as earth’s history shows, leave our children a climate system that is out of their control.

We need to start reducing emissions significantly, not create new ways to increase them. We should impose a gradually rising carbon fee, collected from fossil fuel companies, then distribute 100 percent of the collections to all Americans on a per-capita basis every month. The government would not get a penny. This market-based approach would stimulate innovation, jobs and economic growth, avoid enlarging government or having it pick winners or losers. Most Americans, except the heaviest energy users, would get more back than they paid in increased prices. Not only that, the reduction in oil use resulting from the carbon price would be nearly six times as great as the oil supply from the proposed pipeline from Canada, rendering the pipeline superfluous, according to economic models driven by a slowly rising carbon price.

But instead of placing a rising fee on carbon emissions to make fossil fuels pay their true costs, leveling the energy playing field, the world’s governments are forcing the public to subsidize fossil fuels with hundreds of billions of dollars per year. This encourages a frantic stampede to extract every fossil fuel through mountaintop removal, longwall mining, hydraulic fracturing, tar sands and tar shale extraction, and deep ocean and Arctic drilling. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/10/op...mate.html?_r=1

We've gotten turned around over time. The "government is forcing the public" instead of the "public is forcing the government." The coercion will only get worse as the government grows.

[cutthemdown]

The Earth warms, it cools, we adapt. Trying to control the weather isn't going to work. You can't legislate away global warming. We would be better off using the money we have to build sea walls, develop drought and heat tolerant crops and livestock.

The problem with liberals is they think they can solve everything with govt.

[Pony Boy]

Originally Posted by Bronco_Beerslug

You deniers on the Right ought to watch Frozen Planet and any other of dozens of shows that show you visually what's happening in our world.

Science is only a b*tch for those that can't understand logic and common sense.

That's right keep your face planted in front of the TV screen watching Frozen Planet and a dozens of shows they will keep filling your head with all you need to know.

[Bronco_Beerslug]

Originally Posted by cutthemdown

The Earth warms, it cools, we adapt. Trying to control the weather isn't going to work. You can't legislate away global warming. We would be better off using the money we have to build sea walls, develop drought and heat tolerant crops and livestock.

The problem with liberals is they think they can solve everything with govt.

Nominated for stupidest post of the year.

Are you Right Wingers really this ignorant and uneducated?

[Boomhauer]

In the list of similar Gov/expert/industry scams - CO2 hysteria, terrorism industrial complex, banking bailout - I forgot to include the war on Iraq and Obamacare. Including now to pinpoint this as both bipartisan and fundamental.