Guest Post by Dmitry Orlov
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| Mathiole |
The non-binding climate deal which the US and China just signed will allow the Earth’s atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration to go to 500ppm and beyond by the end of the century, far past the current concentration of 400ppm. Historically, this concentration was sufficient to produce an ice-free Arctic, significantly higher ocean levels, and an environment unlikely to be able to sustain large human populations.
According to a November 2011 study published in Science, “On our current emissions path, CO2 levels in 2100 will hit levels last seen when the Earth was 29°F (16°C) hotter.” Scientists participating in the IPCC have warned that just a 4ºC rise will mean that “people won’t be able to cope, let alone work productively, in the hottest parts of the year.”
In short, this deal does nothing to forestall a complete, total, unmitigated disaster that is likely to spell the end of agriculture, urbanized civilization, and may doom humans, along with most other large vertebrate species, to extinction.
At the same time, May Boeve, Executive Director of 350.org, had this to say: “It’s no coincidence that after the biggest climate mobilization in history, world leaders are stepping up their ambition on climate action. This announcement is a sign that President Obama is taking his climate legacy seriously and is willing to stand up to big polluters.”
Perhaps it is time to rename 350.org to something closer to reality. This organization has obviously lost its fight to limit atmospheric CO2 concentrations to 350ppm, and the fact that its leaders are claiming victory and want to continue the fight can only mean one thing: there never was a fight, just some of the usual useless politicking.
Of course, the White House was also quick to take credit, claiming that “the new U.S. goal will double the pace of carbon pollution reduction from 1.2 percent per year on average during the 2005-2020 period to 2.3-2.8 percent per year on average between 2020 and 2025.”
Against this backdrop of unmistakeable failure of environmentalism, there are actual reductions in carbon dioxide emissions taking place in the US—certainly too small to save us, but real nevertheless. The reason they are taking place is that the US economy is becoming increasingly hollowed out. At this rate, the US will not have much of an industrial economy left in the time frame addressed by this climate deal. Obama’s willingness to sign it signals, among other things, a recognition of the ongoing economic collapse, and an assumption that it will only accelerate. His “2.3-2.8 percent per year on average” sets an optimistic upper bound on how slowly the US will collapse.
China’s situation is rather different. In signing the climate deal, the Chinese played to a domestic audience that is increasingly upset by the environmental devastation it cannot possibly ignore, including filthy air, rivers full of dead pigs and other such wonders. At the same time, the Chinese leadership still sees economic growth as something that’s required for it to maintain political stability, and economic growth in turn requires burning more fossil fuels.
Yes, there was talk of “renewables” such as wind and solar, but wind and solar installations are built and maintained using an industrial base that runs on fossil fuels. They only provide energy when it’s sunny and/or windy and are incapable of providing for the constant base load that an industrialized society demands. There was also talk of “zero-carbon” energy sources such as nuclear, and the plan requires China to build an additional terawatt of nuclear power generation, but it must be kept in mind that nuclear power plants consume prodigious amounts fossil fuel energy during their decade-long construction phase, then pay it back while operating, but then continue to consume fossil fuel energy into the indefinite future—or melt down like Fukushima Daiichi in Japan.
Unlike the US, which, once the current, short-lived fracking bonanza is over, will go back to juggling resource depletion and economic collapse, China is building two massive natural gas pipelines to connect it to Russia’s plentiful reserves which, unlike the very expensive “tight gas” produced in the US by fracking, can be produced quite cheaply. This may allow China’s economy to continue growing for some time, and placate its population by reducing the urban smog problem through lessening its reliance on coal.
Thus, this climate deal seems to mean the following things:
1. The US is going to continue collapsing, and even the Obama administration takes this for granted and has set a safe upper bound on how slowly this collapse will unfold.
2. China will continue growing, gobbling up ever more reserves, until something breaks (which it will).
3. Climate activists in the US will continue tooting their horns, expecting us to believe that they have achieved something other than defeat.
what a load of leftist tripe. I pray for global warning everyday , because the alternative is much worse.
Food for thought:
Climatologist: 30-Year Cold Spell Strikes Earth
Sunday, 16 Nov 2014 07:46 PM
With nasty cold fronts thrusting an icy and early winter across the continental U.S. — along with last winter described by USA Today as “one of the snowiest, coldest, most miserable on record” — climatologist John L. Casey thinks the weather pattern is here to stay for decades to come.
In fact, Casey, a former space shuttle engineer and NASA consultant, is out with the provocative book “Dark Winter: How the Sun Is Causing a 30-Year Cold Spell,” which warns that a radical shift in global climate is underway, and that Al Gore and other environmentalists have it completely wrong.
The earth, he says, is cooling, and cooling fast.
And unless the scientific community and political leaders act soon, cold, dark days are ahead.
If he’s right, that would be very bad news.
“Dark Winter” posits that a 30-year period of cold has already begun. Frigid temperatures and the food shortages that inevitably result could lead to riots and chaos.
Casey tells Newsmax, “All you have to do is trust natural cycles and follow the facts, and that leads you to the inevitable conclusion that the sun controls the climate, and that a new cold era has begun.”
Casey is president of the Space and Science Research Corp., an Orlando, Fla., climate research firm.
His new book debunks global warming orthodoxy. For more than a decade, he reports, the planet’s oceans have been cooling. And since 2007, the atmospheric temperature has been cooling as well.
“The data is pretty solid,” Casey says. “If you look at the 100-year global temperature chart, you look at the steep drop-off we’ve had since 2007. It’s the steepest drop in global temperatures in the last hundred years.”
So how can the media and scientific elites make a case for global warming when it’s actually cooling?
Casey suggests climate-change theorists have simply wedded themselves to the wrong theory — namely, that global temperatures respond to the level of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
Any scientist suggesting otherwise is castigated as a heretic, though there are other prominent scientists who support Casey.
Noted Russian astrophysicist Habibullo I. Abdussamatov has argued that a new mini-ice age has begun, though Casey doesn’t go that far.
He does agree with Abdussamatov that the real driver of global climate is solar activity, namely sunspots. These correspond to shifts in global temperature with a greater than 90 percent accuracy, he says.
The environmental left focuses instead on ever-rising greenhouse emissions, suggesting nature is just taking a bit of a breather before the upward march in temperatures ineluctably resumes.
“There are two fundamental flaws with that,” Casey says. “No. 1, the greenhouse-gas theory, and the global climate models that they produced, never permitted a pause. As long as CO2 levels were going up, the only thing that could happen was global temperatures could go up. That has not happened.
“No. 2, there could absolutely be no cooling, much less a pause. And yet we’ve been cooling for 11 years now.”
The recent polar vortex that sent temperatures across the Midwest plunging to sub-zero records is not an aberration, Casey says.
If “Dark Winter” is right, that means the nation is busily preparing for the wrong calamity.
“We don’t have 10 years,” Casey warns. “We’ve squandered during President Obama’s administration eight years … and we didn’t have eight years to squander.”
The worst of the cooling cycle, Casey predicts, will hit in the late 2020s and the early 2030s.
Food riots will break out, demand for heating oil will spike, and the failure of the corn crop will put the squeeze on ethanol.
He even predicts the United States will ban agricultural exports to feed its own citizens.
When Casey developed his theories in 2007, he emerged with several predictions.
Rising temperatures would begin to reverse themselves within three years. The sun would enter a phase of reduced activity he called “solar hibernation.” And oceanic and atmospheric temperatures would enter a long decline.
So far, all of Casey’s predictions have come true. He says, “My theory tells you when it will be cold … and it is the cold that kills.”
Casey also suggests that a long-term cold spell will have dire effects on the earth’s geology.
As air and ocean temperatures cool, the earth’s crust begins changing, leading to more volcanic activity and earthquakes. Casey notes that the worst earthquake to strike the continental U.S. in modern times was in 1812 in New Madrid, Missouri — during the last great solar minimum.
The climate changes also will affect human activity and may be a prelude to revolutionary politics. He says the French Revolution took place at the beginning of the last solar minimum in 1789.
“It could be one of the reasons Putin is so eager to get Ukraine,” Casey says. “For many decades before Ukraine became independent, it was the primary source of wheat for the Soviet Union during cold weather times. Putin must have the wheat of Ukraine for the new cold era.”
Casey has a worried look as he talks about the revelations in “Dark Winter.”
“There is no human on earth, much less here in the U.S., who has experienced the depth and duration of cold we’re about to experience — it’s that serious,” he says.
http://www.newsmax.com/Headline/dark-winter-cold-global-cooling/2014/11/16/id/607672/
global warming bullshit is no more than the means with which the 1% insert their greedy wealth extracting hooks a litter deeper into the collective anus of the terminally ignorant.
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h/t http://happyacres.tumblr.com/
Another HUGE fucking difference between the two party’s. Dimocrats worship the idea of Global warming…….Oh wait…..they changed it to climate change and Republicans think it’s all a crock of shit.
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In Northern California where I have lived for 16 years, the weather for the last forteen years is milder summers, colder winters, and a lot less rain. We seem to get more rain in milder winters.
While we await the verdict on climate change, the one thing I am sure of is that Al Gore is full of shit on most things.
Sensetti says:
“Another HUGE fucking difference between the two party’s.”
Regardless of their differences, it’s their similarities that consistently fuck all of us. I’m tired of being fucked so they can both go suck diseased donkey dick!
I am tired of people saying there’s no difference between the two party’s when theirs huge glaring differences a blind man could see from gun control, taxes, climate change, and healthcare, the list goes on and on.
Sensetti says:
“Another HUGE fucking difference between the two party’s.”
I wouldn’t bet the farm on the party of backstabbers.They haven’t blocked a penny pissed away on the “war on global warming” yet and smart money wouldn’t bet on the party of corporatist bullshit in denying in taxpayer money to grease the palms of their cronies in the energy markets any time soon.
“Graham ( just another DC disk whisperer) suggests Republicans need to find a positive message on climate change heading into the next presidential election. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call File Photo)
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http://blogs.rollcall.com/wgdb/graham-urges-gop-to-take-on-climate-change-ahead-of-2016/?dcz=
“I think there will be a political problem for the Republican Party going into 2016 if we don’t define what we are for on the environment,” Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said. “I don’t know what the environmental policy of the Republican Party is.”
Graham, who worked on a climate change proposal in 2010 with Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., suggested that what worked in the midterms might not work the next time around.
Exit polling after the elections showed that nearly 60 percent of voters believe climate change is a “serious problem.”
According to a Pew poll, the environment is the only one of nine issues where President Barack Obama leads Republicans — and he does so by 15 points.
Former South Carolina Republican Rep. Bob Inglis — who founded the Energy and Enterprise Initiative, which seeks to convince conservatives to combat climate change — agrees with Graham.
“If conservatives plan on winning the White House back, we’ve got to have something on the menu that addresses this felt need for action on climate,” he said.
Inglis’ group has suggested a revenue-neutral carbon tax, as well as smaller steps, such as increasing energy-efficiency standards and more transparent electricity pricing.
Inglis warned that the 2016 electoral map looks much worse for Senate Republicans than it did in 2014, when Democrats were competing in solidly Republican, or Republican-leaning, states. Younger voters, who are more likely to be concerned about the issue, also are expected to turn out in larger numbers given that it is a presidential year.
Under one party life sucks. Under the other party life sucks a little bit less.
Sensetti says:
I am tired of people saying there’s no difference between the two party’s when theirs huge glaring differences a blind man could see from gun control, taxes, climate change, and healthcare, the list goes on and on.
Surely you jest .Since the Rethuglican party took Southern political power from the old yeller dawg democrats we’ve our seen rights degraded exponentially in the areas freedom of property, freedom of association , loss of healthcare choices, forced licensed to work , build and carry a weapon.
I’ve carried a weapon since highschool without a permit and as of now we have to be investigated, fingerprinted and DNA swabbed just to carry a pistol on our persons , which was never the case under the old party of yeller dawg Democrats. RES!
There is strong scientific consensus about the fact that global climate change is occurring, and occurring as a result of human activity. Those few scientists and those in industry that claim otherwise do so despite their lying eyes.
John-Shitstain-McCain
If you voted for McCain, you’re probably an idiot,
@ whatever
30 year cooling cycle?
That’s awesomeness on a bun!
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Republican dick-tard Chuck Hagel : We Should Worry About Climate Change Like We Worry About ISIS
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/29/chuck-hagel-climate-change_n_6068922.html
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So I guess the Republicans don’t want the keystone pipeline either. The Dinocrats don’t want the pipeline for stated environmental reasons, climate change. Republicans will get the pipeline approved. Difference in policy?
Dimocrats despise Coal and carbon fuels. Republicans are just the opposite and will revive the coal industry.
Now that the Democrats are out of the power seat, the Republicans are champing at the bit to change the direction of the United States’ energy policy.
Energy has always been high on the Republican agenda. They view it as the easiest way to generate economic growth.
After all, the United States is flush with energy… even if some fuels don’t have the best reputations.
Now the Republicans want to bring back an unpopular but powerful commodity: coal.
The new ruling party aims to get it on the market as fast as possible, and the Democrats will be all but powerless to stop them…
http://www.wallstreetdaily.com/2014/11/13/coal-power-comeback/
“In short, this deal does nothing to forestall a complete, total, unmitigated disaster that is likely to spell the end of agriculture, urbanized civilization, and may doom humans, along with most other large vertebrate species, to extinction” ————from the article
Fuckmedead. Orlov, whom I normally enjoy, — just went FULL RETARD!!!!
Fucking GW assholes … acting as if WARMTH is a BAD thing?? Can you grow a tomato in Antarctica? No, dipshit, you can’t. You know what happens when the earth is warm? Things grow … lots and lots of things grow, sometimes really really BIG.
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GW haters can go suck my frigid cock.
CO2-correlation is not causation.
Stucky,
You’re just afraid of shrinkage.
Bob.
I watched a program that showed rocks from Wisconsin in death valley. Pushed by ice. They also stated our current warming trend is holding off the next ice age. Yup, Climate does change.
That article posted by Whatever is fascinating. Prompted me to start poking around a bit, looking for some outlook on what it might mean, especially for those of us in food production.
Found a great “preparedness” plan here: http://www.coldplanet.org/?p=83. Basic stuff most of us already do, but it makes some good points about surviving continuous cold weather and storms.
Some people will deny climate deterioration is occurring until they suffocate from the lack of O2.
So now it’s climate deterioration? That seems awfully judgmental.
The FAR bigger problems are desertification of the land–the US is going to desert faster than any other country in history–and ocean acidification. Screw up the oceans and you take out a tremendous amount of food.
If global climate change was really a problem, they wouldnt have told us about it.