Posted on 12/18/2011 6:52:35 AM PST by Kaslin
British Lord Christopher Monckton parachuting into Durban, South Africa, to challenge UN climate crisis claims, brought numerous journalists and onlookers to the beaches where he landed. A 20-foot banner across our press conference table gave the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow further opportunities to present realistic perspectives on the science and economics of climate change.
CFACT played by the rules, obtained the necessary permits beforehand, and ensured that its message was heard throughout the seventeenth annual climate conference (COP-17). Greenpeace, on the other hand, got no permits before staging an Occupy Durban protest in the hallway outside the plenary session – and got kicked out of the conference.
Shortly thereafter, however, Lord Monckton and another CFACT representative were summarily (though temporarily) ejected from Durban, for preposterous reasons that dramatize how thin-skinned and arrogant the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has become.
As a South African and delegate at the COP-17 conference, I witnessed more amazing and absurd exhibitions than one would find at a Believe It Or Not circus sideshow. Along with thousands of government delegates, scientists and journalists, we witnessed music and dance groups, Women for Climate Justice, the Alliance for Climate Protection, APEs (Artists Protect the Earth) and others pleading for “planetary salvation.”
It took a truly nimble mind, and abiding sense of humor, to appreciate their often competing messages. One large official poster proclaimed “More climate change means less water,” while the one next to it said “More climate change means more floods.”
A socialist group sloganeered “One planet living is the new aspiration.” I could only conclude that they were neo-Malthusians worried about speculative climate chaos and resource depletion – and promoting a roll-back of energy use and living standards, so that people can share “more equitably” in sustained poverty and misery, enforced by UN edicts.
Yet another group insisted that the world should “Stop talking and start planting.” However, this group and countless others oppose profits and private enterprises. They apparently haven’t yet realized that large paper and timber companies plant the most trees and create the largest new-growth forests, which breathe in the most carbon dioxide and breathe out the most oxygen.
These and similar organizations also demanded that profit-making companies give more money to environmentalist NGOs – which might temporarily make the companies less reprehensible and more eco-friendly. Of course, if the activists succeed in further obstructing the companies, they will plant fewer trees, remove less CO2, create fewer jobs and have less money to give to NGOs.
This parallel universe aspect of the Durban extravaganza was troublesome enough. Another aspect of the conference was much more sinister and worrisome. Which brings us back to Lord Monckton, a renowned debater and expert in IPCC and climate science, economics and politics.
One day he and I were meandering through the halls, as advisors to CFACT and its official delegation to the conference. We were accompanied by CFACT project organiser Josh Nadal, who was using his video camera to film anything he liked, to make a video of “what we did at COP-17.”
As we rounded a corner, we saw someone we didn’t know being interviewed for the in-house television information system that transmitted programs throughout the official venue. We were astounded by how biased and inaccurate his comments were. When atmospheric carbon dioxide levels rose, temperature also rose, he insisted – very simple. Of course, that is simply not true.
His interview over, he stepped off the dais and headed our way. I asked him whether he would agree that global temperatures had actually gone down during the early 1970s, even as CO2 levels continued to rise. He refused to acknowledge this universally accepted fact. I then mentioned the Medieval Warm Period of a thousand years ago. In response, he asserted that the MWP was merely a localized event of no consequence. Also simply not true.
At that point Monckton asked him to acknowledge that the science was nowhere nearly as clear cut as he had proclaimed. The official refused to do so, asserted “I have work to do,” and walked off.
Josh had been filming the entire exchange, but now an aide put a hand over the camera lens. When I remarked that just walking off was bad manners, the aide said “You are not worth debating.” I replied, “All he had to do was answer two simple questions.” I was amazed when the aide responded, “He is the Secretary General of the World Meteorological Organisation. He does not have to answer your questions.” The aide then walked off just as rudely as his boss had.
These unelected technocrats and bureaucrats want to decide the science and ordain the energy and economic policies that will determine our future livelihoods and living standards. And yet they are of the opinion that they can talk scientific nonsense and ignore anyone’s inconvenient questions. We had not known that he was Michel Jarraud, Secretary General of the WMO. But that is irrelevant. We were polite, and he should have been, as well. But it gets worse.
Two hours later, Lord Monckton and Josh were informed that they had violated ad hoc rules and were banned from further participation in the conference: Josh for filming without permission, Monckton for “unprofessional” conduct. Somehow I was spared. The next day, following negotiations between CFACT and UN officials, the two were reinstated.
A couple of days later, a TV interviewer asked IPCC Vice Chair Jean-Pascal van Ypersele whether there was now enough information to decide the next steps COP-17 should take. van Ypersele answered, “The body of knowledge was there already in the first [IPCC] report twenty years ago and was actually good enough to start the action which inspired the convention on climate change.”
The interviewer then asked if the science was well enough understood. “Not only is there enough science” the Vice Chair replied, “but that science has been there, available and explained by the IPCC, already from the first report.”
In other words, in the view of the IPCC, climate change science was settled even before the term “climate change” was coined – and all “research” and “findings,” reports and conferences since then have been window dressing – inconsequential. Even new evidence about cosmic ray effects on cloud cover, and thus on the amount of the sun’s heat reaching the earth, is irrelevant in the view of the IPCC and other UN agencies, and thus may be intentionally ignored.
The imperious attitudes and intolerance of dissenting opinions displayed by these officials further underscores the wholly unscientific and politicized nature of the IPCC process. Even in the face of Climategate 2009 and 2010, The Delinquent Teenager, Marc Morano’s A-Z Climate Reality Check and other revelations, the UN and IPCC fully intend to impose their views and agendas.
At this point, in the view of the IPCC, the only thing left is for first world countries to pay up and shut up – and poor countries to develop in the way and to the extent allowed by the United Nations.
FUUN!
FUIPCC!
And all you other Commies.
Get a rope.
The UN has some apt initials as it wants to UNdo all that might be good on the planet.
Ad hoc = made up on the spot.
For the most part, this is false. While large timber companies do "plant the most trees," small operators are more intensive on a per acre basis. The only carbon forests actually consume is what goes into soil, yet perennial grasslands actually do that far more efficiently. Algae consumed by diatoms consume the most atmospheric carbon and also sequester it for the longest term.
Just because the greenies are idiots doesn't justify pitching misinformation.
If this is not accomplished, we will be living in what will amount to a third world economy. That's the way its headed.
Are you certain of your comment about how trees take in carbon?
After reading your posting twice, I realized that you don’t get it. And you don’t get it that you don’t get it.
Lumber companies replace big trees with a whole bunch of little trees. You claim that grass or algae would be better for consuming CO2. You then imply that lumber companies really aren’t good guys for planting trees.
How can lumber companies plant algae on hillsides? Should they plant grass instead of trees and thus increase the CO2 absorption but lower the amount of lumber available to future generations?
What a looney tune you are. Factually accurate but reality silly!
As the debate on man-made global warming has been heating up, the UN has tried to freeze out the scientists and new evidence, summarily dismissing them with the claim "the science is settled."
James M. Taylor, senior fellow for The Heartland Institute explained, "It is not surprising the UN has completely rejected dissenting voices. They have been doing this for years. The censorship of scientists is necessary to promote their political agenda. After the science reversed on the alarmist crowd, they claimed 'the debate is over' to serve their wealth redistribution agenda."
They take it in, but don't hold it long. If a forest goes decadent (which can take only a few decades if a fprest is overstocked as National Forests now are) they can even be net carbon producers on an annual basis (rotting wood or fire). Wood sequestered as buildings also eventually rot or burn. OTOH, soils holding carbon from decomposed roots can retain it for millennia. Even then, it erodes and ends up at the bottom of the ocean as calcium carbonate. Dynoflagellates consuming algae are the big long term carbon sequestration engine.
Thanks. The net carbon production of older/decaying trees is what I was thinking about. We have planted several thousand pine trees over the years but will likely never harvest them.
Not worth the price.
You don't get it. The lumber doesn't hold the carbon that long compared to soils. Wood rots or burns. Soils hold carbon for the longer term and grasslands put more ton per acre of carbon into the soil than do trees. It's a fact. Deal with it.
I was comparing BIG timber companies with smaller ones on a per-acre basis, because the author was asserting that large timber companies are planting the most trees. Yet most of the large-scale logging going on these days is in colder climates where growth is slower compared to the locations of smaller holdings (often domestic). Those companies currently hitting Canada or Siberia can never match the growth rates possible in Arizona, California, or the Southeast.
How can lumber companies plant algae on hillsides?
He was saying that planting trees is an optimal way to sequester carbon. It is not.
What a looney tune you are. Factually accurate but reality silly!
Check out what these people have to say about this "loony tune." If you don't have the brains or diligence to check out who I am before posting, then it is you who gets to look like an idiot.
And that IS the problem. The left has imposed so many costs on operations that management becomes unaffordable. Guess who gets to log under those circumstances?
Major timber companies operating overseas. Now you know why Mark Rey didn't do diddly about regulatory BS during the Bush Administration.
That’s it. Makes me angry every time I think about it but at least the trees are beautiful and wild turkeys and some rare woodpeckers have made their homes amongst our pine trees but that could be the basis of another problem, could it not..
You see, Mr. ranger sir, I gave up a successful engineering career to do something about the environmental move-mint fourteen years ago. It has cost me well over $1.5 million in lost income, never mind over a decade of arduous physical toil on my land.
I came to FR nearly that long ago and have been a prominent poster since, having authored numerous articles and been the subject of threads. I have spoken at a FReeper conference.
I have authored two well-regarded books. I hold the only patent capable of invalidating the Bartels patent for carbon trading.
I have restored the only 100% native grassland in all of California and perhaps all of North America. I have developed innovative stream-bed restoration techniques using logging. I have been asked to publish in biological, archaeological, and native plant journals. I climb and top redwoods.
So when you come on this forum and tell me that I'm a "loony tune" lacking a sense of "reality" (whatever you think that is) without so much as clicking my FR page...
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.