Posted on 11/02/2006 11:05:17 AM PST by The Raven
Two scientific events of note occurred this week, but only one got any media coverage. Therein lies a story about modern politics and scientific priorities.
The report that received the headlines was Monday's 700-page jeremiad out of London on fighting climate change. Commissioned by the British government and overseen by former World Bank chief economist Nicholas Stern, the report made the intentionally shocking prediction that global warming could eliminate from 5% to 20% of world economic output "forever." Meanwhile, doing the supposedly virtuous thing and trying to forestall this catastrophe would cost merely an estimated 1% of world GDP. Thus we must act urgently and with new taxes and policies that go well beyond anything in the failed Kyoto Protocol.
The other event was a meeting at the United Nations organized by economist Bjørn Lomborg's Copenhagen Consensus Center. Ambassadors from 24 countries--including Australia, China, India and the U.S.--mulled which problems to address if the world suddenly found an extra $50 billion lying around. Mr. Lomborg's point is that, in a world with scarce resources, you need priorities. The consensus was that communicable diseases, sanitation and water, malnutrition and hunger, and education were all higher priorities than climate change.
We invited Mr. Lomborg to address the Stern report, and he takes apart its analysis brick-by-brick here. To our reading, there isn't much left of this politicized edifice. But we'd stress a couple of points ourselves.
-snip-
(Excerpt) Read more at opinionjournal.com ...
Climate change has the potential to directly influence affect all of these except education. Vector-borne diseases are affected by the ecological distribution of the vector, particularly insects or rodents. (Hantavirus outbreaks are tied to regional climate, especially precipitation.) Sanitation and water are affected by water supply, and in many areas mountain glaciers, which are diminishing, are a significant water supply. Malnutrition and hunger are related to food supply, and climate change has the potential to shift where crops grow and how well crops do in different regions (see what's happening in Australia right now!).
So if there was $50 billion to spend, most of it should be spent on improving the current situation, and some of it should be spent on long-term planning.
The predicted horrible consequences of global warming are way overblown, and in my opinion are the weakest part of the whole global warming argument.
Before we spend $ trillions chasing this ghost we better be damn sure it is going to yield some benefit.
I am for the conservation projects such as planting trees and building water reservoirs and other improvements that they say will get us 20% to goals. Then let's see.
So we should donate to the economies that are taking our jobs and are responsible for obscene trade deficits? Maybe they could donate a portion of their trade surpluses to the cause?
This Stern report seems to be pure eco-porn.
Global warming is observable and has been so since the last global cooling, before our time. The contribution of humans to the warming is arguable. Our contribution to an hypothetical cooling is negligible. Global warming hysterics is a religion.
The potential for large-scale melting of the Greenland ice sheet is a serious consequence of global warming that might happen on the century scale. The reduction of water resources from mountain glaciers is a short-term (decade scale) consequence of even moderate warming scenarios above the current global temperature. That may not be a "horrible consequence", but it will have societal implications, even in the United States (ever hear of the Colorado River?)
>>The potential for large-scale melting of the Greenland ice sheet is a serious consequence of global warming that might happen on the century scale
I think the point is - that there is no serious "cure" that will work in reality. There is no good way of weaning off of carbon fuels.
I think more reasonably one could say that there is no ONE good way. Changing society's energy sources will require several different technologies. Nuclear is probably the best short-term solution; for vehicular fuels, biodiesels, hydrogen (fuel cells) and ethanol may all work.
The over arching pessimism of these ecological compendia is misleading because the observations of "over 2000 scientists" are touted by the report compilers as some consensus, while,in reality, they are discreet in nature. That alone puts the scientific tenor of the claims into the realm of political and philosophical spin. A cosmopolitan "earth first" perspective necessarliy puts national,economic,and human interests in arrears at the outset of the discussion. Human activity and propsperity, the very notion of "property" are relegated to the immaterial. The religiosity assumed by eco-zealots is used to trump any talk of "trade-offs" versus "solutions" of the utopian variety. A classic example of past "solutions" would be the nearly universal ban on DDT in reaction to Carson's "Silent Spring" without any thought to the catastrophic cost in increased malarial mortality. Of course there are many more such examples that illustrate the mindset of central planners and their assumption of omniscience. The hubris of many "Greens" lies in that very condescension and is a sad misuse of ecological consciousness. These are the so-called "Watermelons"...green on the outside, but obviously "Red" collectivists under the skin.
“That may not be a “horrible consequence”, but it will have societal implications, even in the United States (ever hear of the Colorado River?)”
The states served by Colorado river water are Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, Wyoming, Nevada, Arizona and California. They continually fight over apportionment of said water.
I wonder how much water 12 - 20 million illegal aliens use?
Or conversely, how much water would we save if that number of illegal users were not here?
>> Nuclear is probably the best short-term solution; for vehicular fuels, biodiesels, hydrogen (fuel cells) and ethanol may all work.
No...the best way is the market. Tax the bazoozies out of carbon and have that be the only tax.
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