Christinne Muschi/Reuters
Mother Earth In Montreal, the site of an international meeting on global warming, a wall of paintings
proclaims support of the Kyoto Protocol, which set limits on the release of greenhouse gases.
Posted on 12/04/2005 5:24:52 AM PST by Pharmboy
Christinne Muschi/Reuters
Mother Earth In Montreal, the site of an international meeting on global warming, a wall of paintings
proclaims support of the Kyoto Protocol, which set limits on the release of greenhouse gases.
IN December 1997, representatives of most of the world's nations met in Kyoto, Japan, to negotiate a binding agreement to cut emissions of "greenhouse" gases.
They succeeded. The Kyoto Protocol was ultimately ratified by 156 countries. It was the first agreement of its kind. But it may also prove to be the last.
Today, in the middle of new global warming talks in Montreal, there is a sense that the whole idea of global agreements to cut greenhouse gases won't work.
A major reason the optimism over Kyoto has eroded so rapidly is that its major requirement - that 38 participating industrialized countries cut their greenhouse emissions below 1990 levels by the year 2012 - was seen as just a first step toward increasingly aggressive cuts.
But in the years after the protocol was announced, developing countries, including the fast-growing giants China and India, have held firm on their insistence that they would accept no emissions cuts, even though they are likely to be the world's dominant source of greenhouse gases in coming years.
Their refusal helped fuel strong opposition to the treaty in the United States Senate and its eventual rejection by President Bush.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
India and China will not join Kyoto. Which makes it dead. Without India and China, there is no Kyoto. Even if it was based on real science, without India and China, Kyoto is dead.
But Kyoto is no longer backed up by science. The evidence is that even if India and China joined, it wouldn't be enough. Not nearly enough. The gasses are already released and the warming is already in progress and the effects of that warming include increased water vapor in the atmosphere, which is also a warming gas.
So go ahead, shut down all industry all over the planet and you know what you'll have? Mass starvation and global warming.
The only way to reverse warming (assuming it's something you actually want to do, given the fact we might be heading into a mini-ice-age cycle without it) is to come up with some technological fixes. Carbon sequestration.
Socialist schemes to shut down production will do nothing. Kyoto is stupid. It's a religion, not a science.
(Denny Crane: "I Don't Want To Socialize With A Pinko Liberal Democrat Commie.Say What You Like About Republicans. We Stick To Our Convictions. Even When We Know We're Dead Wrong.")
Wow--you're good--and fast! Excellent...
Climate change on the earth has been going on since it was formed and man had nothing to do with it.
The enviro nazi movement was only useful as a home for international Communist goals, since the Soviets couldn't keep up with us. They had to translate their agenda into something with universal leverage, and the weather was a good choice at the time, since it respects no borders.
That tactic seems to be outliving it's usefulness as China gains strength.
Kyoto is all about attacking the US. In practical terms the US has made more progress than Europe in controlling 'greehhouse' gases.
Nature is resilient and tends to be self-correcting.Yes. But.
Nature doesn't have a "preferred state" for either global temperature or sea levels. It can get along fine with oceans washing over the Great Plains, as in previous eras.
It very well might turn out that we have to do some tweaking. But the only tweaking that will actually work will be in the form of active technological intervention, not a socialist shutdown of business, industry and commerce.
As President Bush says, we have to grow the economy to make it strong enough to handle the technological challenges of the future.
Global Warming is a technological challenge. And it will be solved by scientists and engineers. Not by socialist, commies, Democrats or other assorted left wing scum.
Ok, how long before "tourist guy" appears here?
Global warming has been a periodic event throughout history. Whether it poses a "challenge" to be "solved" remains to be seen. Warming of the northern zones may be seen as a gift of God before all is said and done.
The putative negative effects of warming, such as inundated shorelines and superstorms, are hypothetical, with huge error factors in the models which predict them, as is the proposition that we human beings have anything to do with it in the frist place.
President Bush is right to counsel patience until we identify with some accuracy what problems, if any, we will have to "solve. If and when that happens, then yes, it will be technology not politics which will serve us best.
"Photoshop Elements..$69 at Frys"
Is that the 3.0 or 4.0 version?
Warming of the northern zones may be seen as a gift of God before all is said and done.Weren't all the Club Of Rome Chicken Littles squawking about the Coming Ice Age back in the 70s?
4
Was it ever backed up by science? I'd love to know where you're getting your numbers on the impact of human-produced atmospheric gases. Can you quantify the effect of humans on warming? Once someone can show me that humans have any significant effect over and above natural processes like volcanism, variations in solar output, perturbations in axial tilt etc. I'll consider their arguments. The earth gets warm then it gets cold again. It's been going on for millions if not billions of years.
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