Climate change threatens California (Calif EPA Secretary on Schwarzenegger policy)

IN JUNE 2005, before an enthusiastic audience at World Environment Day in San Francisco, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger declared that, "California will be a leader in the fight against global warming... We know the science. We see the threat. And we know the time for action is now."

That same day, Gov. Schwarzenegger signed an executive order to reduce California's greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by approximately 30 percent by the year 2020 — establishing the most ambitious state-level emission reduction goal in history. The executive order also created a Climate Action Team (CAT), led by the Cal/EPA, to develop strategies and policy recommendations to meet the goals.

On Monday, the CAT Team released its first Climate Action Report to the governor and Legislature. It includes 46 strategies to cut heat-trapping GHG emissions and reflects input from over 200 representatives of public agencies, businesses, non-profits, universities and municipalities statewide.

The governor is enthusiastic about the release. On Tuesday, he will hold a summit at San Francisco City Hall — in the same room where, a year ago, he called for the report — to discuss the key policy recommendations.

NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies declared that 2005 was the hottest year on record. Most scientists believe that the earth is warming because of a build up of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere due in large part to human activity and from the burning of fossil fuels.

Governor Schwarzenegger recognizes that global warming threatens California's natural resources, the health of its citizens and the economy.

For example, global temperature increases between 3 and 10 degrees could result in a loss of as much as 90 percent of the Sierra snow pack by the end of this century, according to the California Energy Commission. Other studies have linked global warming to extreme weather events, intensified heat waves and flooding — all of which put the health of Californian's at risk and strain the state's infrastructure.

Economists also predict that the damages of global warming could reach billions of dollars, harming our agricultural and tourism industries, constraining our supply of water, increasing our demand of electricity and critically damaging our vast natural resources.

The governor is committed to the continued economic resurgence of California and believes that by protecting our environment we will also further grow our economy.

The numbers back him up. An analysis conducted by the California Air Resources Board concluded that implementation of emission reduction strategies needed to meet the Governor's targets would increase personal income by $4 billion and create 83,000 new jobs.

California's leadership on climate change positions our state to lead the world's growing GHG-reduction technology industry. We're already on the cutting edge in this area, and jobs created by California-based companies will only increase the positive economic impact of reforms.

Governor Schwarzenegger's leadership in combating climate change is unrivaled at the executive level, and is a call to other states and the federal government to join this critical movement to preserve our natural resources, our health and our future.

Much dialogue and work lies ahead but the Climate Action Report is the blueprint to move forward in achieving the governor's goals.

I am proud of the CAT's work and optimistic about the opportunities that lie ahead. California has a long, proud tradition of leading the world in environment-friendly public policy. I applaud Gov. Schwarzenegger for continuing this tradition and for demonstrating bold leadership to address one of the most important issues of our time.

Let’s just assume for a moment that we had the power to influence our weather (which this is the most arrogant belief that man has ever come up with.) There's a difference between affecting something and controlling it. Noone is saying that we can control the weather. But we effect everything around us, the oceans, the land, the forests. But expect that pumping millions of tons of carbon and methane into the atmosphere would not have any effect on climate?

"that pumping millions of tons of carbon and methane into the atmosphere would not have any effect on climate?"

Let me back up a bit here. Humans do have an influence on the climate but if you calculate how much of an influence which has been done by NASA it is a very small fraction of a degree C.

This is broken down into direct influence on the earth and indirect influences on the earth. Direct heat means heat from our bodies, cars and industry. Indirect heat is what is in dispute.

If you want to get into some really nice details on this read one of my favorite posters on FR JasonC posts on this thread:
http://www.freerepublic.com/forum/a3acb8ec745a7.htm

he gets into a lot of detail if you have any questions please feel free to ask.

Well, he (Jason C) could have written the thread a bit more clearly.

But assuming that his intention is to communicate rather than confuse the issue, I guess I'd ask why, that if he knows something that all of the climate modelers don't (that all of them forgot the Stefan-Boltzman law, which states that the radiation given off by a black body is proportional to the fourth power of its temperature in degrees Kelvin), why he doesn't publish this in a journal? Imagine it! He'd be the most famous man in science - acclaimed for saving us from the mistakes of so many other scientists. Every single one of the modelers forgot this and he points it out to the world. It would be incredible!

I guess my point is that you don't have to completely understand how everything works to make intelligent evaluations. I understand the basic concepts of climate change but would be the first to admit that I don't know how to build a working climate model. But if faced to choose between a near consensus of climate scientists around the world and a guy who says they ALL forgot a basic law of physics, then I'm going to choose the former, especially since temperatures are rising, ice caps are melting, etc. I mean what kind of evidence does one need before you start taking preventive measures?

And, for the NASA study, it makes a big difference what the proportion of a degree celsius is, as that has been about the amount of 20th century warming we've seen. Last I heard from NASA is that one of their higher-ups resigned because of being censored after he publicly said that we really, really should be worried about climate change based on the evidence that they were finding.

don't remember his name but you see the guy that has been in charge of the project for years Jeff Kiehl?
He calls him self a scientist what a joke.
He states,"If science proceeded the way the textbooks say it does, every scientific problem would have been solved long ago," he quips. Instead, he points to creativity and intuition as critical elements in solving the complex puzzles the natural world poses.

here are some other mistakes made in the math

Those "mistakes in math" involve one graph, often cited called the "hockey stick". But they don't discredit all the other indicators that temperatures are increasing significantly. And the analysis of the hockey stick methods has it's own problems, according to a NASA representative:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4349133.stm

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.