tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-47054627309144600942024-03-19T08:48:08.725+00:00All Dishevelled Wandering StarsSomewhere for Truth to stay when the World just gets to be too muchThe Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.comBlogger92125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-58077463016337972552017-08-08T12:16:00.001+01:002017-08-08T12:16:57.798+01:00Cars, Carbon, Energy, Monbiot, Scribbler, Tesla and the rest<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://robertscribbler.com/" target="_blank">Robert Scribbler</a> likes EVs, especially the new <a href="https://robertscribbler.com/2017/08/02/a-beautiful-machine-to-change-the-world-model-3-to-transform-global-automobile-markets-open-pathway-for-rapid-energy-transition/" target="_blank">Tesla</a>. He thinks that these vehicles will help reduce emissions and thereby reduce the effects of a changing climate. I agree. But they won't make as much difference as many of us hope in the bigger picture. Where they make the most difference is in how we as individuals can pass on responsibility for the future by 'doing our bit'.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/aug/01/car-chokehold-britain-polluted-inefficient-transport-system-motor-industry" target="_blank">George</a> doesn't like EVs so much. Perhaps more accurately, he isn't keen on the social/environmental pathway implied by a continuing commitment to personal vehicles and thinks that there are better ways to do things. As usual, he has a point, but in common with most (all?) thinkers about the future, he struggles with finding the best way to get from here to there; I don't disagree with many of the things he says or proposes, but there is a disconnect between the present state of affairs and the desired endgame position (his views on re-wilding also struggle with this).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Elon has put his money where his mouth is; making (and very successfully promoting) stuff which doesn't spew out toxins (directly), in large volume. But as George points out, when it is resource exploitation which is a part of the problem, more resource exploitation can't really be the solution.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">More critically, Elon's solution (EVs) only works under one condition; the means of generating the energy required to operate them must be exclusively either renewable or nuclear, otherwise, EVs merely move the emissions problem rather than solving it.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And all of these need to be put into context. The BIG Carbon problem is Energy. We have created a society which depends utterly on the readily available supply of cheap energy with which everything else in our society is possible. Personal transportation is a problem and doing something about this particular problem is a good thing, no doubt, but it is only a small part of the problem, and an even smaller part of the solution.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Energy isn't the only very important societal/environmental problem, though. Pollution, deforestation, waste, inefficiency and biodiversity busting all represent problems which are already biting us and will continue to do so. In some cases, there is no connection between these and the energy problem, but in many cases, there are underlying connections which can be addressed, most specifically, the way in which we perceive our World, our lives and our needs. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is the big target of George's issues with EVs; it isn't that EVs can't help some, but that seeking solutions like this don't address deeper and more difficult problems, such as why we need personal vehicles in the first place, and why we keep imagining that we can fix the problems caused by overexploitation by doing some more exploitation, only differently.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In my next post I'll propose some ideas for breaking the energy log jam. Meantime, I'll make a simple point. Electric, Hybrid or low-emissions cars are a good way forward in dealing with the problem of energy and emissions related specifically to cars - they're better than what we have at the moment, IF and ONLY IF they source their power for the batteries from renewable sources. That's a small plus and a move in the right sort of direction, but it ain't gonna save the World.</span>The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-49695916787253765172017-07-02T11:43:00.000+01:002017-07-02T11:43:38.875+01:00How to be a moral actor on climate change<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Clear the air: Individual action in itself is not enough, corporate action or system-scale action to mitigate and adapt to climate change is needed. And yet, 'what is the ocean but a multitude of drops?' - every bit of energy left unused (Carbon left unreleased) is a gain, every bit wasted is a loss. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Some people I know have complex relations with climate change action. They want to be 'good' about it, often for the sake of their own children, but also in a more general context, for the avoidance of harm to unknown others. (Are we all not siblings?)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There is no obligation for any given individual to act such as to reduce their carbon impact. This is and will always be a personal choice. It is essential that individuals are allowed to retain the right to their own opinions, regardless of our personal opinions of their opinions.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">If you are one of those people who believe, or, more generally 'feel' that it is right for you to at least try to make an effort on the side of not making things worse than they already are, then you may, like the aforementioned friends, want to know what is a good way to act, what are the useful actions, and which the 'greenwash'. For you, here is a list of suggestions:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">1.1 Buy less stuff.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">1.2 Buy less plastic stuff.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">1.3 Avoid buying c**p.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">1.4 Educate yourself on which necessary products and goods are more or less environmentally sound. Product labels do not tell the whole story, but can sometimes help.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Summary: Be a mindful consumer.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">2.1 Waste less stuff.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">2.2 Try to get the full use out of a product, rather than replacing it for fashion, vanity or victim-consumer habits. Stuff does wear out, some quicker than others (see 1, above). It's okay to replace stuff, but a new computer, phone or tv every years or so is NOT necessary in most cases.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">2.3 When you get stuff, if you spend wisely, you can the spend your time appreciating the stuff you have, rather than worrying about what you don't have. Example: I recently bought a classical guitar. I spent more on it that I possibly should. However, it will cherish it until my dying day, it will always be as good as any guitar I could have bought, and it will return its cost in both value and utility for as long as I could want. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">2.4 Instead of throwing away stuff you don't need or want any more, but which is still useable, try giving it away, or selling it. This allows the carbon cost of a product to be spread over a longer period, avoids material wastage, and allows other people to share the pleasure you once had when the thing was new to you.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Summary: waste is a state of mind, which is often careless, thoughtless. Be a mindful chucker-out of stuff.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">3.1 Try to learn how to fix, repair, maintain or care for the stuff you have. Even keeping some things clean can extend their life by months, even years. Two generations ago, every poor bachelor or young woman was taught how to sew, stitch, make do and mend.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">3.2 There are things which can no longer serve their original purpose. This does not mean they are useless. Some things can be repurposed, adapted, adjusted or slightly altered to suit another purpose. When something 'breaks', think about what alternative use it might have. Example: a Wellington boot with a hole in it is not much use as a Wellington boot, but makes a useful 'plant pot'.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Summary: the longer that stuff has an utility, the less waste there is, and the less need there is to use up even more resources. be creative.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">4.1 Don't beat yourself up for what you can't change. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">4.2 If you do even a little bit of the stuff above, which is only a starter list, then you are 'doing good'. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">4.3 You have a carbon footprint. Get over it. It is commensurate with your lifestyle, occupation, the world around you as it is, and other things. You can't eliminate it completely, but you can make it earn its place.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Summary: You don't have to live in a cave to do something good. Every small effort is a net good in itself, and the avoidance of a net bad - a double-win.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Final thoughts: If you want to be a moral actor in a modern world, you mainly need to be more thoughtful and less lazy about your actions, choices and decisions. It's mostly a state of mind which needs to change to get into 'better' habits. Is it worth it? You are one of seven billion. If a small percentage of the people who say they want a change in attitude did some of the above, and other things, this would, in collective consequence, represent a revolution. It would change the markets, undermine the worst excesses of the corporate system, and cause a reconsideration of the relationship between people and stuff.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is a taster. There's a million more things to be offered, but let's start easy.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-61671303888552948752017-02-20T13:36:00.000+00:002017-02-20T13:36:52.271+00:00Some "alt-names" for Trump<br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Inspired by <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2017/feb/20/john-oliver-on-trump-he-dominates-the-news-like-a-fart-dominates-a-car" target="_blank"><b>John Oliver's most recent observations</b></a> about <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhOeG-uTJxw" target="_blank"><b>Tango Man</b></a>, for the time being I will be referring to POTUS 45 as "President Ping Pong". This is because his observations reminded me of the wonderful Phoenix Nights, Peter Kay's first great comic series, and in particular, this (go to 39 seconds if you can't wait), the 'auditions' strand which ran at the end of every episode: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5EA2g3nZWo" target="_blank"><b>https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F5EA2g3nZWo</b></a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Since it seems impossible to take the person concerned too seriously, for the time being, I'm just going to follow the crowd and, in the English (Cockney) vernacular, Take the piss...</span><br />
<https: v="F5EA2g3nZWo" watch="" www.youtube.com="">
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The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-60051523474278590712017-02-15T16:36:00.000+00:002017-02-15T16:36:54.881+00:00Time to get used to the stupidity and move on<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As per, The Guardian tries to keep abreast of developments in climate science. Though at times the headlines are irritatingly provocative, in general it does a decent job.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This morning's piece on Wm Happer, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/feb/15/trump-science-adviser-william-happer-climate-change-cult" target="_blank"><b>here</b></a>, contained a quotation from the latter which is so stupid I thought it deserved a mention:</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><i>“There’s a huge amount of money that we spend on saving the planet,” he said. “If it turns out that the planet doesn’t need saving as much as we thought, well, there are other ways you could spend the money."</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Though the stupidity is self-evident to some of us, I'll try not to take anything for granted and just unpack this a bit.</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">First off: <i>"there's a huge amount of money we spend on saving the planet"</i></span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Okay, Mr Happer, please <u>provide examples</u> of these 'huge amounts' of money. Now, compare the amounts with the 'huge amounts' we spend trashing the planet; how do these figures compare?</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Beyond this, <u>why does anyone think that the planet might need saving in the first place?</u> </span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Is it, perhaps, because some people have identified a number of risks? Is it because decades of analysis from insurance companies, military think tanks, corporates and, on top of these, academics and specialists, have led these people to think that some types of human interaction with the planet is a risk, not just to the planet but, more meaningfully, to the people who live here?</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Trying to find an analogy is challenging, because there is really very little comparison to be made - we only have one planet. We need it. We need the living things besides us which live on it. We need its atmosphere and oceans. We'd quite like to keep hold of most of the people on it, too, for a decent lifespan.</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Then we need to ask; <u>what is it that people think the planet needs protecting from?</u> What is the source of these risks? It is us, our activities, exploitation, misuse, abuse, destruction, pollution, chaotic and entropic </span></span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">dissolution of that which we once inherited. </span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Happer's point is easy to unpick: the administration is going to remove not just protection but also monitoring. The mistreatment of 'the planet' is not a risk - not enough of a risk - to justify reining back its continuation, or the corporates who profit from it, despite the endless, depressing, ongoing warnings from pretty much every direction that if we go on like these we really will be screwed.</span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This isn't an argument for inaction - it is way too stupid to be graced with the title of 'argument'. It is an excuse. Happer may as well have said : "we aren't going to even try to improve things because it might make some of us less rich".</span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Get used to it. This is going to continue for a while. It has been going on in the UK for several years, with government using any excuse to justify its systematic ideology-driven demolition of all the social systems which we have already paid for, simply to reduce its revenue commitments and pass on the problems and solutions into private (and often international) hands.</span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The current administration will provide spurious and trivial justifications for stupid decisions which bear no relation to the reasons for them.</span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Get used to it, and move on. If the chimps are throwing their caca at the visitors, go enjoy the penguins instead, while you still can.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-8752919098814025712017-02-10T06:23:00.000+00:002017-02-10T06:25:14.608+00:0023 minutes to kiss the planet goodbyeWaking up in the middle of the night, the World Service was interviewing Myron Ebell.<br />
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I hope friends in the US can access this from the BBC World Service: <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04rq0fk#play"><b>http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p04rq0fk#play</b></a><br />
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If you feel in the slightest depressed, don't listen till you are more cheerful. I haven't slept in the three hours since the show was broadcast, it's now around 06:30am.<br />
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A couple of sample take homes for the lazy:<br />
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<li>The EPA is to be gutted (staff cut by 2/3 and budgets slashed)</li>
<li>The hiatus proves that there is no connection between CO2 and warming</li>
<li>roughly: " it has recently been shown that the temperature record is a hoax". No, really.</li>
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Can you spot the glaring inconsistency? Others already have.</div>
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Really should go back to bed, but time seems to be getting more precious every day these days...</div>
The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-29662963225652109192017-02-08T11:51:00.000+00:002017-02-08T11:51:55.873+00:00Climate change - why the fuss?Sometimes it is hard to remember why people make a fuss about climate change and global warming. In the politically charged arena of online advocacy the language of the issues has been framed by the denihilist procrastinators, so that most discussions of consequences revolve around whether or not climate change is 'catastrophic', whether or not warnings are 'alarmist' (crying wolf), whether or not projections of harm with large uncertainties are useful for policy discussions.<br />
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All of these, deliberately, miss the point, the reasons why action to mitigate and adapt are urgent, and reveal the moral vacuum which is inhabited by too many people these days.<br />
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So, here is a reminder of why I bother to have a blog and to comment on websites and fora such as Quora. These are my reasons. Some co-bloggers will have similar motives, others will have their own, but for me, this is the bottom line.<br />
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People will suffer.<br />
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Recent work has shown the link which already exists between both emergency and systemic situations and their consequences. Not just storms, floods and wildfires, which make dramatic TV and therefore feature in the media, but drought, seasonal shifts threatening food supply chains, evapo-transpiration effects, disease vector changes; there is really quite a long list.<br />
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Inasmuch as these measured effects are either affected or exacerbated by the changing climate - and the argument is not that they are not affected, but the extent to which a measurable difference can be identified and isolated - the problems which exist now are overshadowed by the problems which will exist soon.<br />
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So, people have already suffered, and more people will suffer. Many more.<br />
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There is a strong general agreement that, whilst balancing other social factors, a move to reduce the upper limit of the changes down the line (through mitigation) will actually reduce the extent and degree of suffering.<br />
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Recent discussions on Quora have enlightened me to contemporary attitudes to the harm expected from climate change; there are people who think this is not important, that the suffering of others does not matter.<br />
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At the more radical end, it would be surprising if others hadn't worked out what I have calculated and reached the conclusion that by the end of this century, and quite likely well before this, many millions of people will have either died or been permanently displaced by the various upheavals which result from and are magnified by climate change. For some people, this is perceived as a 'good thing'.<br />
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So there are already two opposing forces pulling in different directions when it comes to the question of why climate mitigation is necessary.<br />
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On one side, we have identified that people are suffering and will suffer, and that at least some of this suffering is preventable. Our duty/responsibility is clear - if we can act to reduce the suffering of others, we should act. This is a baseline in the very notion of society. There is a further principle too, that if we choose not to act when we have the means to do so, then we are culpable in that suffering. Most particularly, our political leaders, who have executive power and common responsibility, are on the line for allowing suffering without intervention or assistance, where these would prevent it.<br />
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On the other side, we are conscious that population stress is another magnifier of suffering and that environmental and ecological problems, along with infrastructure problems, in part exist because of the strain put on them by increased consumption demand purely from the pressure of numbers. An analyst taking the very long view might conclude that allowing a degree of suffering for the time being, so that population pressures are eased down the line, could be a better solution.<br />
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But this is very harsh on the victims. One reason why climate impact projections focus on economic or environmental damage is that these have a degree of measurability and are thus amenable to modelling. Conversely, the extent and degree of human suffering - people being harmed, is much more difficult to quantify, since it is also affected by a cluster of magnifiers and causes which are more or less connected to climate. Nonetheless, the IPCC, WHO, UNEP and UNHCR. along with other agencies, have placed their analysis in the public record, and it makes for ugly reading.<br />
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The more recent projections suggest that there will be several million additional premature (and unnecessary) deaths from climate related impacts by 2050 alone. The current estimates include 160,000 per year already in the system, rising to 250,000 a year out to 2030-2050.<br />
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Later, I'll write about the error we make in assessing the personal consequences of climate inaction, but there is still a lot more to say.<br />
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For the time being, let this sink in. Not very long ago, there was no doubt that the untimely deaths of six million people as a consequence of a state policy was such an appalling crime that the perpetrators with command responsibility were tried and executed for their decisions. This was the Holocaust.<br />
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What is the material difference, especially to the victims, between that situation and this? What is the moral difference between that situation and this? For those who promote caution or outright denial of the issues linked to climate change, I ask - are you, morally, any better than those people? Are you, in effect, wearing a symbol-laden armband in support of the unspeakable? How will you be judged?The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-4977058598805155262017-02-01T15:39:00.001+00:002017-02-01T15:42:46.187+00:00Do you want ice with that?<div style="line-height: normal;">
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A popular pastime amongst those of us who have an interest in what's going on with the climate is to try to guess how much Arctic sea ice there will be each season when the annual minimum is reached.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For anyone reading who thinks this might interest them, there is an almost endless ongoing source of information, graphs and analysis at the excellent <b><a href="http://neven1.typepad.com/blog/" target="_blank">Arctic Sea Ice Blog/ Forum/Graphs</a>.</b></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There is also a science program which collects various predictions, from the technical (model-based) to the amateur (heuristic), called<b><a href="https://www.arcus.org/sipn" target="_blank"> SIPN</a> </b>(used to be ARCUS).</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Part of the fun of this is to try to work out the different factors which may or may not affect future sea ice level down the line. On a long time scale, this is easy enough, if you simply reference the climate data since 1979 and look at the history of decline in Summer sea ice levels. It is quite possible to do a 'rough fit' with historic data and come up with a prediction which is not far off the mark, though this is going to be more by chance than reason.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One of the most popular sources of data and information is the <b><a href="http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/" target="_blank">NSIDC</a> </b>dedicated sea ice and cryosphere pages. These focus on the measured data rather than prediction, but contain a wealth of useful graphics and links.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">On the recent page you will notice a reference to a recent piece of research conducted by some of the members of the team, Serreze M. C. et. al., JGR (2016).</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This paper demonstrates a connection which has an effect on the annual minimum:</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white;"><br /><i>"...They found that 68 percent of the variance in the date that ice retreats from the continental shelf break in the Chukchi Sea in spring can be explained by fluctuations in the April through June Bering Strait oceanic heat inflow..."</i><br /><br /><br /> So, one way in which we can now make a more reliable prediction in relation to one part of the Arctic is in place.<br /><br /><br /> Then, I noticed (not reported widely elsewhere yet) that others of the team have been involved in a different piece of research at the opposite side: <b><a href="http://www.the-cryosphere.net/11/65/2017/">Fram Strait sea ice export variability and September Arctic sea ice extent over the last 80 Years.</a> </b>(Smedrud et.al.). Here we find the useful:<br /><br /><br /><i> "...Increased ice export during winter will generally result in new ice growth and contributes to thinning inside the Arctic Basin. Increased ice export during summer or spring will, in contrast, contribute directly to open water further north and a reduced summer sea ice extent through the ice–albedo feedback..."<br /><br /><br /> and: "...We find a general moderate influence between export anomalies and the following September sea ice extent, explaining 18 % of the variance between 1935 and 2014, but with higher values since 2004...".</i><br /><br /><br /> These two useful recent pieces of work add to our understanding of two of the mechanisms which contribute to Arctic Summer minima. They don't give the whole picture; the number and range of the variables are such that we don't have a full picture of all of the teleconnections or causes.<br /><br /><br /> What we can do, though, is look at these two parameters and add some inferences to our other observations. If Fram export has been relatively high recently, then the September minimum is likely to be lower than the long term average. If Bering Sea heat input is higher than usual during the Spring, then the September</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif;">minimum is likely to be lower. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif;">If both cases occur simultaneously, it is reasonable to infer that there is a high likelihood of a reduced minimum, if the other other known variables (such as the Arctic oscillation - AO) do not contradict this, and if the historic patterns of weather and overall seasonal temperature anomalies are also in alignment.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, Arial, sans-serif;">This is an example of how ongoing scientific research and information collecting adds to our understanding of the ways in which the climate can vary, and the trends which show how the climate is changing relative to the past.</span></span>The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-63955909535461338822017-01-30T12:20:00.000+00:002017-01-30T21:00:37.358+00:00When will the Gulf Stream ‘shut down’ and how will it affect our part of the World?<div style="font-size: 12px;">
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Quick answer: It probably won’t shut down completely in the next century or two. It will almost certainly weaken progressively during the 21st century, and will have an effect on both UK climate and US sea level. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"> This means that the UK may experience an amount of cooling relative to the global average and the long-term local average, and the US Eastern seaboard may experience an amount of sea level rise greater than the global average and the local long-term average, both within this century.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">In simple terms, even if the Gulf Stream does not shut down completely, the impact of a weakening of the system will be felt this century, and conceivably within the next 20-30 years. It has already been felt at least once (2009-2011), and the current CO2 concentration pathway suggests that this kind of thing can easily be repeated, is likely to be repeated.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Back in 2006 I spent some time trying to understand how the Gulf Stream worked and what the implications of climate changes would be for me, living in the UK. This included exchanging some emails with a few of the people who were active at the time in analysing the data and models, and a lot of reading.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">In 2009, the UK Climate Impacts Programme (UKCIP09) published it conclusions about projected changes to the UK in the 21st century, which also leaned heavily on similar sources to infer likely scenarios for change to our climate.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Since that time, the issue has stayed in the scientific literature, and occasionally pops up as a matter of concern on the internet or in the media.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Most recently, the technically reliable RealClimate has drawn my attention again to the matter in a post: <b><a href="http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2017/01/the-underestimated-danger-of-a-breakdown-of-the-gulf-stream-system/" target="_blank">The Underestimated danger of a breakdown of the Gulf Stream System.</a> </b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This summarises a paper which draws attention to some of the limitations of the modelling of the Gulf Stream, or AMOC.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Whilst it is a very useful reference, including links to several recent developments in both analysis and modelling, it does not address a question which I raised in the comments section but have not yet had answered: When is this going to happen?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Even more recently, The open access Journal of Ocean Science has published a paper which, though it focuses on a different aspect (sea level rise), has a strong section on the AMOC and some interesting material on modelling: <b><a href="http://www.ocean-sci.net/13/47/2017/os-13-47-2017.pdf" target="_blank">Changes in extreme regional sea level under global warming</a>.</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The Scripps paper (Wei Liu et. al.) applies a flux correction to better model the freshwater exchange in the system on which so much depends. It suggest that the Gulf Stream could lose about a third of its strength by 2100.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The Brunnabend et al paper uses a reasonably new high resolution ocean model, POP, which is able to capture the mesoscale eddy formations in the north Atlantic and the impact this has on regional sea level rise. It also, as you might expect, provides a greater resolution for modelled AMOC flow under the scenarios used (RCP8.5). The model runs out to the end of this century, from an original baseline of 1950, and a comparison between the first and last twenty years of the model.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">In that model: <i>The maximum AMOC at 26◦ N decreases </i><i>from about 20 Sv to about 5 Sv (red curve in Fig. 4a). The </i><i>spatial pattern of the AMOC does not change, but the North </i><i>Atlantic Deep Water shallows by about 1000m (Fig. 4b–</i><i>c). The maximum strength of the AMOC at 35◦ S decreases </i><i>(blue curve in Fig. 4a) by more than 60 %. The decline in the </i><i>AMOC causes a rise in mean DSL of up to 0.4 m near the </i><i>North American continent, mostly because of a redistribu</i><i>tion of ocean mass towards these regions (see Fig. 1a).</i></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: 12px;">*Note: Sv refers to Sverdrups: "</span><span style="font-size: xx-small;">...</span></span></span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; font-size: xx-small;">used almost exclusively in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oceanography">oceanography</a> to measure the volumetric rate of transport of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_current">ocean currents</a>...</span><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #252525; font-size: 14px;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 14px;">"</span></span></span>
<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif; font-size: 12px;">This is derived from a model which assumes a high CO2 concentration pathway and associated global temperature change, so might be considered a ‘worst case’ result.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Where does this get us?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So far, I am at the stage where I’m reasonably confident that the Gulf Stream will demonstrate a severe case of Hiccups over the next 80 years, with has already begun. As in 2009-2010, there will be years when the current slows by 30% or more, resulting in seasons which are noticeably cooler than the long-term trend would otherwise suggest. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This is the UKMO comment on the Winter of 2010, which followed the most recent hiccup:</span></div>
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<i><b><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">The following represents an assessment of the weather experienced across the UK during winter 2009/10 (December 2009 to February 2010) and how it compares with the 1971 to 2000 average (the period used for the seasonal forecast). </span></b></i><br />
<i><span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Mean temperatures over the UK were 2.0 °C below the 1971-2000 average during December, 2.4 °C below average during January and 1.6 °C below average during February. The UK mean temperature for the winter was 1.6 °C, which is 2.0 °C below average, making it the coldest winter since 1978/79 (1.2 °C). Over England and Wales it was also the coldest since 1978/79. Over Northern Ireland and Scotland, winter 2009/10 was comparable with 1978/79 and 1946/47, with only winter 1962/63 significantly colder in series from 1910. For northern Scotland, it was the coldest winter on record, with the highest number of frosts. A generally mild first 10 days in December was followed by a colder period. This cold spell persisted for the first half of January, with some severe frosts. After mid-month, temperatures rose to around normal before a return to colder conditions. These persisted for most of February, with only a few brief milder interludes mostly in the west and south.</span></i><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">For the sake of simplicity, I’ll assume that a slowdown of 30% roughly equals a drop in mean winter temperature of around 2 degrees. I am not aware of a similar ‘spike’ in the US Eastern Seaboard sea level and am interested to know if this has been researched.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This occasional and regional cooling has to be taken into the context of expected rises in global mean temperature (which will go on irrespective). As things stand, depending on the mitigation scenario, this is likely to mean a temperature rise of between 2 and 4 degrees out to 2100. Again, for simplicity, I’m going to use a median figure of 3c by 2100.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So, by about 2070, the cooling effect of the AMOC slowdown will be offset by the warming effect of the global mean, which at that stage would be between 1.5 and 2.5 degrees. This suggests that the UK will experience a number of cooler winters, comparable to 2010, for the next forty years. After that, its more likely that the cooler winters will be statistically more like recent seasonal averages, i.e., mild.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Meanwhile, back on the US Eastern seaboard, I am speculating that there is a chance that AMOC weakening events could enhance dynamic sea level rise and add 20-30 cm of extra level by the end of the century. This means that a rise of a metre in some areas is plausible by 2060-2070. Add the effect of storm surges and increased offshore cyclonic activity, and New York could experience ‘Sandy-type’ surges on several occasions, with the probability and frequency rising as time goes on.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">This is a complex area of study and I have not really done it justice here; my hope is that the average lay person can get a bead on what a slowdown of the Gulf Stream actually means for us and our children.</span></div>
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The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-25588077494790849822017-01-27T14:56:00.000+00:002017-01-27T15:00:46.738+00:00It just seemed like the right thing to do<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CK3uf5V0pDA" target="_blank"><b>Back in the chain Gang</b></a></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">I've never exactly been a Player in the online climate science field, though have dribbled around the edges for some time and have occasionally received encouraging noises from scientists whose opinions I respect.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">But in previous iterations, my blogs have received a few tens of thousands of readers, and, more recently, I have a steady readership when I post on Quora.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">So, though it may be a small constituency, yet there may be some people who appreciate what I try to do online and it is for them, as well as myself, that I have decided to reopen the blog.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Why now? Mainly, because it feels as if Truth is under attack. Prejudice and dishonesty abounds and is sometimes rewarded. Decency is not in vogue, and being human matters less than being noisy/young/pretty/opinionated/a cat.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Which leads to my second reason: for some time I have been concerned that there is a moral issue in respect to climate science and future-casting in general which is being steadily eroded. And this issue is our treatment of, and respect for, each other as humans. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Today is <b><a href="http://www.yadvashem.org/" target="_blank">Holocaust Memorial Day</a>.</b> It exists because many people think it important to remember the evil which can and has been done in our names, or with our consent. It is important.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">As I spend more time than is healthy considering, analysing and speculating about our collective future, I am reasonably confident that our society is changing, not for the better. There is an ongoing and future injustice which, if the projections play out, represents a human harm, a level of suffering, which is not just comparable to the suffering of the holocaust, but on a scale so vast as to be almost unthinkable.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">Seventy five years ago, there were people who saw what was happening in Europe, in Nazi Germany and elsewhere, a more virulent continuation of historic persecutions going back centuries, and they turned away. Some did not.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">And this is why I have returned. If a vast, unspeakable crime against humanity is to be committed, it will not be with my consent, not in my name, and I will not ignore it or simply let it happen. I am opening a dialogue to people who understand the stakes in climate, politics, environmental and social Justice and injustices, and who believe that such depravity should not go unchallenged.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "verdana" , sans-serif;">All this is very serious, but please don't be put off - I'll still sometimes make a joke.</span></div>
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The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-36371600303293428072015-07-04T12:34:00.002+01:002015-07-04T12:34:34.112+01:00No news is not news, but nonetheless.<br />
Picked up a short review on Newsnight this week, where Kirsty Wark praised <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Rapley" target="_blank">Chris Rapley'</a>s new (ish) book, "<a href="https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=veq5BwAAQBAJ&pg=PT3&lpg=PT3&dq=rapley+2071the+world+we'll+leave&source=bl&ots=03Lvdl7IRp&sig=ixi-i5BkgMT7ds1DwlZuU2_zzYo&hl=en&sa=X&ei=KMSXVcbdG8yBUfGigcAC&ved=0CE8Q6AEwCA#v=onepage&q=rapley%202071the%20world%20we'll%20leave&f=false" target="_blank">2071, the world we'll leave our grandchildren</a>". When I've read it you'll get my opinion, but on the surface it looks pretty decent.<br />
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One of the things which has been happening to me alongside the new job - yes, thanks, it's going okay - is a new 'way of living'. This hasn't been arbitrary. Having been less than ideally placed in the health department, early April saw a diagnosis of Type 2 diabetes and some fairly serious reevaluation of my circumstances, choices and wishes.<br />
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As a consequence, there has been a rediscovery of the joys of cycling, which anyone who keeps up with <a href="http://julesandjames.blogspot.co.uk/" target="_blank">Annan & Hargreaves</a> knows, is a bit lively round this neck of the woods. Which is to say, there aren't very many flat roads. Or, more accurately, there are no flat/level roads, just downhills or uphills, some more so than others.<br />
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Starting from a base of some past experience some years ago but not much in recent years, since work moved me off travelling to work by bike and on to travelling to visit clients by car, there was the mixed challenge of getting the bum-bones used to the idea of sitting on a saddle for more than a few minutes, getting the heart and lungs working beyond 'normal', and generally shifting far too much excess weight around one way or another.<br />
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So, here's the slightly bizarre parallel, and probably not very original. I have been self-indulgent, easy-living, comfortable but essentially not very healthy. A bit like Western (sic) society in modern times. As a consequence I got a few problems, which aren't the type which go away in a hurry, especially if they are ignored. So, for no better reason than it seemed the sensible thing to do, I have slightly adjusted little bits of my life habit to steadily modify the present effects of past indulgence, and to reduce the risk of future complications or, at worst, crises. Are you following so far?<br />
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So, the parallel is with the way as a society we tend to live in the world; comfortable, self-indulgent, unhealthy. The planet is showing the kind of symptoms and problems that indicate a long-term problem with both present and future issues, which won't be resolved by ignoring them. So, to make a difference to present and future circumstances, we could do worse than make some small, positive adjustments to the way in which we live in the world.<br />
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Is Carbon dioxide the Sugar of the Environment? There, that's the question. Your thoughts?The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-90932186111423572012015-04-17T18:06:00.001+01:002015-04-17T18:06:03.845+01:00On noticeI've tried to sustain this blog for a while, feeling that there is still room for some odd thinking here and there, but events have conspired to make it rather more difficult in future.<br />
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In short, I'm starting a new job next week which is likely to demand a fair bit of my 'spare' time and a whole chunk of energy.<br />
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Luckily for the climate science debate, this isn't a significant contributor, my viewers are eclectic, if high quality (thanks, chaps), and a lot of what I cover features elsewhere, with a slightly different slant.<br />
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Sometimes I pick up on things which seem to have gone under the radar, and I wish that a few more people had seen what I saw as significant, but readerships have a way of telling the story in their way, too.<br />
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I don't intend to abandon writing about climate and related issues, but it could be some weeks between messages (yes, real hiati) , but regulars have got used to that.<br />
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Its also highly likely that my regular appearances in the commentariat elsewhere will be curtailed.<br />
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Thank you for your support and patience. When it matters, I'll still be posting, especially after the General Election, where I have been supporting the Green Party and getting involved locally.<br />
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Fergus.The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com272tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-69352609136368120372015-04-07T11:13:00.003+01:002015-04-07T11:13:34.378+01:00In defence of Tol, or not<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This morning's exchange with Richard Tol at <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2015/apr/06/revealing-interview-with-top-contrarian-climate-scientists" target="_blank"><span style="color: red;">the Guardian</span></a> allowed me the opportunity to raise a point which I think needs to be clear to people engaged in climate science discussions online: Tol is <u>not</u> a hardcore denialist.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Below is what has appeared so far. The point is Richard's central comment, divided into four parts: </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Guardian Text Sans Web', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">off topic, and in the public record</span><br style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Guardian Text Sans Web', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;" /><span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Guardian Text Sans Web', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">- climate is changing</span><br style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Guardian Text Sans Web', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;" /><span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Guardian Text Sans Web', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">- greenhouse gas emissions are a major cause</span><br style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Guardian Text Sans Web', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;" /><span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Guardian Text Sans Web', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">- climate change is, in the long-term, net harmful</span><br style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Guardian Text Sans Web', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;" /><span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Guardian Text Sans Web', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">- polarization a la Nuccitelli hampers climate policy</span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: 'Guardian Text Sans Web', 'Helvetica Neue', Helvetica, Arial, 'Lucida Grande', sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">No problem with points one and two, and all those who love or hate RSJT on the basis that he is a denial monkey should read and digest.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Point three is of course a key matter and IMO worth engaging in discussions about. Where Tol sometimes seems to miss the point is that climate change is, ipso facto, a long-term problem (it may also be a short-term problem, but this is open to discussion, too). The point is that his qualifier 'in the long term' is redundant. There is a tendency for people to extrapolate from this idea that it is not a 'problem' in the short term, therefore it is not necessary to create mitigation policy now. To reach this conclusion is to fundamentally misunderstand the nature of the risks and problems which science has highlighted.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="color: #333333; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Which brings us to point four. Richard accuses Dana of polarising the issues and thereby obstructing policy. Anyone familiar with his track record will find this a most peculiar claim, since Tol has allowed those who wish to obstruct policy, notably the GWPF, a number of Tory MPs and people such as Matt Ridley to persistently misrepresent his work without correction, whilst at the same time offering self as critic to those, such as Cook and Nuccitelli, who are clear advocates of policy action.</span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;"><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">I believe that Richard Tol believes himself to be a rational, impartial observer, but you have to judge a person (insofar as judgment is required) on what they do, not just on what they say. By this parameter, Tol has by default placed himself in the 'denial' camp. if this sits uncomfortably with him he must respond to it. By distancing himself from the people who misrepresent him to obstruct climate policy he can undo some of the harm already caused by these people. Should he feel no obligation or responsibility to so do, one feels inclined to presume that he is satisfied with this state of affairs, and by implication supportive of it. In which case he should stop whinging about the whole thing and accept that to many people he is a 'bad guy' and his actions (or inactions) prove him so.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;"><br /></span></span></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-size: 14px; line-height: 20px;">Come on Richard, show your capacity for decency. There is a very important discussion of policy to be had and it could benefit from your input, but before that you need to detach yourself from your current reputation. Will you do that?</span></span></span><br />
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I particularly like the bit where Mr Nuccitelli tells Dr Spencer what Dr Spencer really thinks.</div>
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I liked this bit. <a class=" u-underline" data-component="in-body-link" data-link-name="in body link" href="http://skepticalscience.com/climate-contrarians-accidentally-confirm-97-percent-consensus.html" rel="nofollow" style="-webkit-transition: border-color 0.15s ease-out; border-bottom-color: rgb(220, 220, 220); border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-width: 0.0625rem; color: #005689; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none !important; transition: border-color 0.15s ease-out;">Gremlins</a>.</div>
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I for one would be interested to hear from RSJT what RSJT actually thinks about whether the climate is changing and whether this represents a social risk.</div>
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Well, Richard?</div>
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off topic, and in the public record<br />- climate is changing<br />- greenhouse gas emissions are a major cause<br />- climate change is, in the long-term, net harmful<br />- polarization a la Nuccitelli hampers climate policy</div>
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Polarization as in the anti-science promoted by the GWPF? Maybe the GWPF needs a scientific advisor.</div>
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Kudos due for paying attention and bothering to respond. TY. I sort of know this anyway, really, because I've read your (available) papers. But people often misunderstand you - probably because you are as guilty as Dana of stirring things up, so I think the polarisation comment is a bit rich.<br />I know many 'denial' commenters such as Ridley etc depend heavily on your work, especially as distorted by Lomborg via Copenhagen, but you never seem to spend time correcting their misunderstandings or inaccuracies. As a result, there's a tendency to place you one one side of 'the divide'. This may be unfair in your eyes, but it is perfectly understandable in mine.<br />Polarization? Isn't that the bread and butter of journalism? I agree it can be frustrating, but via friends in the USA it is clear that there the discussions are not just polarised, they are politicised.</div>
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The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-87297146737449927612015-04-01T07:28:00.000+01:002015-04-01T15:11:44.872+01:00It's not us! New report casts doubt on Anthropogenic source of climate change!<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Once the news gets out about the new paper published in the obscure but worthy Journal of Mythological Climate Studies there is going to be a lot of trouble.</span><br />
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The new report from academics in Iceland claims that humans are NOT the cause of climate change. After extensive research. they say, it has been established that Trolls are the principle source of the hot air - via CO2 and methane emissions.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Iceland has long included consideration for elves and trolls in its legislation, for example making sure that roads and other developments avoid certain stones and features in the local landscape which are said to be occupied by mythological beings: <span style="background-color: yellow; color: #cc0000;"><a href="http://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2015/mar/25/iceland-construction-respect-elves-or-else" target="_blank">Guardian, 25/03/15</a> </span>.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But the new research is truly unbelievable. "According to the data gathered," we were told by lead scientist Arne Illbebaackersson, "we have historically vastly underestimated the volume of emissions generated by Trolls and other quasi-human entities. Once these new estimates are incorporated into climate models the correlation becomes obvious."</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Dr Illbebackerrsson's team has been collecting data from around elf-stones for more than a decade and their new paper shows the correlations in startling detail. Unfortunately, the article is paywalled so this blogger cannot provide a link.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Similar material published in nature and reported by well-known blogger Rabett <span style="background-color: yellow; color: red;"><a href="http://rabett.blogspot.co.uk/2015/03/its-dragons.html" target="_blank">(here)</a> </span>attributes the origins elsewhere, based on the same core evidence.</span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Famed climate scientist Michael Mann was unavailable for comment.</span></div>
The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-40662403339949186132015-03-30T18:00:00.000+01:002015-04-01T18:35:12.215+01:00This is important and should be shouted about<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Holy Cow!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Thanks to <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/mar/30/climate-change-paris-talks-oslo-principles-legal-obligations" target="_blank"><span style="color: red;">the Guardian</span></a>, I find The Oslo Principles, a new publication on the Laws relating to climate change. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It is hard to assess the detail in one chunk, but to me this is so significant it deserves full publication, as well as links:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What it does is set out in law the ways in which both nations and enterprises are legally liable, now, for the impacts of climate change.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The implications of this are very, very far reaching. The commentary, rehearsing the legal arguments and providing references, is 94 pages long, and can be accessed <span style="color: red;"><a href="http://www.yale.edu/macmillan/globaljustice/Oslo%20Principles%20Commentary.pdf" target="_blank"><span style="color: red;">here</span></a>.</span>Enjoy:</span><br />
<br />
<div class="page" title="Page 1">
<div class="layoutArea">
<div class="column">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 16.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">O</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 13.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">SLO </span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 16.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">P</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 13.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">RINCIPLES ON<br />
</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 16.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">G</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 13.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">LOBAL </span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 16.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">C</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 13.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">LIMATE </span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 16.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">C</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 13.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">HANGE </span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 16.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">O</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 13.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">BLIGATIONS
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">On March 1, 2015, a group of experts in international law, human rights law, environmental
law, and other law adopted the Oslo Principles on Global Obligations to Reduce Climate
Change.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">The experts came from universities, national and international courts, and organizations
located in every region of the world.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">Based on extensive legal research and discussions over a period of several years, which
culminated in a meeting in Oslo, Norway, in 2014, the undersigned experts adopted the
following principles:
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">P</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 9.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">REAMBLE
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">Climate change threatens the well-being of the Earth. The threats are grave and imminent.
Indeed, climate change has already begun to harm human communities and the environment.
As a group of legal experts concerned about global climate change and its disastrous effects
on the planet and on life, we have come together to identify and articulate a set of Principles
that comprise the essential obligations States and enterprises have to avert the critical level of
global warming.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">These Principles, seeking to overcome the generally abstract nature of previous efforts to
define the scope of legal obligations relevant to climate change, express both
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">1) the current obligations that all States and enterprises have to defend and protect
the Earth’s climate and, thus, its biosphere; and
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">2) basic means of meeting those obligations.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">Fulfilling these obligations is necessary and urgent if we are to avoid an unprecedented
catastrophe. The obligations set out here derive from broad fundamental principles and a
wide range of well-established law.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">The biosphere, all forms of life within it and the ecological processes that maintain all living
organisms are part of the common heritage of humanity. Human beings, because of their
unique nature and capacities, have an essential duty as guardians and trustees of the Earth to
preserve, protect and sustain the biosphere and the full diversity of life within it.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">Avoiding severe global catastrophe is a moral and legal imperative. To the extent that human
activity endangers the biosphere, particularly through the effects of human activity on the
global climate, all States and enterprises have an immediate moral and legal duty to prevent
the deleterious effects of climate change. While all people, individually and through all the
varieties of associations that they form, share the moral duty to avert climate change, the
critical legal responsibility rests with States and enterprises.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">According to the view of the overwhelming majority of leading scientists and other experts,
climate change poses serious risks to both present and future generations of humankind, to
other living species and to the biosphere. Climate change further endangers social and </span><span style="font-family: TimesNewRomanPSMT; font-size: 12pt;">economic progress, international peace and security, and equity and justice among human
beings and States. Communities and segments of the population already in the most
vulnerable circumstances will tend to suffer the effects of climate change most acutely.</span></div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="page" title="Page 2">
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<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">Prevailing international scientific opinion recognizes that a two-degree Celsius increase in the
Earth’s mean global surface temperature over the pre-industrial level will have a profound,
adverse and irreversible impact on human and other life and on the Earth. The even greater
increase toward which the climate is currently moving would cause significantly greater
damage. Human activity is already causing grave and potentially catastrophic changes in the
climate. The rate of global climate change is widely understood to put humanity at a tipping
point that requires urgent action to avert disaster. While a small minority of opinion is critical
of the consensus, the power of prevailing scientific opinion requires action as set forth in
these Principles.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">All principles, laws, policies and practices, whether local, national or international, that may
affect the environment and, in particular, the global climate must be based on scientific
evidence. As this evidence is constantly evolving and improving, lawmakers, policymakers
and tribunals have a duty to inform themselves of and base their actions – in good faith and
respecting justice and equity – on prevailing scientific knowledge and opinion. If necessary,
in order to respect the Precautionary Principle (Principle 1 below), such decision makers must
take into account, and take action to avoid, any credible and realistic worst-case scenario
accepted by a substantial number of eminent climate change experts.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">International law entails obligations to act cooperatively to protect and advance fundamental
human rights, including in the context of climate change and its effects on people’s ability to
exercise such rights. Threatened human rights include, but are not limited to, the right to life,
the rights to health, water, food, a clean environment, and other social, economic and cultural
rights, and the rights of children, women, minorities and indigenous peoples.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">International law recognises that each State is legally responsible for the deleterious trans-
border effects that human activities in its territory have on other States.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">The grave and universal nature of climate change’s threat to the Earth affirms the basic
principle of human solidarity and requires all States and individuals to act, in regard to
decisions affecting the climate, with urgency and respect for justice and equity and to
negotiate in good faith to achieve agreements that, taken together, would prevent the critical
two-degree Celsius increase in global temperature.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">If global emissions contributing to climate change continue to increase, or if the required
reductions, as set out in these Principles, fail to prevent a two-degree Celsius temperature
increase, States and enterprises must reduce their emissions further.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">These Principles set out the legal obligations of States and enterprises to take the urgent
measures necessary to avert climate change and its catastrophic effects. They do not claim to
address all action that humanity will need to take to respond to the dangers climate change
poses to human life and the biosphere. Additional crucial initiatives include:
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'Symbol'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">• </span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">action by international, national and local actors to adapt to inevitable climate-change
effects in ways that minimize harm to human and other forms of life and to the
exercise of human rights;</span></div>
</div>
</div>
<div class="page" title="Page 3">
<div class="layoutArea">
<div class="column">
<ul style="list-style-type: disc;">
<li style="font-family: 'Symbol'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">transparency in the conduct of all actors with responsibility to implement these
Principles;
</span><br />
</li>
<li style="font-family: 'Symbol'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">widespread education initiatives to ensure that humanity, in general, and all people
making relevant decisions, including legislative and judicial decisions, understand the
urgency of action to avert climate change; and
</span><br />
</li>
<li style="font-family: 'Symbol'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">guarantees of public access to information about the climate effects of policies,
projects and practices, public participation in relevant decision-making, and the
establishment of appropriate institutions to coordinate and implement efforts to reduce
climate change.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">No single source of law alone requires States and enterprises to fulfil these Principles. Rather,
a network of intersecting sources provides States and enterprises with obligations to respond
urgently and effectively to climate change in a manner that respects, protects, and fulfils the
basic dignity and human rights of the world’s people and the safety and integrity of the
biosphere. These sources are local, national, regional, and international and derive from
diverse substantive canons, including, </span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-style: italic;">inter alia</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">, international human rights law,
environmental law and tort law.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">Under well-established principles of international law, States are entitled to a degree of
discretion in the means they choose to fulfil their obligations under these Principles.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">I. G</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 9.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">ENERAL </span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">P</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 9.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">RINCIPLE
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">1. Precautionary Principle: </span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">There is clear and convincing evidence that the greenhouse gas
(GHG) emissions produced by human activity are causing significant changes to the climate
and that these changes pose grave risks of irreversible harm to humanity, including present
and future generations, to the environment, including other living species and the entire
</span><br />
</li>
</ul>
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">natural habitat, and to the global economy.
</span><br />
<ol style="list-style-type: lower-latin;">
<li style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">The Precautionary Principle requires that:
</span><br />
<ol style="list-style-type: none;">
<li>
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">1) GHG emissions be reduced to the extent and at a pace necessary to protect against
the threats of climate change that can still be avoided; and
</span><br />
</li>
<li>
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">2) the level of reductions of GHG emissions required to achieve this, should be based
on any credible and realistic worst-case scenario accepted by a substantial number
of eminent climate change experts.
</span><br />
</li>
</ol>
</li>
<li style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">The measures required by the Precautionary Principle should be adopted without
regard to the cost, unless that cost is completely disproportionate to the reduction in
emissions that will be brought about by expending it.
</span><br />
</li>
</ol>
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">II. D</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 9.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">EFINITIONS<br />
</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">2. </span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Least developed countries</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">: Countries that qualify as least developed, as defined and
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">classified by the United Nations Committee on Development Policy.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">3. </span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Permissible quantum of GHG emissions</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">: Maximum amount of total global GHG
emissions per capita in a given year, calculated on a global basis, that, based on Principle 1.a,
may be allowed consistent with a plan of steady emissions reductions to ensure that the total
</span></div>
</div>
<div class="layoutArea">
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<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">3
</span></div>
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</div>
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<div class="column">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">global average surface temperature increase ultimately caused by GHG emissions never
exceeds pre-industrial temperatures by more than 2 degrees Celsius.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">4. </span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Above- or below-permissible-quantum country</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">: A country that, in a specific year, has
GHG emissions per capita that, respectively, exceed or fall below the permissible annual
quantum.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">5. </span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Reduction of GHG</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">: For the purpose of these Principles and Obligations, reduction of
GHG emissions includes measures to reduce GHG already in the atmosphere as well as to
reduce GHG emissions.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">III. </span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">S</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 9.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">PECIFIC </span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">O</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 9.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">BLIGATIONS<br />
</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">A. Obligations of States and Enterprises
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">6. States and enterprises must take measures, based on Principle 1, to ensure that the global
average surface temperature increase never exceeds pre-industrial temperature by more than
2 degrees Celsius.
</span><br />
<ol style="list-style-type: lower-latin;">
<li style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">The extent of the measures legally required must be determined in light of the
Precautionary Principle, defined in Principle 1.
</span><br />
</li>
<li style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">The permissible quantum of GHG emissions that a State or enterprise may produce in
a specific year must be determined in accordance with this Principle.
</span><br />
</li>
</ol>
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">7. All States and enterprises must reduce their GHG emissions to the extent that they can
achieve such reduction without relevant additional cost. Relevant measures include switching
off power-consuming equipment when not in use; eliminating excessive power consumption
where possible, including for heating, cooling and lighting; promoting, to the maximum
extent possible, measures that will reduce the need for consuming energy, such as improved
insulation of buildings and improved efficiency of energy-consuming devices; elimination of
broad fossil-fuel subsidies, including tax exemptions for certain industries, such as air
transportation.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">8. States and enterprises must refrain from starting new activities that cause excessive GHG
emissions, including, for example, erecting or expanding coal-fired power plants, without
taking countervailing measures, unless the relevant activities can be shown to be
indispensable in light of prevailing circumstances, as might be the case, in particular, in the
least developed countries. If the new activities are shown to be indispensable, a least
developed country is obligated to opt for less GHG-emitting new activities only if and to the
extent that developed countries or other entities provide the relevant least developed country
with the additional means to meet this obligation.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">9. Developed and developing countries, as well as enterprises, must take available GHG-
reduction measures that entail costs if the costs will be offset through future savings or
financial gains. Least developed countries and local enterprises in least developed countries
have the same obligation to the extent that other entities provide the financial and technical
means required without imposing more than a minimal financial burden on the relevant least
developed countries or enterprises.
</span></div>
</div>
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<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">4
</span></div>
</div>
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<div class="column">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">10. Any entity to which an obligation in these Principles applies has flexibility in selecting
the measures it uses to meet this obligation, if the measures chosen, in their totality, achieve
the legally required result, as described in these Principles.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">11. No Country or enterprise is relieved of its obligations under these Principles even if its
contributions to total GHG emissions are small.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">12. States and enterprises must comply with the obligations set out in these Principles even if
relevant national law or international agreements, whether existing or later promulgated, set
lower standards and, thus, would result in less reduction of GHG emissions</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">B. Obligations of States
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">13. Every above-permissible-quantum country is required to reduce the GHG-emissions
within its jurisdiction or control to the permissible quantum within the shortest time feasible.
This obligation in no way diminishes the obligations set out under Principles 7, 8 and 9.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">14. The obligations of States are common but differentiated.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">15. Least developed countries do not have a legal obligation to reduce GHG emissions at
their own expense. They are subject only to the duties set out in Principles 7, 8, and 9.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">16. A country with GHG emissions close to the permissible quantum is not obligated to
reduce its emissions to the permissible quantum if and to the extent that doing so would
create undue hardship, considering, in particular, the country’s historical GHG contributions,
its capabilities in terms of its wealth, its needs, its dependence on fossil fuel, and its access to
renewable energy.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">17. Because the permissible quantum will decrease as time progresses, a below-permissible-
quantum country producing emissions close to the permissible quantum should refrain from
increasing the level of its GHG emissions, unless so refraining would cause undue hardship.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">18. If and to the extent that an above-permissible-quantum country has taken all steps
reasonably available but nevertheless has failed to fulfil the obligations in Principle 13 or, as
appropriate, Principle 15, that country must provide financial or technical means to below-
permissible-quantum countries to achieve the reduction of GHG emissions that the
responsible above-permissible-quantum country has failed to achieve. The receiving country
must use these means for GHG-reduction purposes. Both countries have a joint responsibility
to ensure that the support provided, whether financial or technical, is not used for other
purposes, although such support may provide benefits in addition to GHG reduction. On the
request of a State that has provided technical or financial means to another State to achieve
GHG reductions, the receiving State must provide information to allow the supporting State
to determine whether the support was used to achieve the intended purpose. Reductions
brought about through such financial or technical support shall count as reductions for the
State that has provided the financial or technical means and not as reductions for the
receiving state.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">19. The global reduction of GHG emissions required to ensure that the global average
surface temperature increase never exceeds pre-industrial temperatures by more than
</span></div>
</div>
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</span></div>
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<div class="layoutArea">
<div class="column">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">2 degrees Celsius, according to estimates based on the Precautionary Principle, may be
impossible to achieve without additional reductions by above-permissible-quantum countries.
</span><br />
<ol style="list-style-type: lower-latin;">
<li style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">If that is the case, those countries must, to the extent reasonably possible, reduce
their emissions enough to ensure the global average temperature increase does not
exceed the stated level.
</span><br />
</li>
<li style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">If such additional contributions do not suffice to meet the obligation to ensure that
the global average surface temperature increase never exceeds pre-industrial
temperature by more than 2 degrees Celsius, as set forth by Principle 6, below-
permissible-quantum countries must reduce their emissions to the extent necessary
to achieve that result. Unless such a country is a developed country, this obligation
applies only if and to the extent that developed above-permissible-quantum
countries or other entities provide the relevant country with the means to meet this
obligation.
</span><br />
</li>
</ol>
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">20. States must make their best efforts to bring about lawful and appropriate trade
consequences for States that fail to comply with the obligations set out in these Principles.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">21. States shall refrain from providing new subsidies, aid, credits, grants, guarantees, or
insurance for installation of major new facilities or major expansion of existing facilities that
will result in the emission of unnecessarily high or, in the given circumstances, unsustainable
quantities of GHG, either within or outside their territories. For a least developed country,
there may be an exception to this requirement if choosing more efficient facilities would be
unduly burdensome for that country.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">22. A State that fails or is reasonably likely to fail to meet its obligations shall, without
prejudice to the imposition of possible consequences for such failure or impending failure,
initiate or support research designed to identify and develop means to reduce GHG emissions.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">23. Neither high cost nor the lack of financial means can, alone, excuse a State’s failure to
meet its obligations to achieve GHG reductions or constitute a defence against legal sanctions
that may be imposed as a consequence of such a failure. To avoid such sanctions, a State
must show excessive hardship or extraordinary circumstances beyond the State’s control that
have prevented the State from meeting its obligations.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">24. States must regulate GHG-emissions in their jurisdictions or under their control to meet
their obligations set forth in these Principles.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">C. Procedural Obligations of States
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">25. States must accept the jurisdiction of independent courts or tribunals in which the State’s
compliance with its obligations as set forth in these Principles can be challenged and
adjudicated.
</span><br />
<ol style="list-style-type: lower-latin;">
<li style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">States must participate in these proceedings in good faith and ensure that such
proceedings are fair and efficient.
</span><br />
</li>
<li style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">In such proceedings, the State whose compliance with its obligations has been
challenged must fully disclose the ways in which it has effected compliance in
order to enable the court or tribunal to determine whether the State has complied
with the relevant obligations and, where it is found the State has not complied, to
determine the extent and nature of the State’s failure to comply.
</span><br />
</li>
</ol>
</div>
</div>
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<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">6
</span></div>
</div>
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<div class="column">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">26. Each State must make available information that is necessary to enable persons within its
territories to assess the risks to their lives and health that climate change poses.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">D. Obligations of Enterprises
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">27. Enterprises must assess their facilities and property to evaluate their vulnerability to
climate change; the financial effect that future climate change will have on the enterprises;
and the enterprises’ efforts to increase their resilience to future climate change. Enterprises
must publicly disclose this information and ensure, in particular, that it is readily accessible to
those who are or are likely to be directly or indirectly affected by their activities, including
investors, clients, and securities regulators.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">28. An enterprise whose activity includes fossil-fuel production must assess the impact that
any limitations imposed on future extraction or use of fossil fuels, consistent with the “carbon
budget” concept enunciated by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and others,
will have on its financial situation. The enterprise must disclose this information to investors,
securities regulators and the public.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">29. Before building any major new facilities, enterprises must conduct environmental impact
assessments. Such an assessment must include an analysis of the proposed facility’s carbon
footprint and ways to reduce it and the potential effects of future climate change on the
proposed facility.
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">30. Enterprises in the banking and finance sectors should take into account the GHG effects
of any projects they consider financing.
</span></div>
</div>
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<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">7
</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Annex
</span></div>
</div>
<div class="layoutArea">
<div class="column">
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">These principles were prepared by an Expert Group on Global Climate Obligations, which
consisted of the following members:
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Antonio Benjamin</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">, Justice, High Court of Justice of Brazil<br />
</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Michael Gerrard</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">, Andrew Sabin Professor of Professional Practice and Director, Sabin
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">Center for Climate Change Law, Columbia University Law School
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Toon Huydecoper</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">, retired Advocate-General of the Netherlands Supreme Court
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Michael Kirby</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">, retired Justice of the High Court of Australia
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">M.C. Mehta</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">, advocate before the Supreme Court of India
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Thomas Pogge</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">, Leitner Professor of Philosophy and International Affairs and founding
Director, Global Justice Program, Yale University
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Qin Tianbao</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">, Professor of Environmental and International Law and Assistant Dean for
International Affiliations, Wuhan University School of Law
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Dinah Shelton</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">, Manatt/Ahn Professor of International Law, George Washington University
and Law School, and Commissioner and former President, Inter-American Commission on
Human Rights
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">James Silk</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">, Clinical Professor of Law, Allard K. Lowenstein International Human Rights
Clinic, and Director, Orville H. Schell, Jr. Center for International Human Rights, Yale Law
School
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Jessica Simor QC</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">, barrister, Matrix Chambers, London<br />
</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Jaap Spier</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">,* Advocate-General of the Netherlands Supreme Court and Honorary Professor,
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">Maastricht University Faculty of Law<br />
</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Elisabeth Steiner</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">, Judge, European Court of Human Rights;<br />
</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPS'; font-size: 12.000000pt; font-weight: 700;">Philip Sutherland</span><span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">, Professor, Stellenbosch University Faculty of Law
</span><br />
<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">* Rapporteur of the Expert Group on Global Climate Obligations
</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: 'TimesNewRomanPSMT'; font-size: 12.000000pt;">8 </span></div>
</div>
</div>
The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-64810914436348764582015-03-20T10:15:00.001+00:002015-03-20T10:15:48.099+00:00A Solar eclipse in the clouds<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Not a post so much as a share...</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKF-Ex7LzA1WiVXGJG2oUJmRX-hY9iqRpDgW7iqA646-Lp4-25LegTf9TA2g3S_CntXmbtZflHEsPA3CD0F1ovsf82c9CGTV3HEp4Mat2P8KXNZl-162EQasSEo0Lc8p28buq9UXDkHaH4/s1600/DSC_0016.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKF-Ex7LzA1WiVXGJG2oUJmRX-hY9iqRpDgW7iqA646-Lp4-25LegTf9TA2g3S_CntXmbtZflHEsPA3CD0F1ovsf82c9CGTV3HEp4Mat2P8KXNZl-162EQasSEo0Lc8p28buq9UXDkHaH4/s1600/DSC_0016.JPG" height="227" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-42644303154879720692015-03-18T18:12:00.000+00:002015-03-18T18:12:29.961+00:00Sea ice, sea level and permafrost<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Recent updates all over the place point out that Arctic sea ice levels are pretty low considering the time of year. Historically, the rate of decline of Winter Arctic sea ice cover (area, extent) is slower than that of the Summer (and the intermediate seasons). This year, the maximum so far (as pointed out at <a href="http://neven1.typepad.com/blog/2015/03/early-record-late-record.html" target="_blank"><span style="color: orange;">Neven's excellent blog</span></a>, the finale is not yet concluded for certain, rather like a Tchaikovsky symphony) is below two standards deviation from the long term average. <a href="http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/" target="_blank"><span style="color: orange;">(here)</span></a></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I don't subscribe to the notion that one season's extent is indicative of following seasons, for the simple reason that the range of inter-seasonal variability exceeds the range of climate variability. In other words, it isn't enough that there isn't much ice now to determine how much there will be at the end of this Summer (if only it was that easy!). But here we see the fortification (or continuation) of an existing and persistent trend, a reminder that we are apparently set into a pattern for the long term.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Meantime, Down South, recent observations (not yet officially published) are that the Larsen C ice shelf, thought to be stable when assessed in 2010, is now showing a big crack comparable to the one which preceded the loss of Larsen B some years back. Unlike some media, I won't publish more till the original is published, but you can check out the discussion paper at<a href="http://www.the-cryosphere-discuss.net/papers_in_open_discussion.html" target="_blank"> The Cryosphere</a>.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Add to this the recent material illustrating the instability of the Totten Glacier in East Antarctica, the latest of a run of observations done in different parts of the EAIS showing a trend towards likely destabilisation (At least 4 papers recently on different glaciers).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Looking at a couple of other papers (I'll have to go find the sources at some point) I was caught by surprise when it was noted that the potential for sea level rise from the melting of permafrost is potentially very large (over time and relative to scale) and that permafrost is indeed melting reasonably rapidly across all Arctic landmasses (and, one supposes, potential under the ocean as well).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Which is all apropos of what?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One looks at a range of things and extrapolates a pattern. The apparent pattern is that a lot of the markers which might indicate an accelerated rate of sea level rise are all pointing in the same direction, and furthermore, that the observations of the changes are imminent, not down-the-line projections. For some time I've said, along with Rasmus Benestad and others, that the current 'mainstream' estimates of SLR are on the low side. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I'd like to see a concerted effort to assess recent developments in observations and evidence as a whole and a review of the conclusions. IMO the odds of a 1 metre rise by the end of the century are now much shorter than they would have been twelve months ago. if a reader can point me to any material on the projected contribution of permafrost melting to SLR, that would be helpful, too.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<br />The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-36878721622281537492015-03-16T11:34:00.000+00:002015-03-16T11:34:22.059+00:00The Legacy problem<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This post addresses a key challenge in climate discussions - what kind of future do we want for our descendants and whether we have to choose the lesser of two evils if we are to prosper.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That we are capable of incrementally changing the nature of our planet for the future should now be acknowledged as a given. That our current action pathways are destructive and will, unchecked, almost certainly result in great harm, suffering, damage and destruction to Nature and ecosystems, human societies and the social stability of our society and cultures should also be acknowledged, though even at this level there are divisions among people.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What is unquestionable is that by necessity, in living our lives, we effect the conditions of future lives by default. We are laying down a legacy for our descendants.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The central questions of climate change action relate to the nature and pace of the legacy and the extent to which this legacy can be altered, to decisions about what kind of legacy is preferable. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Opinions about the nature of what we can or should do are strongly connected to opinions about what the risks are, what the timescales are, and what kind of human society is desirable.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">What is generally accepted is that Energy is a key component of both the problems and the answers. So we have to have an idea about what to do about energy if we intend to plot any future scenario.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">As things stand, our society is dependent on access to reliable energy, whether it is electricity, gas, full for transport or industrial production. Energy is a part of what we now are and much of what we do. We collectively use a vast amount of energy to support the ways in which live and this creates the first problem: the infrastructure of supply is necessarily vast, much, much bigger than most people realise or understand.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Even if our chosen pathway incorporates plans to reduce overall energy use, the reality is that, if we are to sustain a culture comparable to that of the present we need to produce large amounts of energy in the future. One set of questions arise from the choices we make about how we make use of that energy and how we reduce current levels of consumption. A second set of questions revolve around the extent to which we want to sustain that culture or whether it would be better to permit a degree of regression.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Another set of questions, my focus here, is the practicality of oil and coal divestment and usage, against the practicality of renewable energy and, third, the practicality of nuclear power.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Though there are other energy matters which could be included here, these three options form the basis of possible future energy production.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">I work in renewable energy and believe strongly that any relatively cost-effective renewable energy should be encouraged and supported in the vast majority of cases. But I have to acknowledge that even with a vast uptake of renewables for the next thirty years there is still likely to be a shortfall between what can be supplied and what will be needed, however well we improve our energy efficiency.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the absence of a magic bullet to suddenly solve these problems (all current solutions are partial and specific to certain preconditions), we have to make a difficult choice about how our needs are to be supplemented. That choice is between fossil fuels and nuclear energy.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The time may come in the next ten, twenty years that neither of these is necessary, but that time is not now. Given that we must choose to develop one or the other in the timescale from the present out 25 years, we need to decide which of these represents the better choice in terms of legacy.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Some of the risks associated with Fossil are relatively well understood. The timescales are in question, but the problems are potentially existential, intolerably painful and, in general, unacceptable. Other associated problems are less certain but even worse in their impact. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For me, the problems with nuclear power are all about legacy. As things stand we have not satisfactorily resolved the problems of what to do to avoid harm completely - after all, in these processes we are creating highly toxic and damaging materials which need to be managed (potential) for hundreds, if not thousands, of years.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But I feel there is a fundamental difference: the legacy problems associated with fossil fuel use cannot be resolved - once they are in the system, we have no choice but to live with the consequences. In this sense, the legacy (including the uncertain elements) are bound in and unavoidable, unchangeable. What will be will be.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">On the other hand, I think that the legacy problems and issues of nuclear energy can be resolved. Since the source of risk is physically constrained (a relatively small amount of highly damaging residue), there is at least the possibility of finding the means by which the legacy can be managed, since the solution is engineerable. Though dreadful in themselves, nuclear incidents are localised when compared to the harms stimulated by climate change from fossil fuel use. The side-effects (ecosystem failure, drought, famine, flooding) of the latter do not arise from the former.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Being a member of the Green Party, I tend towards the view that nuclear weapons have limited justification and the risks that they exist to manage are extremely uncertain. But there is a big difference between nuclear weapons and nuclear energy.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So, here is the legacy problem - which of the two energy options is the lesser of two 'evils' for the next twenty five years, and for our legacy? We must assume that our descendants will be living with changes, some of which will be negative, but we must also assume that the direction of our decisions will make a difference to the kinds of threats they will face and the opportunities they have to find solutions.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In the absence of other practical solutions, I am inclined to suggest that nuclear energy is the lesser evil.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br /></span>The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-28362181140923190812015-03-04T13:08:00.000+00:002015-03-04T13:12:50.481+00:00Fiction<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This is a piece of fiction.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It is a popular delusion that wealthy and powerful people feel the need to be members of clubs or secret societies and that they spend their time conspiring to manage the 'World order' to suit their best interests.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are clubs and societies. Some of them are very exclusive. In some of these clubs, some of the members will sometimes talk about politics, capital, and so forth, quite possible over a bottle of old rare port. But this is no more than ordinary social behaviour. There are no grand conspiracies.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The main reason that this is so is that there is no need for such conspiracies. By and large, the more powerful or wealthy a person is, the more likely he or she is to have a certain set of values, expectations and prejudices, just like everyone else. The shared values and desires of a group of people are sufficient to generate understandings and agreements which do not require contracts, promises or secret meetings. Most of these are clever, or at least cunning people. They have experience, habit, often history, as well as a broad understanding of how the world really works.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So, when I say that in the early twenty-first century there was an agreement, I don't mean to say that anything was made explicit or written down or even directly discussed. Call it instead a feeling, a mutual understanding, a general sense that certain problems implied certain solutions.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Nor need all of these people shared an agenda, world-view or ideology. They did share a knowledge of power and its applications.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The agreement related to Climate Change, or what some people call Global Warming.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There was no serious doubt in these people's minds that this was a real phenomenon, with real risks and a real possibility of a number of social and financial crises attached to it. These people were smart enough to understand that the projections of tens of thousands of scientists was not random and needed to be addressed.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The direst warnings were of social, political, environmental and financial collapses which would cause millions, perhaps billions of premature deaths, large scale extinctions, anarchy, famine, extremism, brutality, the end of the rule of law (in some places).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But there were certain items at risk which could not be let go. Perhaps surprisingly, it was understood that the environment, nature, ecosystems, had to be protected in the long term. Nothing would survive if this was destroyed, so radial measures to protect the environment from the worst ravages of exploitation were considered justifiable.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Given the nature of the wealth and its sources, the other item at issue was the survival of Markets and Capital, trade and business. Without these, there was no basis on which to generate, protect or justify wealth.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And the agreement was this: let it run its course. Any rational analysis came to the same conclusion; that there were too many people on earth for the planet to sustain, and that the imbalance of resource demand over supply would worsen if population increased as projected. So the solution was reasonably simple: without having to make hard decisions, or get involved in ethical finery, a simple strategy of inertia (no need to rush to change anything) would produce the desired result - a reduction of the world's population, a reduction on the unsustainable demand on resources, a reduction of poverty by eradicating the poor, rather than the cause of poverty, inequity.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And so, not consciously, nor conspiratorially, the program was set. The usual balance of fine words and half-hearted gestures, of grand plans and good intentions, mixed with the absence of real action or the necessary hard decisions. This was the simple, elegant solution; let what will be come to pass.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">And that is how we get to where we are today... the dawn of the Passive Holocaust.</span><br />
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The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-15182768631657862912015-02-19T18:03:00.000+00:002015-02-19T18:03:13.723+00:00Odds and ends<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Hydrogen has been an object of some research recently.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It is no magic bullet. Pres. Bush did it a great disservice by presenting it as the answer to the USA's energy problems many years ago. The expectation has stuck, though the aspiration was always highly suspect.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">But R&D has continued, and there are numerous developments which suggest that creative approaches to energy requirements can (and already do) result in positive results for the climate.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In case anyone is wondering, I don't have the historic expertise of a Joe Romm, but I do think his prejudices are based on assumptions which no longer apply, in both engineering and sustainability terms. So here it is: the time has come to review the case for hydrogen within the greater energy debate and place it in context.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are several reasons for doing this, but foremost is the <a href="http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/japan-plans-develop-2020-olympics-village-into-hydrogen-town-1482091" target="_blank">recent announcement</a> that the Tokyo Olympic village will, post Olympics, become a 'Hydrogen Town'. This is (broadly) an extended community whose varied energy needs are met primarily by hydrogen. Japan has already run a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P4iD6U_Hx8Y" target="_blank">similar pilot project</a>, in Fukuoka. There is an extensive plan for a project in <a href="http://www.iea.org/media/workshops/2014/asiahydrogenworkshop/1.16_HydrogenTown(KOREA)JunbomKim.pdf" target="_blank">Ulsan, Korea</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Alongside these civic developments are important ones in industry - <a href="http://www.hyundai.co.uk/about-us/environment/hydrogen-fuel-cell?gclid=CjwKEAiAsJanBRCgnpfa0orvyz4SJAAbxEq-ZfjEZfz67_KaEuH5gxe32Tw7wKZ1rDtsXhx8kFD7yhoCtJPw_wcB" target="_blank">Hyundai </a>and <a href="http://www.toyota.com/fuelcell/" target="_blank">Toyota</a> both have hydrogen fuel cell vehicles (FCVs, or FCEVs) in production. California (along with many European countries) is developing a hydrogen fuel network - albeit a bit slowly. But before we get carried away, <a href="http://jalopnik.com/elon-musk-hydrogen-fuel-cells-are-extremely-silly-a-1686545341" target="_blank">this blog</a>, being focussed on cars, makes relevant points in a nice style, pro and con, about using hydrogen instead of Gasoline (petrol) or batteries.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Don't be misled into thinking I am promoting hydrogen as a 'better solution' than renewable energy as things stand. But it seems clear to me that many promising and imaginative developments already exist which demonstrate the potential of using it into the future.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">There are several features of hydrogen which I particularly like. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">First, assuming a renewable energy source to hydrolyse it from water, it is amazingly 'clean' in environmental terms. It has been observed that some people may resist 'hydrogen' because of a historic (and incorrect) association with hydrogen bombs. If this refers to you, please be clear, there is no connection whatsoever. Hydrogen as an energy storage and usage solution is incredibly clean and has no link with nuclear tech.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Second, it is a scaleable solution. Not only can factories produce it, or utility-scale energy companies, but domestic-scale plant is already available; that is, a solar or wind installation which can hydrolyse, store, distribute and manage it for an individual property. It is not cheap (yet), but as an off-grid, isolated community or property solution, it offers autonomy from dependence on an unreliable supply chain.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Third, it is flexible. It can be used to heat homes, power cars, drive trains or power stations, generate electricity or whatever.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Fourth, it is often generated from excess capacity in other systems, whether it is an industrial process or excess generated capacity of renewable resources. In other words, rather than being seen as an alternative to these, it should more properly be viewed as an 'additional bonus', in the sense that energy which has been generated but would otherwise be lost to the system ('dumped') can instead be stored in a readily useable form.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The difficulties I do have with hydrogen is that a great deal is already created and almost all of it is already processed and used, for example, in the UK, by BOC. Increasing hydrogen generation to point where it makes a difference to the global energy mix requires a very large uptake in technologies and opportunity realisation. This concern feeds into a more practical concern about current and future cost of energy, which cannot be ignored since it is on a scale which affects national economies.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The observant reader will note that there are projects in the Far East, Europe, Canada, but not in oil-rich countries like the UAE. The USA is an anomaly in that present needs are being met cheaply, but future energy security is a real issue of concern for planners and long-term strategists. There is certainly a limited will to expend resources in catching up with other countries, though should the technology and solutions prove viable, no doubt the USA will catch up rapidly.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">My final though might properly be included much higher up the article, but for commercial reasons I am reluctant to discuss this in detail. The implementation of hydrogen fuel cells into rail infrastructure could be one of the more interesting, viable and sustainable solutions of all, but of this, more (maybe) later.</span>The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-23035558149947554192015-01-16T15:16:00.000+00:002015-01-16T15:16:29.636+00:00What's going on?<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=inFDgCSGWDs">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=inFDgCSGWDs</a><br />
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There's no accounting for folk. At the start of 2014, give or take, there were 13,000 paid-up members of the Green Party in England and Wales (The autonomous parties in Scotland and Northern Ireland are effectively the same party, with the same principles, their existence being in part a function of the principles of decentralisation and local engagement).<br />
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One of the reasons I joined up, apart from the very obvious one that this was the only political organisation the UK which takes climate change seriously enough to incorporate it into most parts of its manifesto, was that by September 2014 the party had grown to over 20,000 members and was polling better than previously - around 4-5% in the national polls.<br />
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During the time that I've been involved, helping out with the local group with PR and fundraising, the party has grown steadily, and opinion polls have rated it anywhere from 5 to 10% on various occasions.<br />
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Then, earlier this week, on National TV News, there was coverage of the discussion in Parliament over the protocols for the leadership debates due to be aired in the lead-up to the General Election in May. David Cameron had said he would participate unless the Greens were represented, as a party which was often polling above the Liberal Democrats, who are a part of the current Government, and have representation at all political levels.<br />
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This was a response to the statements first by the BBC then OFCOM, that the Green party was a minority group and therefore didn't justify the same rights of coverage as the 'major' parties, which include both the Lib Dems and UKIP.<br />
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The public response has been somewhat unpredictable to say the least. We aren't renowned for our political engagement in the UK - only a very small percentage of the population is a member of a political party compared to 50 years ago, and a long tradition of disgust and disenfranchisement has left many indifferent to the process.<br />
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Over the last two-and-a-half days more than 7,000 people have become members of the Green Party. So many that the party's website has crashed several times (probably slowing the rate of growth).<br />
On Wednesday, after the TV coverage, more than 2,000 signed up. Yesterday, more than 3,500 joined.<br />
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As of 2:40pm today, the number of people who are members of the Green party of England and Wales is just short of 40,000, a number almost certain to be exceeded by day's end. On Wednesday, the Scottish and Northern Irish groups counted around 8,350 members (three times as many as in early 2014). It is likely that combined membership will exceed 50,000 by the end of the week.<br />
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You may not be impressed by these numbers, but to place them in context, there was a large surge of membership last year for UKIP (which has since slowed), and it currently has a bit less than 42,000 members. The Lib Dems have around 44,500 members (though it is known that some of these may be lapsed memberships which are still being counted).<br />
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Which all means that where, just a year ago, there were only two-and-a-half political shades of grey in the UK spectrum, today there are six parties who are likely to have an impact on our next Government and its structure and policies. Four are Grey, one is Scottish (the SNP has massively increased membership in the wale of the Scottish independence referendum, to almost 100,000 members), the third is a bright shade of Green.<br />
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One of the absolute essentials to saving the planet in some form of civilised sustainability is that politicians do more than pay lip service to green issues. This is a change which has to happen now, if we are to have a future which our children can look forward to: <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jan/15/rate-of-environmental-degradation-puts-life-on-earth-at-risk-say-scientists">http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jan/15/rate-of-environmental-degradation-puts-life-on-earth-at-risk-say-scientists</a><br />
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It's no longer sufficient to simply whinge about how everything is going to pot and why doesn't someone do something about it. Many people are working hard to plan for a more sustainable future and at many levels good work goes on. But this is a big problem which needs big responses and only politics (and the corporates) can deliver on these levels. In order to gain leverage to promote action by politicians we need them to realise that inaction will cost them votes. The great the number of obviously environmentally concerned voters there are, the better the chance that change will occur.<br />
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By joining a local political group, whether or not it's a Green party, you are registering your engagement and increasing the value of the principles which you wish to see pushed up the agenda. It's another thing we as people can do to move collectively towards greater sustainability. So why not do it?<br />
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<br />The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-42525878867711957282014-12-30T13:53:00.000+00:002014-12-30T13:53:56.301+00:00What I have (not) been doing<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Both of my regular readers will have noticed the paucity of commentary here in the past several weeks. There are a number of causal factors, but the main one is that I have been a bit busy doing other things, like this:</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilM2G4IApm2dOXLa-0C9lsfDh8ULbh7a42Jnz5sn6psBURffYycTALMJRImZ4j93OuVKZXGnnW4tGgUSKEAtGcpXjHEGAQfjTJRwKcH7ePhf_Rh9CRWJVnEJ5U_zVoFbKtJh4S8ltrWOer/s1600/townnov114+001+(2).jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEilM2G4IApm2dOXLa-0C9lsfDh8ULbh7a42Jnz5sn6psBURffYycTALMJRImZ4j93OuVKZXGnnW4tGgUSKEAtGcpXjHEGAQfjTJRwKcH7ePhf_Rh9CRWJVnEJ5U_zVoFbKtJh4S8ltrWOer/s1600/townnov114+001+(2).jpg" height="340" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Since we're at the year end and such things have associated traditions, I thought it would be a chance to catch up with what has been going on during the year and what I have done to 'do my bit'. </span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The most obvious change is an increase in my level of direct political engagement.</span><span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">For several years it has been easy enough to feel engaged in the process of advocating for action on climate change by blogging and commenting on blogs and media, but the motivation to continue with this has declined a bit, because there are now so many good blogs, with so much good science, that one's own voice tends to get lost in the maelstrom. The other aspect is that in the UK, while there is still some crass denial, especially amongst the government, and thus some advocacy, in particular to combat the pernicious GWPF, by and large the argument seems to have settled into a broad acceptance not only of the facts of AGW but also of the need to actually do something about it.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">In September, I finally cracked. During the course of my work as a renewable energy consultant I deal on an every day basis with people's uncertainty about climate change science, and of course their uncertainty about the viability of renewable energy. As a result of this I sensed a change in perception of our global problems and local solutions over time. A friend in the USA declared the intention to go to the Climate Action March in New York and, being a sympathetic type, I thought it was about time I did my bit, so went to Knaresborough. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">That day was transformative because of chance. The march had gathered some supporters but not a large contingent, and there were suggestions that it should be abandoned. I stood on a park bench and said something about why I was there and that I was going to go to the town hall and make my point in solidarity with others around the world. Everyone cheered, then we all marched down the road, disrupted the traffic in a polite, British way, and made a lot of noise, in a very un-British way. Even the drivers going by were appreciative and supportive and everyone who went along seemed to have a good time. Most importantly, we made our point there and then.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This made me realise that there was still work to be done: plenty of people were concerned about action on climate change, but there seemed to be a shortage of leadership and purpose. A few words and some rhetoric later, instead of a follower, I had become a leader of the march. Inspiring me in part were two people from the local Green Party who had turned up with several others to make their voices heard, along with my NY chum who had an altogether more extravagant experience on the day. Within the week I joined the Green Party of England and Wales.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Currently I am the local group's press and publicity and fundraising officer and may stand as a paper candidate in the local elections in 2015. I'm also giving input to the central party's policy discussions on defence and energy (two separate strands, not one). So now I am busy on the facebook page I generated, writing for the local press, and will shortly be blogging elsewhere for the local group. Our (small) membership has grown over 60% since September, but there is a lot of work to do.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This has been my most relevant action during 2014. Engagement in AGW and the ethics of climate and the environment has become more focussed on politics, and more direct. This, along with the plans for the next few months, will probably keep me from blogging more than occasionally here, and more often contributing here: <a href="https://www.facebook.com/rcgreensyorks?ref=hl">https://www.facebook.com/rcgreensyorks?ref=hl</a> .</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Enough about me and the blog. Have a jolly nice time over the next few days of the holiday, and please accept my best wishes for you and yours in 2015. I'll catch up with you later.</span>The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-68795083356479672322014-11-05T17:24:00.000+00:002014-11-05T17:24:57.852+00:00is Doomerism doomed?<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Republicans take over the running of the USA in yesterday's mid-terms and no doubt there will be those who feel that this is it; the beginning of the end.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Any chance that the USA will contribute meaningfully and positively to next year's Climate Summit, already identified as being crucial to the well-being of us and our planet, is probably vanishing pretty fast. And without strong positive input from the USA, there isn't likely to be unilateral movement from other key players in the climate policy debate.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">A lot of people are already pretty downbeat about where humanity is going vis-a -vis the planet and Nature, and this is more fuel to the fire of underlying doom-mongering, that the end of civilization as we know it has come a step closer, a step sooner.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">It's good that lots of people are now aware of the many issues which arise in relation to a changing climate and are worried about what the future might bring. It's less good when people promote the idea that we might as well give up any hope of progress and work on the basis that we are, fundamentally and inevitably, fucked.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This isn't just because of the 'negative waves' which rebound from such consciousness, though. There is a very tricky problem, which connects environmental doomerism to its political antithesis, objectivist libertarianism.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The assumption of many people who write, blog or produce journalistic pieces on Climate is that the readers all agree and understand that the future which is being projected in social terms is self-evidently 'Bad', or 'Evil', or otherwise morally unacceptable. Speaking personally, I find it enormously worrying that the human victims of climate change around the world are barely considered in considerations of many bloggers and writers, when in the end, the consequences of an unmitigated warming of the planet will be comparable to the Holocaust (there, I said it).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The problem is, that whilst our 'friends' and online audience will agree with us that the moral implications are appalling, it is likely that our opponents will be inclined to think the complete opposite. How could this be?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You need to understand the underlying 'vision' of Randian and Objectivist Libertarian Philosophy. The ideal society envisioned by these world-views is one in which a minority (the meritocratic plutocracy of intellectuals - consider the conflicts there) is the only meaningful object of value and benefit, at the cost of the unwashed, illiterate, worthless majority. The Libertarian world exists to satisfy the needs of the empowered individual, to permit that person's liberty to pursue meaningful intellectual activity and behave responsibly in making decisions which impact on others (without giving those ignorant others a say in what they think is good for them).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So, a world of the near future in which millions of Africans, Asians, South Americans, Poor people, vulnerable populations, all are at great risk, and likely to suffer and die, is not necessarily a 'bad thing'. Because it means there is more to go round for the deserving/empowered/justified. Because it means that the 'natural order' of society as envisioned by the unspeakable Rand may come to pass.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Under these conditions, it's very hard to see what the point of being 'doomerist' could possibly be. Your opponents are singing from a fundamentally different song-sheet, and your natural allies, who push for mitigation and adaptation to preserve and protect future generations, well, they just get depressed.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Maybe the mid-terms are just more evidence that we are too stupid to save ourselves from the 'big crash'. Maybe it is clear that Business As Usual has too much inertia to stop it. But this is not going to stop me for fighting for a better, more just, more equitable, more sustainable world. I'm going to keep fighting for this in whatever small ways I can. Because it is the right thing to do.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">You are likely, reading this, to agree with me that the kind of future scenarios painted in the IPCC summary report are things we don't want to happen, that are morally unacceptable. So, what do you want to do about it? If its wrong, you can choose either to give up and hope it doesn't hurt too much when it comes, or perhaps imagine that you will somehow miraculously find the means or luck to survive the coming breakdown of civilization and be part of a new, better re-creation of the Next Social Order, or you can stand up for your principles and say to yourself; "No, this is wrong, and I'm going to fight it. I'll write to my local press and TV stations, my politicians and representatives. I'll be active in local environmental campaigns and, if necessary, stand in the streets and shout about injustice. I'll campaign for better answers and make as much damn noise as I can make."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Sometimes, the realities of politics, human society, human nature, come and bite us on the ankles. Even more reason to get back up, dust ourselves down, and get on with what we believe must be done.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kS-zK1S5Dws">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kS-zK1S5Dws</a></span><br />
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<br />The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-16283206895157727102014-10-19T17:18:00.000+01:002014-10-19T17:20:31.745+01:00Do I have Ebola Virus or a Hangover?<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;"><br />I feel hot. my head aches, I'm sweating, my muscles and joints ache, my throat is sore, and I can't seem to move. Am I sick?<br /><br /> The planet is warmer than it used to be, has heavily polluted oceans and atmosphere, is experiencing sea-level rise and Arctic sea-ice decline, is losing forests and biodiversity, seems to be experiencing more extremes of weather (in impact, if nothing else). Is it sick?<br /><br /> There are good reasons why doctors accumulate evidence before proceeding to diagnosis, even while sometimes treating symptoms. Two things are important: context and range of symptoms.<br /><br />Why context? Take the first example. If I've been working as a nurse in a hospital in Liberia and I exhibit the symptoms described, one potential diagnosis which requires evaluation is the Ebola virus. Which would be bad.<br /><br /> On the other hand, if I played rugby yesterday in heavy rain, in the scrum, drank ten pints of beer afterwards during a lively singalong in the clubhouse, then walked home, and haven't been anywhere near West Africa or anyone who has been there recently, I might well describe the same symptoms to my doctor, but the diagnosis is most likely to be that a) I'm hung over, b) I'm too old to play serious rugby in the scrum and should know better - how do I expect my body to react? and c) Even if you are too drunk to feel it, walking home in just a shirt in forty degrees may have stimulated a reaction.<br /><br />It is not just important to look for the context, it is essential. To answer the question 'why' requires proper investigation.<br /><br /> Why range? If I describe just one of those symptoms, say a sore throat, with none of the others, there could be several explanations or diagnoses, but hundreds can be eliminated because the symptom is not tied to any others. A sore throat and a headache might suggest a head cold. Add a temperature and aching muscles, perhaps influenza. Even with a large range of symptoms, placed into a context, a likely explanation is reasonably easy to find.<br /><br />So, to Climate and the internet. There are very good reasons why it is important to gather evidence for a range of global conditions before attempting a diagnosis. Isolating one element is not very helpful, and cannot provide enough information on which to make any secure conclusions. One way to check out the 'records' is to use the IPCC assessment summaries, since they provide a reduction to readable size of a huge amount of very diverse information.<br /><br /> But you will very often see people arguing about, for example, whether the global temperature record is reliable, or if it is showing that the world is warming, or if the physics of AGW is a reasonable explanation. The reason that many of these people try to focus a reader's attention on any one of the possible 'problems' with the world and attempt to cast doubt on it's validity is because anyone who looks at the big picture cannot possibly be fooled.<br /><br /> As soon as anyone with a reasonable degree of intelligence looks at the range of evidence- the symptoms of the health of the world's natural and human systems - it becomes clear that there are a lot of bad signs in all sorts of places, that there are long-term persistent trends in many diverse measurements (the distribution of beetles, the volume of Arctic sea ice, global ocean temperatures, etc etc) -in other words, that the World is sick.<br /><br /> So it is extremely rare to see any genuine 'climate sceptic' looking at all the evidence. Or any of the evidence. Most often, what you will see is a recycled meme picked up second hand and spouted without thought as demonstration (as often as not) of a person's political or metaphysical world-view (okay, I'm being generous here).<br /><br /> So here is a suggestion. When you read a comment stream or argument on the web, ask yourself - is there more than one 'symptom' at question, or a 'single issue' focus? If someone is insisting on dealing with a specific 'fact' (often, these are actually false anyway), ask yourself (or them) whether they are seeing the big picture.<br /><br /> It's not about whether this year is warmer than last year in Alaska, or whether there is more or less ice than the long-term average this year in the Arctic, or whether any one scientist or another is correct. It is, and you know it is, much, much bigger than this.</span>The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-81149077158881900482014-10-06T18:38:00.000+01:002014-10-08T19:18:18.479+01:00Emergent Properties of World Views<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">One of the strange things about politics is that a large proportion of the voting populus seem to make voting decisions based on intuition and 'broad understanding', which is like ignorance, but with a better accent. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">This doesn't make voters dumb - just (frequently) indifferent. Part of the reason for this, I believe, is that people learn fairly early on where their 'interests' lie, and where their own world view coincides with the range on offer in their local political spectrum and, having established whether they are more or less liberal or society-oriented, conservative or libertarian, in their morals, standards, ethics and norms, they then stick with their decisions and go for what works for them. On the assumption that the real differences between political ideologies play out in action terms as smallish differences, we tend to get lazy and, eventually, fixed in our ways.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Having an interest in being a bit more rational than this, relying on intuition to guide my choice of representative, I thought it would be worth laying down a few 'policy guidelines' and working out where my actual knowledge and understanding take me in terms of who to support. So, today's post lays out a couple of thoughts about each of a number of issues, then reaches a conclusion about what this implies about 'my' politics.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Energy: pro-renewables, anti-fossil, dubious about nukes and scathing about fracking.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Climate change: mitigation and adaptation are real and present necessities for future well-being.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Wealth: Each of us should be able to enjoy the benefits of our labours and sustain ourselves and families on a living wage. Taxation should be proportional to earnings. Corporate welfare (profit) should be subservient to general welfare (health, well-being, pollution, etc.). </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Animals & Nature: The general principle is that all of Nature needs protection from exploitation, abuse or harm and that utilitarian measures of least harm should guide actions.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Health: universal healthcare for all, as much as possible free at point of need.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Transport: for local transport, support best local low-carbon solutions, personal or public systems, seek improved solutions for trade/goods transport & logistics.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Personal liberty: each individual retains all rights over their own body and how they choose to use it. Freedom of religion where it does not conflict with the above. Freedom of expression where it does not do harm to the above. Freedom to conduct trade where it does not harm the above or Nature. The right to own property (but land??)</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Personal responsibility: inherent in each right of liberty is the responsibility to support or permit the rights and liberties of others and the duty to protect such liberties on the behalf of others as well as oneself.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">Looking at these 'principles of a decent society', and then comparing them with the avowed policies and practices of various political parties, I found that the Party which came nearest to sharing my world-view in the UK was - the Green Party. This surprised me, since I am not a vegetarian or vegan, don't fight for animal rights, and though I try to live sustainably, I don't live 'morally'. Till I realised that my assumptions about Greens were based on my own, lazy habits of thinking. I used to be a liberal, have never been a conservative, don't like libertarians at all, and am dubious about socialism, less because of its intentions than its history.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">So, by chance, I have discovered that I am, after all, in my tweed and Barbour, public school education, ethical and concerned 'gentle' liberalism, a closet hippie*. Which, on reflection, is fine by me.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">The point here being, by actually comparing the values espoused by political groups rather than assuming their prejudices from habit, I have learned something useful about myself and the world. Next time, I'll be voting Green.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Verdana, sans-serif;">*note: spelling changed out of respect :)</span>The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4705462730914460094.post-24438589589324056512014-10-01T16:01:00.000+01:002014-10-01T16:01:01.513+01:00Virtuous Circles – a trillion dollar business opportunity that might help save Society<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I was quite surprised the other day when an American friend, who is quite active on climate and environment issues, responded to my references to the Circular Economy with 'what's that?'<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Since a good proportion of this blog's readers (by the analytics) come from the USA, and since it is anyway a growing, rather than a well-understood concept/practice, I thought a quick introduction might be helpful.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Because the idea is, to my eyes, an important one. As Walter Stahel, the person accredited with first defining 'cradle-to-cradle' industrial process models describes it, this is a paradigm shift in the way we not only do business, but also in the way we understand our relationship with the world as an economically active society.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The basic ideas behind it are summarised on wikipedia, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circular_economy" target="_blank">here</a>. The idea is that products and services are designed from the outset to cycle back into their own production processes, creating a system which replicates Nature, by turning what was once called 'waste' into 'reusable material'. It is a long way, almost the opposite to, the idea of a Consumption Economy, which takes resources, makes products (with built in redundancy), then dumps the cast-off.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Not only is a Circular economy (and businesses operating on circular economy principles) hugely better for the planet (since finite resources are used much more efficiently, vastly reducing the dependence on new resource exploitation), but it is also potentially hugely profitable, to the tune of perhap a trillion dollars added to the value of the Global Economy. This alone makes it worth exploring more deeply.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">One of the current champions and leaders in the field is a foundation with an implausible central figure, the gamine, 5'2" heroine of global sailing, Dame Ellen Macarthur. There is a nice article on her and her work on euronews, <a href="http://www.euronews.com/2014/07/31/ellen-macarthur-making-waves-on-a-journey-to-a-regenerative-circular-economy/" target="_blank">here</a>.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In 2010, this extraordinary person, having conquered the World's oceans and broken numerous records along the way, and having become the youngest Dame in modern history and a Companion of the Legion d'Honneur, put competitive sailing to one side and launched the Ellen Macarthur Foundation (<a href="http://www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/" target="_blank">here</a>), designed to promote a Circular economy.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So, some basic resources for you, if your interest is piqued:</span></div>
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<o:p><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></o:p><a href="http://www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/circular-economy/circular-economy/the-circular-model-an-overview" style="font-family: 'Helvetica Neue', Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">http://www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/circular-economy/circular-economy/the-circular-model-an-overview</a></div>
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<o:p><span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> This provides a summary of the main ideas and links to other material.</span></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/business/reports">http://www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/business/reports</a> is a core set of reports, compiled with McKinsey, giving detailed information and a considerable amount of inspiration - all three reports are free to download.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/circular-economy">http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/circular-economy</a> is one example of a media outlet, The Guardian (UK), both supporting and informing on various initiatives and actions around the World.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The underlying principles are powerful enough that the EU, by 2012, announced that it would be looking at using these concepts to inform future policy decisions. Perhaps it is time in the USA for similar initiative and corporate engagement.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Why this, here, now? Because we are fairly clear that Business as Usual is a really, really, bad idea, for Nature, the environment, poor people, climate change, social order and the future of human society - and this is more than an idea, it is a considered and sophisticated new operating model for a sustainable and healthier society, which might help us turn the corner from what looks like an impending crisis, with real world examples, case histories, financial analysis and substantial corporate engagement.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Hopefully, this will have given you some reason to hope - yes, I think we do need an international agreement to mitigate CO2 emissions, but I also think that our resourcefulness and initiative will move us, step by step, towards the goal of a better kind of world, on the way.</span></div>
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The Old Man is backhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06299949591915788184noreply@blogger.com8