The environmental movement has been taken over by eco-loons with a CO2 fetish. We need to save it – Telegraph Blogs

Posted by gwcalvert 10 years, 8 months ago to Science
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"It is rising living standards and scientific innovation, both products of capitalism and modernity, that provide us with the best hope of conserving the natural world."

Nice essay on how the environmentalist movement has been taken over by "eco-loons" with a "CO2 fetish".
SOURCE URL: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/douglascarswellmp/100231591/the-environmental-movement-has-been-taken-over-by-eco-loons-with-a-co2-fetish-we-need-to-save-it/


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  • Posted by j_IR1776wg 10 years, 8 months ago
    I've written this elsewhere, the hard core environmentalists are hell bent on right-sizing the population of the Earth. Hence reducing the human pop. to 500 million to a billion humans for them would be a good thing. Why would anyone support this nonsense?
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  • Posted by $ stargeezer 10 years, 7 months ago
    The comment about the windmills was far more appro than the author may know. While I'm not a power systems engineer, I am a very informed investor in power systems. I also have a number of friends who are contractors involved with the mass construction of windmill farms which now clutter the sky-scape across America.

    One day as my wife and I were out for a drive in the country, we happened upon a huge installation of these things that stretched across a couple miles of farmland. We had been in that area just two years before and nothing was there except for Illinois corn. In my mind I thounght how grand capitalism is and how investors would now be earning income from the eco-Nazis diatribes. Then as we drove around the wind "farm" I noticed that there was one thing missing that was absolutely required to get ANY benefit from this - WIRE!

    There was no substation, no transfer lines, no transformer yard and no high power lines anyplace for miles. The only electrical service lines in the area were supplying power to local farms, typical 13.8kv you see anywhere there are light poles. The closest High Voltage lines we could find we 8 miles away and the transformer/switch yard served the small town there.

    When we returned home I promptly called one of my buddies and asked him about it. I got the shock of my life. He informed me that those windmills were not hooked into the grid - not anywhere. Furthermore he informed me that most of the "farms built in the past 4 years are not hooked in and that there's no plans for them to be hooked in.

    The reason was so basic to the Eco-economics that I was flabbergasted. As we all know, the administration has spent trillions of dollars in the past few years, a lot of it called stimulus and a lot on so called green projects. In order to get double value for the money dollars were made available for windmills (a large percentage from GE) and their construction - but no money was made to improve the electrical grid or to stretch it to the new windmill farms. Where a high voltage line was close (or a pocket of voters??) they could be tied in, but if there were Eco concerns about making the tie-in - in a phrase - that was it. They were built and left to idle until some private money could be found to tie them in.

    Once more the present administration proves it's being run by Mr. Thompson.
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  • Posted by maxgeoac 10 years, 7 months ago
    Decent article. I just wish everyone would get off of the "CO2" is destroying the earth train.

    H2O is the largest green house gas in our atmosphere, and holds in the greatest amount of heat compared to any of the other green house gasses. We are in a much more volcanic active time in earth's history, thus providing more green house gasses (H2O, CO2, H2SO4, SO2, etc) naturally, than humans ever could. The earth has natural hot and cold cycles. We are coming out of an ice age (if you consider that the natural state of the earth is without ice caps).

    Some of these are proven theories, while others are hypotheses that are still being studied. However, it is a proven theory that Water Vapor holds more heat within the atmosphere than any other green house gas. Now, if the ice caps are melting, and more of the earth's surface is covered with water, and more evaporation is occurring due to more water, then...

    As humans we must adapt to our ever changing environment. We need to make progress in technology, especially when it comes to energy needs. However, thinking that Oil & Gas, Coal, and Nuclear powers are bad is non-sense (to an extent). Wind, Solar, and Hydroelectric power sources are currently much less effective, and are much larger impacts to the land, due to overall size and space requirements. Unless we all want to live back in the dark ages without any modern technology, we must advance forward and use what we have until then.

    Environmentalists are so narrow minded in their views that if they were to take more full vantage points of cause and effect, they would know that it's impossible to do what they "require". How many of them do you see without cell phones, computers, AC/Heating, vehicles, etc? None. Yet, that is what they are asking everyone to give up. You can't have it both ways.
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  • Posted by CircuitGuy 10 years, 8 months ago
    I agree with the tenor of this article, BUT we need to develop geoengineering technology. Simply denying the evidence of the effects of CO2 on the environment is foolish. We need real solutions that allow us to burn stuff (necessary to provide things 7 billion people want) and manage the costs to environment. The other option is, as the article mentions, reduce the population to 500 million and live a preindustrial lifestyle. Even THAT wouldn't make the environment do what we want. Glacial maxima and minima would still occur Geo-engineering is what we need.
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    • Posted by Lucky 10 years, 8 months ago
      I do not need more geo-engineering. Nor do I want to pay for it. Those who mistakenly think they need it can pay for it. I need more energy. Some of that could go into exposing the carbon dioxide fraud as Douglas Carswell in the Telegraph has done very well.
      Evidence.
      I like this, it is probably a spoof but it is what we are told by the 'carbon change' establishment:
      --'The current 16 year pause in global warming shows if not for climate change, we would have been able to clearly show that climate change is actually accelerating faster than forecast - not stopping as climate change is making it appear to those outside of the climate science community. We noticed that as carbon dioxide concentrations climbed, the more we had to adjust the data to get the results we knew to be right.
      It's a very strong positive feedback.--'
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      • Posted by CircuitGuy 10 years, 8 months ago
        Who pays for it is another matter. I imagine it would be proportional to how much benefit they get from it.
        "We noticed that as carbon dioxide concentrations climbed, the more we had to adjust the data to get the results we knew to be right. "
        Isn't that the key. If we don't take efforts to avoid it, we fall into trap of looking for the answers we want to be true. This is true for the millions of dollars of research into geology and climate and the ten trillion (as in 10^13) dollars of economic activity associated with CO2 emissions.
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        • Posted by Lucky 10 years, 8 months ago
          My-oh-my! There has been some irony lost between intention and interpretation.
          ' "We noticed that as carbon dioxide concentrations climbed, the more we had to adjust the data to get the results we knew to be right. "
          Isn't that the key. '

          I agree, it is the key. There are those who want to reduce the population of the earth and to return the remainder to the stone age. They postulate scary scenarios based on biased computer models, they say 'the science is settled'. When actual measurements are found to be different from their simulated numbers (not forecasts) they come up with statements such as the data is wrong (many instances of with-holding and destroying of data, data manipulation by inappropriate statistical techniques, biased data selection). Faking of data has occurred to get it to agree with 'what knew to be right'. They call for more research and more funding (funding= more taxes).
          Their intention is wealth redistribution (poor people in rich countries pay to send money to rich people in poor countries), and to support an entire industry of climate change economists, policy activists, consultants, accountants, activist politicians, lawyers, those who call themselves scientists, psychologists, and movie actors (actresses).
          Evidence: No global warming for the past ~17 years. Carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased to 400ppm (with CO2 below about 200ppm, vegetable life on the earth's surface stops). The proposition that more CO2 causes a rise in temperature is falsified.

          'ten trillion (as in 10^13) dollars of economic activity associated with CO2 emissions.'
          This statement is a 'non-sequitur'. That is, so what? There is no powerful new religion with this as there is with the new environmentalism. The carbon change industry feeds on mis-placed altruism as well as gross self-interest with its hands in the taxpayers pocket.
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          • Posted by CircuitGuy 10 years, 8 months ago
            Real science by definition is always open to new evidence. Saying science is "settled", if settled means we're not open to new evidence or we're drawing conclusions BEFORE collecting data, is contradictory.

            My understanding is you're not speaking a climate scientist but rather someone following the patronage and politics. Science throughout history has been corrupted by politics, so you're rightly skeptical. But if we're following the political interests, it's not non-sequitur to point out the amount of political interest in various activities. There's a political motivation to fund studies that reach certain conclusions, and there a big chunk of *all economic activity on the planet* that produces CO2. Both can corrupt science.

            It seems like you're saying because science can sometimes be corrupted by politics and prejudices, we should simply throw our hands up and select the results we *wish* were true. That's exactly what you're accusing the scientific establishment of-- argument from final consequences. If we're always going to select the outcome we wish were true, we should dispense with creating hypotheses, devising blind tests, and creating models based on results. Unless we can be completely pure, you're saying, we abandon science altogether.
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