According to Kurt Volker, US Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs speaking in Berlin a couple of days ago, the US is doing more than its bit to reduce greenhouse gas emmission infact:
“The United States, and this Administration, care deeply about climate change. We agree that human activity contributes to global warming. We support the recent IPCC report, in which U.S. scientists played a leading role.
We are committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. We have made tremendous investments in reducing emissions. We are working multilaterally to do so. We are continuing these efforts.
These efforts are producing results that stand up favorably against anyone in the world.
Just because we haven’t joined the Kyoto Protocol doesn’t make any of these statements less true.”
Furthermore, according to Mr Volker:
“Now, I know there is a deeply held view among many in Europe that the U.S. Government doesn’t get it. That we don’t care about climate change, that we are doing nothing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and that Europe, while perhaps not perfect, is doing a far better job of tackling the issue than the United States. This proposition–no matter how simple, no matter how widely held, and no matter how much it fits a pop-culture “blame-the-United States” paradigm–is completely wrong, on every point…
Read the full speech entitled ‘Post-Kyoto Surprise: America’s Quiet Efforts to Cut Greenhouse Gases Are Producing Results’ here: http://www.state.gov/p/eur/rls/rm/80465.htm
Now does he have a point, or not?
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
Seems to be all part of the Whitehouse campaign to re-write history. See:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/02/20070207-5.html
which is in some contrast to the Bush quotes that Thinkprogess has found:
http://thinkprogress.org/2007/02/08/bush-quotes-on-warming/
Frankly, though – WHO CARES? If Mr Bush now openly accepts the reality of anthropogenic climate change and that action is needed to combat it, then thats all that matters.
Now if only we could convince the IPA…
Bollocks, the US emissions have slowly, but steadily been increasing, so how on earth can anyone say they are doing their bit?
Quantified action, not just ‘caring deeply’ about the issues is required to actually reduce impact Mr Volker, but then the most intelligent people grasped this idea decades ago.
Sorry, folks, the USA absorbs more CO2 than it emits.
Nobody wants to talk about that because nobody wants carbon sinks, really. They want control of the world’s biggest economies. Which means control the emissions and hang the rest. And as we all know by now, the rest–80-90 percent of atmospheric C02 is *not* from fossil fuels.
The USA is a model the world should follow, so if we’re not real enthusiastic about AGW, it’s because we’re part of the solution.
You are dead right schiller, nobody will give credit for millions of hectares of forest that has been absorbing CO2 long before any IPCC spivs ever heard of the gas.
So we have highly industrialised countries like Belgium, the Netherlands etc who have no forests and no territorial oceans, seeking to impose their own perverted version of a “level playing field” on nations, like USA, Canada and Australia, that have been protecting their environment, especially their forests, for more than 150 years.
And the essence of this brave new planet salvation is to give NO credit to anyone or any nation that took any steps that also help the carbon balance prior to 1990.
And the other tragedy is that they completely neuter the one industry that is capable of capturing CO2 on a massive scale, the pre-existing forests.
But the way the Europeans have failed to match their kyoto targets, and are now baulking at any further mandatory targets, just reveals that they were gross hypocrites to begin with.
I doubt that those whose philosophy/ideology is simply to oppose any and all things American ( their Hansonite appeal seems to be growing ) will take any notice.
Even many who are aren’t threatened by a non-black and white world view , will still be cynical because Kyoto wasn’t signed by the yanks and the combination of collectivism and anti-capitalism is all too tempting.
From a purely rational perspective , researching , developing and sharing technology for minimising or mitigating emissions with major current and future polluter nations , is at least as effective a response as Kyoto.
A fast track nuclear energy approach would seem the only short – medium term affordable , effective and technologically feasible approach.
AGW proponents would boost their independent/non-political credentials enormously by acknowledging progress wherever it was found.
Garbage Schiller
The figures for CO2 absoption in the US have been greatly overstated – as also has occurred here, the Feds love to tell us we are on target of meeting Kyoto anyway, though largely due to the reduction of land clearing in queensland, yet the land clearing reductions being quoted have been proved inaccurate and thus australia isnt close to meeting Kyoto.
furthermore this kind of flawed argument means that all countries ‘unlucky’ enough to be saddled with desert, mountainous or arid geography should not be able to have any technological/economic advancement that causes CO2 emissions. well looky what that means for us here in little old dry, largely land-cleared australia. but then you guys would then use that other wing-nut argument that we are only contributing to 2% of global emissions, so we shouldnt do anything as china produces more in a month, but ignore the fact that the USA with one quarter the population of china still pumps out more CO2 and around and around the sceptic circular argument for doing nothing goes.
Yes, ian ‘land clearing’ motty – australia has cleared a majority of its native, CO2 sequestering forests in 150 years, not saved them, and i know you know that. And many of the EU countries are closer to meeting their targets than the US or australia is.
Julian,
The CO2 stats for the US are based on two models, both of which rely on the basic notion–well-founded–that the prevailing wind blows from the west to the east.
Air blowing in from the Pacific consistently has more CO2 than air blowing away into the Atlantic. Furthermore, a recent study found that virtually all the CO2 produced west of the Rocky Mountains is absorbed before crossing the mountain range into the eastern US.
I fully realize that there are many who resent the notion of the US being right on anything. But we’re actually good people and we live on a nice continent, and make the best of what we have.
If what you are saying is correct Jennifer then think what America could achieve if they actually did try and reduce emissions. People like you are really clutching at straws now.
Julian
countries ” ‘unlucky’ enough to be saddled with desert, mountainous or arid geography” will pay carbon tax, like australia, which is a country “saddled with desert, mountainous or arid geograph” They all say that Australia is the driest continent.
It is never “I” shall pay, it is always “they” that should pay.
Its a bit like polls,
Q: do you think that there should be no war in Iraq?
A: YES
Q: do you want the troops home tomorrow?
A: YES
Q: do you want leave Iraq to be without defences?
A: no, of course not
Q: if Iraqis were being subjected to genocide on a massive scale would you agree to send troops in?
A: undecided
Julian,
I do not know where you get your information from regarding forest clearing but I suggets that you have a look at the National Forest Inventory web site (via BRS and DAFF, you might wish to review your statement regarding the amount of forest that has been cleared over the last 150 years.
Regardless of whether land clearing in Qld or NSW is responsible for meeting “our” Kyoto target it still seems that we will. This is far more than can be said for most European countries. I suspect that whilst their hearts were in the right place the European Kyoto negotiators failed to realise the costs involved in signing up for the reduction targets that they did.
The latest Greenhouse emissions trends 1990 to 2008-2012 and 2020 publication lobbed on my desk this afternoon and clearly every sector excepting Waste (-4%) and Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry [LULUCF) (-105%) has increased. Emissions from stationary energy have increased 110% on the 1990 benchmark. So yes, in some areas there is work to be done iand in others that work has been done.
Ooops, that should read Mt CO2 -e not percentages for changes in CO2 emissions.
Schiller – I’m speechless. We’ll just agree with you. Off you go now. Take care and look our for drop-bears.
It’s good to have someone to dislike because it helps us establish our own identity, so thank god for the USA, eh?
Back in about AD2000 I mentioned at a bioenergy conference the total energy consumption by Australia – can’t remember the figure, but it was lots of squigajoules. A delegate from the US observed that Australia’s national energy consumption was less than the renewable energy produced in the US.
But never mind, people who aren’t hypocrites achieve this state of grace by setting very low standards and ideals for themselves. Take me for example, I keep lowering my ideals but I still can’t live up to expectations.
If you believe that, I have a limited release of shares in Ayers Rock I\’ll offer you at mates rates. You\’ll also receive 10 Nigerian money bonds, 2000000 Zimbabwe bucks and 4 termite farts free with every 100 shares.
Pinxi,
why did you buy the shares in the first place?
On the evidence of the newsprint that is still in a Sydney landfill 50 years after being put there then we can say with considerable certainty that most of the carbon that the IPCC has claimed to have been emitted by the forestry sector over the past 17 years (world wide) has not taken place at all. And it may not do so for another 45 years.
And that means that cumulative global emissions by year 2060 or 2100 will be seriously overstated in the models, under every scenario.
That is, for everyone but the Europeans who import all their wood and paper products anyway. It is real easy to appear to be carbon careful when your entire wood and paper emissions are accounted for in non-kyoto bound third world suppliers.
Julien, the only inaccuracies in the land clearing data are the over statements and failure to recognise regrowth instead of climax forest. The only inaccuracies in the carbon accounting data are the over statements. So show us exactly when, how and by whom they have been “proved inaccurate” (understated) as you have claimed.
Dearie me
Corporate shill and cash-for-comments king Flannery complains, “..there are those trying to blacken my name..”
http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,21225946-5001021,00.html
Euro bashing Motty, now there’s something I indulge in too. Another bit of trivia for you.
In south west of WA, if you draw a line between Perth on the west coast and Albany on the south coast, you have an area of land about equal to the size of the Netherlands. There are 15 million Dutch. In that little triangle of WA, there are about 2.5 million hectares of native forest and plantations and only about 2 million people.
Now the Netherlands doesn’t have any forest, or so it seems, but the Dutch produce more sawn wood from their forests than WA cuts from its forests. Because though we have large resources and our forest growth rates are not much different from European rates, we are so lazy and complacent we have almost closed down our native forest industries so we can import wood from Asian forests. And most people I know think we should cut even less of our forests so we can import even more wood. But we can dig bloody big holes in the ground – we’re really world leaders at that.
And while we’re bashing other nations, at the recent Australian 2006 bioenergy conference, there was a presentation by an Australian backbench pollie who chairs a biofuels taskforce for a state Labor government. His role was the reason he was invited to speak. International visitors in the audience of perhaps 250 people, keynote speaker from Canada, you get the picture.
The backdrop photo used for the pollie’s powerpoint presentation? An offshore gas platform with the flare burning. It was one of those moments where you want to crawl under your seat and crouch there thinking “where does the progressive democrat Labor Party find so many blockheads? They can’t even spell Labour.” But the answer comes back to us – if populism is your only yardstick you get a pretty ordinary result.
You wonder why I don’t use my real name on this blog Motty.
Your OK, Boxer, I don’t mind pseudonyms from those who are not prone to personal attacks and defamation especially if they must rely on some aspect of the public purse that may risk retaliation.
The irony of the Dutch forestry is that they have full FSC certification for their wood while the local (green) reps for the same certification scheme refused to certify our native forests that were harvested on much longer rotations with tighter prescriptions.
And to top it all, Dutch power companies were/are getting carbon credits by encouraging african farmers to boost the productivity of their own native forests. Go figure.
Ian,
Consider FSC, you can find it at http://www.fscus.org/
It’s a greenie extortion racket. Get FSC cert or get a protest. Or maybe a lawsuit.
If you want protection from the greenies, you need the trademark FSC logo. “FSC’s main tool for achieving this mission is a product-labeling system,” the group says. Link: http://www.fscus.org/logo_use/
Ian, the reason Dutch forestry doesn’t get FSC cert and you don’t is because you aren’t paying protection money.
They call these people the ‘Green Mafia’ for *very* good reasons.
Schiller could you please provide some sort of evidence to back up your claim that the US takes more CO2 out of the atmosphere than it puts in.
“Schiller – I’m speechless. We’ll just agree with you. Off you go now. Take care and look our for drop-bears.”
Lukey, now I´m speechless – another fourecks fan 🙂
Actually the ALP changed their spelling of “labour” to “labor” in an effort to appear “modern”.
“labour” is french/english whilst “labor” is american/english. The ALP appear to be breaking with the french which seems curious, given their inherent anti americanism (and pro lefty like Chavez)
C’est la vie !
bain marie!
Boxer I like your posts but I don\’t understand if you\’ve fallen into the US good, Europe deserves slagging off camp of simpletons? As for the Dutch comparison, well so what? It\’s silly to just isolate their forest productivity. You don\’t want to go from your beautiful, sparsely populated area to live at the height of the world\’s human population density in tiny homes jammed together away from the boring bland plantation forests with no endemic wildlife or much of natural interest to speak of. Why do they need certification in their lefty socialist nation? And what\’s to protect, a couple of snails and some moss? Oh but environmental concerns already permeate every aspect of Dutch society, regulations, bureaucracy and its numerous taxes so you can sure it\’s well managed. Humanity has a history of losing it before realising the need to protect it.
George McCavity the dropbears came before fourecks you silly goose.
I notice that on the latest figures Canada’s production of CO2 has gone up at the same time that the US’s has moderated. I know from general knowledge that some of the change appears to have been generated by a car manufacturing plant (can’t remember which one) being moved from the southern side of the Great Lakes to the northern one.
Which leads me to wonder how much of the US “moderation” is actually achieved by exporting CO2 production to other countries. An expensive US dollar, and relatively higher wage rates, means it’s cheaper to put “dirty” industries overseas in countries like Canada, or more to the point, China.
It’s also part of the explanation for why richer economies have proportionately more of their economy in service industries.
The appropriate measure of greenhouse gas production ought to be the one embedded in your overall consumption, not what you produce in your energy consumption.
Something must be going on:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200702/s1850262.htm
Major glaciers could vanish in five years, experts say
Climate researchers have told a major gathering of scientists in San Francisco global warming is rapidly shrinking some of the most important glaciers in tropical mountain ranges.
One glacier in Peru could lose half its mass in the next 12 months and be gone entirely in five years.
Meanwhile US scientists say world temperatures in January were the highest ever recorded for that month of the year.
“The combined global land and ocean surface temperature was the highest for any January on record,” scientists from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Climate Data Centre said.
The combined global land and ocean surface temperature was 0.85 degrees Celsius warmer than the 20th Century average of 12 degrees for January.
And with all that water just discovered under the Antarctic ice maybe the whole lot might go quicker than Motty’s envelope suggests (does it need a laser?).
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6364577.stm
Still waiting for that cooling trend to kick in.
And Greenhouse gases hit a new HIGH !
http://www.smh.com.au/news/WORLD/Greenhouse-gases-hit-new-high-research/2007/02/17/1171405474027.html
Greenhouse gases widely blamed for causing global warming have jumped to record highs in the atmosphere, apparently stoked by rising emissions from Asian industry, a researcher said.
“Levels are at a new high,” said Kim Holmen, research director of the Norwegian Polar Institute which oversees the Zeppelin measuring station on the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard about 1,200 km from the North Pole.
He said concentrations of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas emitted largely by burning fossil fuels in power plants, factories and cars, had risen to 390 parts per million (ppm) from 388 a year ago.
asdf
Something indeed Luke!
http://www.physorg.com/news90782778.html
The reality isn’t following the model down there at least …..
These comments are interesting;
“The best we can say right now is that the climate models are somewhat inconsistent with the evidence that we have for the last 50 years from continental Antarctica.
Presumably the worst is that the climate models are crap?
“We’re looking for a small signal that represents the impact of human activity and it is hard to find it at the moment,” he said.
Seems desperate to find that elusive “impact of human activity ” signal doesn’t he?
Yes crap indeed in that it’s an UNDERESTIMATE !
From http://www.amos.org.au/conf2007/AMOS07_ABSTRACTS.pdf we note all manner of things are happening with Antarctica and the southern hemisphere, some covered by the models, some still to be unravelled. The modelling is now catching up rapidly and probably not in the 4AR.
Also IMO the ice shelves are at much more risk than than the 4AR represents with base level movement reported as accelerating in Greenland and now water under the ice in Antarctica.
Recent Climate Observations Compared to Projections
Stefan Rahmstorf,a Anny Cazenave,b John A. Church,c James E. Hansen,d Ralph F. Keeling,e David E. Parker,f Richard C. J.
Somervillee
Satellite laser altimeter elevation profiles from 2003-2006
collected over the lower parts of Whillans and Mercer ice
streams, West Antarctica, reveal 14 regions of temporally
varying elevation which we interpret as the surface
expression of subglacial water movement. Vertical motion
and spatial extent of 2 of the largest regions are confirmed
by satellite image differencing. A major, previously
unknown subglacial lake near the grounding line of
Whillans Ice Stream is observed to drain 2.0 km3 of water
over ~3 years, while elsewhere a similar volume of water
is being stored subglacially. These observations reveal a
widespread, dynamic subglacial water system which may exert an important control on ice flow and mass balance.
Repeat-track ICESat laser altimetry, with
complementary image differencing, provides a new, effective
technique for monitoring water movement under glacial ice.
Using this approach, we have discovered a widespread, active
water system underneath the Whillans and Mercer ice
streams, two of the largest streams draining the West
Antarctic ice sheet. The detected motions are large, extensive
and temporally variable. They suggest that there is a net gain
in water over the observation interval (2003 to 2006), which
is likely both reflecting and influencing the motion of these
major Antarctic ice streams. These observations provide clues
to understanding the stability of ice streams through their
sensitivity to basal lubrication. The time scale for subglacial
water transport (months to years) is short compared with
other known drivers of glacial flow variability, suggesting a mechanism for more for rapid changes in ice stream behavior
than has previously been assumed.
http://www.sciencexpress.org / 15 February 2007 / Page 3 / 10.1126/science.1136897
******
And in the same volume of Science
Recent Climate Observations Compared to Projections
Stefan Rahmstorf,a Anny Cazenave,b John A. Church,c James E. Hansen,d Ralph F. Keeling,e David E. Parker,f Richard C. J.
Somervillee
Overall, these observational data underscore the concerns
about global climate change. Previous projections, as
summarized by IPCC, have not exaggerated but may in some
respects even have underestimated the change, in particular
for sea level.
http://www.sciencexpress.org / 1 February 2007 / Page 1 / 10.1126/science.1136843
And as physorg article above says “Bromwich said the disagreement between climate model predictions and the snowfall and temperature records doesn’t necessarily mean that the models are wrong. ”
So all in all I’m a lot more concerned than I was a month ago – the science advancing rapidly, pacticularly in the southern hemisphere, and revealing many things we haven’t factored in. Our estimates seem more conservative than not. But as the recent AMOS meeting shows the science is cacthing up – but is it in the 4AR appropriately – probably not !
So the 4AR can be wrong – but contemplate in which direction ?? !!
It is true that the US is making the most effort/capita (compared to other nations) by spending on the development of alternative energy sources. It is also true that they are the highest in total yearly energy spent/capita among crowded nations(over 100 million), about 99622.55 kWh/capita. http://www.iaea.org/inis/aws/eedrb/data/US-gd.html
Converting this energy figure to more common units (multiplying by 860 Kcal/kWh) we get about 85.7 million Kcal/capita. Accepting that ones daily average food enegrgy need for a healthy living is about 3000 Kcal, the yearly need is about 1 million Kcal/capita. Assuming that one can obtain such food (ready and in-place for consumption at 10% efficiency we need 10 million Kcal/capita for survival. Then the question is how much energy do we realy need for comfort, leasure, economy, manufacture of distructive weapons …etc. I am not familiar with any publications that answer such questions. May be some PhD works can be started along these lines!
Although its the same data base, the extention on the previous web site address is /US-encc.html
that is:
http://www.iaea.org/inis/aws/eedrb/data/US-encc.html
sorry for that error!
Presumably in either Luke given that in Antartica at least the trend is in the wrong direction and we don’t seem too sure why.
I imagine the models will be adjusted accordingly so in the future we can all rest assured that observations match the modelling!
So is the science ” settled” and is the argument “over”?
Jim – indeed I think we have good ideas why Antarctica is behaving the way it is. The reasons are somewhat disconcerting if you had read my links above. It’s not that there is negative nor positive trend on the surface – simply little major trend/movement except for the Peninsula.
Interestingly the biggest warming in the world in the mid-troposphere is happening above Antarctica itself.
The models don’t need adjustment – they need better detailed representation of Antarctic processes.
So no the science is not settled – it seems it might be worse than we have estimated. And for some of you the argument will never be over if you keep the issue acutely political not scientific. But don’t fret – humanity is unlikely to do anything serious soon – so prepare to adapt (or not!).