Ten more faulty assertions from Climate Minister Combet
Carter, Evans,
Kininmonth, Franks
Bob Carter, David Evans, Stewart Franks & Bill Kininmonth
(Also on Quadrant, here and here.)
In a speech given at the National Press Club on April 13th, Climate Minister Combet has yet again revealed that he is receiving unbalanced scientific advice, and that his understanding of the problem of hypothetical dangerous global warming is inadequate. His predecessor, Senator Penny Wong, exemplified the same weaknesses and so does the government.
It is a structural governance deficiency of high order that our current government continues to take exclusive advice on global warming from an unelected, unaccountable international political body (the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change; IPCC), as translated for Australian consumption by the CSIRO and by the Department of Climate’s advisor, Professor Will Steffen.
There are multiple clouds of impropriety hanging over the IPCC’s advice: ClimateGate, thermometers next to hot concrete and artificial heating sources passed off as measuring “global” warming, vital graphs of past temperatures that depend on a single tree in far north Russia, global data sets that are missing, official forecasts of temperature and atmospheric warming that are nothing like the reality that later eventuated, and much more.
Surely the Government should conduct an inquiry before acting on such impaired advice, yet it remains unaudited. There are no checks and balances, and no formal oversight. To commit our nation to deliberate economic hardship, and that of a regressive nature, without even seeking a second opinion would in any other circumstances be considered both foolish and unacceptable (remember Tirath Khemlani, and the bypassing of the Loans Council?).
We deconstruct the scientific part of Minister Combet’s speech below, putting his statements in bold italics, and our commentary in ordinary type.
1. The evidence of atmospheric warming is very strong, and the potential for dangerous climate impacts is high. The scientific advice is that carbon (sic) pollution (sic) is the cause.
Atmospheric warming and cooling happen the whole time naturally, and global temperature has been level or cooling gently for the last ten years; and that despite the fact that a quarter of all human emissions of carbon dioxide, over all of history, have occurred since 1998.
No empirical evidence has been provided, and especially not by the IPCC or Professor Steffen, that a significant part of the late 20th century warming was caused by human carbon dioxide emissions. Instead, warming alarmist arguments rely upon computer modelling and assumptions about positive feedback from moist air and clouds.
Neither has any evidence been provided that the number or intensity of dangerous climatic events has in the near past fallen outside of normal natural variation.
The term “carbon pollution” is a pejorative term that displays ignorance by those who use it. In reality, the public debate is about the magnitude of the warming effect exercised by human carbon dioxide emissions. Carbon dioxide from whatever source is an environmental benefice that sustains most of the ecosystems on planet Earth.
2. Globally, 2010 was the warmest year on record, with 2001 to 2010 the warmest decade. 2010 is the 34th consecutive year with global temperatures above the 20th-century average.
So what? The world has been in a warming trend since 1680, the depth of the Little Ice Age, so of course later years tend to be warmer. Human carbon emissions were insignificant before 1850 and tiny before WWII, so human-sourced emissions are obviously not the sole cause of warming.
Amongst the major records of global temperature, only one shows 2010 as the warmest year since global thermometer records began (about 1850). That record is the NASA GISS index compiled by James Hansen, and its limitations and inaccuracies are well known. The temperature record used by the IPCC is the U.K. Hadley Centre’s HadCRUT plot, and the most accurate record of all is that measured from satellites (which covers nearly the whole planet, not mainly airports and carparks). These two records show that the 2010 temperature was 0.2 and 0.1 deg. C below the warm peak attained during the El Nino year of 1998, respectively.
More generally, all versions of the 20th century thermometer temperature record on which the Minister places his reliance are known to be of limited accuracy and likely warming bias. Representing, as they do, only 3 climate data points, they are a completely inadequate basis on which to make grand statements about climate change.
Judged against climate records of adequate length, the temperature has been declining gently for the last 10,000 years (since the Holocene post-glacial climatic optimum) and increasing for about the last 330 years (since the depth of the cold Little Ice Age around 1680). So it is no surprise (i) that overall warming occurred during the 20th century; and (ii) that 2001-2010 was a relatively warm decade, for the same reason that most of the warmer days each year cluster around mid-summer’s day – in both cases, the grouping of warm temperatures is because of position within a known climatic cycle.
3. In Australia, each decade since the 1940s has been warmer than the preceding decade. With rising temperatures we can expect to see more extreme weather events, including more frequent and intense droughts, floods and bushfires.
In some places, each successive decade of the last 50 years may indeed have been warmer than its predecessor, for the same reasons explained under Point 2; the Earth is currently still recovering from a Little Ice Age.
But Australian temperatures, and those in other regions, do not move in perfect synchronisation with global temperatures, because of regional scale circulations and responses to multi-decadal climate oscillations. So whereas southeastern Australia (and offshore waters) started warming about 1950 after nearly a half century of flat temperatures, they have (along with global temperature) also stabilised over the last decade. But, in any case, it is global temperatures that are the point at issue, not Australian ones.
In the early 1970s, some climate scientists were full of talk about global cooling and the looming possibility of a new ice age — they based their alarm on the fact that the global thermometer record had been falling for the previous three decades. These scientists also cited models that showed that a new ice age might indeed occur (their models, like the current ones, were loaded with too much positive feedback). Minister Combet is now apparently claiming that the 1945-1975 cooling didn’t occur in Australia. Perhaps he is relying upon a temperature graph that has been revised in retrospect?
The accompanying statement that extreme weather events have increased with warmer temperatures is contradicted by the available empirical evidence – and that they will increase or become more extreme in the future should warming resume – is derived from speculative, unvalidated and invalidated computer climate models.
4. The environmental consequences translate readily into economic costs – as well as potential negative impacts on water security, coastal development, infrastructure, agriculture, and health.
Natural climate events and change do indeed impose economic and social costs, as the bushfires, floods and cyclones of the last few years in Australia readily show.
There is no evidence whatever that these costs have been greater in recent years because of human influences on global climate.
5. Professor Will Steffen, a leading expert in the climate science, has advised the Multi-Party Committee on Climate Change that there is 100% certainty that the earth is warming, and that there is a very high level of certainty it will continue to warm unless efforts are made to reduce the levels of carbon (sic) pollution (sic) being sent into the atmosphere.
Professor Steffen is spectacularly wrong. An explanation of why, and a critical analysis of the supporting material with which he last briefed the Canberra Multi-Party Committee on Climate Change, is available here [insert URL to Deconstruction of Steffen’s slide show, which will be available within the next day or so].
The earth is NOT currently warming, and hasn’t been for the last 10 years, and perhaps longer. That this lack of warming has been accompanied by increasing carbon dioxide levels proves that carbon dioxide is not the predominant controlling influence on global temperature.
Neither Professor Steffen nor any other scientist can state with certainty whether global temperature in ten years time will be warmer or cooler than today. But given the currently quiet sun, and acknowledging the importance of multi-decadal climatic oscillations such as the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, many scientists currently hypothesize that cooling is more likely than warming over the next two decades.
6. It is in our national interest to take action on climate change. The national interest case is clear.
It is indeed, and the climate events and change that the Minister should be paying attention to are those KNOWN hazards of natural origin. Because the government instead is focused upon the entirely HYPOTHETICAL risks of dangerous warming caused by human-related carbon-dioxide emissions, it has taken its eye off the main game.
The national interest case for better preparation for natural climate events and change is clear, and it is past time that the Minister focused on it.
7. Climate change is an environmental problem with an economic solution.
This is an absurd statement, which should read “Climate events and change cause environmental and social damage, and are therefore an economic cost”.
For natural climate events and change are obviously hazards with attendant economic costs, and the more costly they are the less prepared we are – as the Victorian bushfires and Brisbane floods have clearly shown.
Perhaps “climate change” (as the Minister intends the term to be understood here) is an invented problem to justify a desired and particular political “solution”? Be that as it may, whatever the Minister is referring to here is certainly not science as we have learned to practice it over the last two centuries.
8. Just as the 1980s reforms laid down the bedrock of our current prosperity, pricing carbon (sic) will ensure that the Australian economy of the 21st century remains globally competitive.
Competitive with whom? Australia will be way out in front, leading de-industrialisation and economic decline, for no other countries are proposing to handicap themselves nearly as much on a per capita basis.
Putting a rising tax on carbon dioxide will have one, and only one, result, which is to render the Australian economy more and more uncompetitive against its overseas competitors, with a concomitant inexorable rise in the cost of living.
At the same time, a tax on carbon dioxide will do nothing to effect global temperature in a measurable way.
9. Intergenerational equity is a key determinant of long-term economic policy making. Our obligation is to leave the world a better place, not to pass on the problems we found too difficult to deal with to our grandchildren and to their grandchildren.
The government’s Climate Commissioner, Professor Tim Flannery, has indicated that some computer models that he favours project that a period of 1,000 years or more will be required before any cuts in Australian carbon dioxide emissions take effect.
The intergenerational equity that the Minister speaks of is therefore like King Canute being held responsible for the living standards of present day Australians. It is astonishing that such fantasies are now being introduced into public discourse by government ministers who, King Canute-like in their turn, appear to believe that they can “stop climate change”.
In any case, there never has been intergenerational equity. The gross inequities that exist across both geography and generations are caused by contrasting access and lack of access to cheap energy. It is estimated that 1.5 billion persons today lack adequate sanitation, clean drinking water and basic health care and education. Such poverty kills millions of persons in developing countries each and every year.
There is no equity in restricting access to cheap energy, and future restrictions on cheap sources of energy such as coal will condemn millions to future poverty or death.
10. Australia is one of the world’s top 20 polluters and we release more pollution per person than any other country in the developed world – more than the US. Not only is it in our national interest to act, we have a responsibility to do so.
Carbon dioxide is not a pollutant, but an environmental benefice.
Even according the IPCC’s faulty models, if Australia stopped all emissions of carbon dioxide from tomorrow, the total effect on the temperature in 2050 would be to theoretically lower it by 0.0154 °C.
Regarding real air pollutants, Australia has excellent controls on industrial emissions through clean air legislation, and it is unlikely that our pollutant emissions are significantly higher than other western countries with similar controls.
Which is not to say that further improvements to air quality might not be effected, especially in metropolitan areas. Indeed, expenditure of public money on that (to demonstrable effect) would be a far preferable course of action to squandering money on cuts in carbon dioxide emissions that will have no effect on either pollution or future climate.
General Comments
The remainder of Minister Combet’s address was concerned with economic and political analysis. Obviously, as scientists, we have no expert comment to offer on those matters.
Equally obviously, however, until there is a demonstrated scientific problem of dangerous global warming to be dealt with, which there currently is not, economic measures and analysis are simply irrelevant.
No amount of economic or political analysis can contradict the following basic, scientific premises:
- Carbon dioxide is an environmentally beneficial atmospheric trace gas;
- Carbon dioxide is also a mild greenhouse gas that produces incrementally diminishing warming as its atmospheric concentration rises;
- The amount of warming produced by human industrial carbon dioxide emissions to date is so small as to be indiscernible against natural fluctuations in global temperature, and is therefore not dangerous;
- The unvalidated IPCC (and CSIRO) computer climate models that project significant human-caused warming in the future are faulty, with many known inadequacies; not surprisingly, therefore, these models have proved to be incorrect when compared with real-world temperature data;
- Natural climate events and change are Australia’s greatest natural hazards, and our society needs to be better prepared for them in advance, and better at adapting to them when they occur;
- The required national climate policy of preparation and adaptation for natural climate events and change is at the same time precautionary against any human-caused change that may manifest itself in future (but which is absent to date).
Like Penny Wong before him, Minister Combet has been captured by the self-seeking, alarmist global warming rhetoric of the United Nations IPCC and its supporters.
It is time that the Australian government shook itself free from these baleful influences by, first, commissioning a review by fully independent scientists as to the relative risks of natural and hypothetical human-caused climate change; and, second, by adopting a cost-effective national climate policy of preparation and adaptation.
——–
Bob Carter is a geologist, David Evans a mathematician and computer modeller, Stewart Franks a hydrologist and engineer, and Bill Kininmonth a meterologist and former Director of the National Climate Centre.
They are the four independent scientists who together advised Senator Steve Fielding during his discussions with Climate Minister Penny Wong over her proposed emissions trading bill in 2009.
Of interest to all who take note of failed predictions of the climate alarmists is a new feature at WUWT http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/04/16/new-permanent-feature-the-climate-fail-files-help-needed/. We could include all the prophet of doom predictions of Tim Flannery especially those which led to the construction of desal rather than cheaper to build and run dams. The many disasters to befall the Great Barrier Reef might also be included.
10
Surely not that bogus per capita head emissions boogyman again.
Consider this.
Australia has a population of 22 million.
China has a population of 1.35 Billion people. (61 times greater than for Australia)
In Australia, every residence has access to a constant and reliable supply of electricity, more than 90% of that generated from CO2 emitting sources, (Coal fired and Natural Gas fired) and 38% of all power being generated goes to the Residential sector.
In China, barely 9% of all power being generated goes to the Residential sector. In China, almost One billion people have no access to electrical power at the residential level whatsoever.
Australia’s total electrical power consumption (all sectors)is 0.24 Trillion KWH
China’s total electrical power consumption (all sectors) is 3.75 Trillion KWH ( only 15.6 times greater than that for China)
Check the two areas in bold. See the discrepancy there.
Naturally our per capita emissions are greater, because we all have access to electrical power, and they don’t.
Australia’s per capita emissions are similar to the US, and similar to Europe, and most other First World Countries.
The ratio for India is even bigger again when compared with China.
I just cannot comprehend how this outrageous furphy has wings, and why these, er, people, still perpetrate this myth, and expect us not to see through it.
See the Post at this link and look at the date I wrote it, November 2009, because nothing has changed since then.
The Bogus Per Capita CO2 Emissions Myth
10
TonyfromOz
The other aspect of the percapita argument shows just how fatuous the argument is. None of the reports showing percapita emissions take into account the mix of generation technologies. The government uses the EU as an exaple of how we should be judged, lets look at the data for Us & France.
From 2008 figures.
Australia – 19t/capita produced with 7.9kW/capita consumption. 97% fossil fuel based 3% renewable.
France – 6.9t/capita produced with 5.8kW/capita consumption. 80% nuclear 6% renewable 2% imported 12% fossil fuel based.
Whilst we use 8 times the fossil fuel per capita than France does we produce only 3 times the CO2 emissions per capita with a higher consumption per capita. On any realistic analysis this shows a couple of key points that the alarmists will never admit, our power generation methods and emissions control measures are better than France and per capita emissions are neither a fair or realistic way to compare countries unless consideration is given to the generation mix and the technologies & clean air regulations in place. If this was done the argument on per capita would be seen for what it is, non representative of the efficiency & “cleanliness” compared to our so called “betters” and grossly deceptive.
We as a nation have nothing to be ashamed of with our emissions, in fact the efficiency of our power generation sector and better emissions controls we have are something to be proud of.
10
Where do our emissions go anyway? Beyond the three mile limit? Over to New Zealand? I haven’t heard the Kiwis complaining about them. Or do they find their way to Antarctica to be soaked up by all that cold water in the Southern Ocean? What allowance does Australia get from the IPCC for being in the Southern Hemisphere? How much does our CO2 heat the world compared to Canada’s, the only country similar in size and population to Australia? Of course Canada is displaced about 35 degrees in latitude closer to the pole than Australia. Where do their emissions go? I’d like some answers from the government to these questions before I’m forced to pay for the air I breathe out.
We could solve the per capita “problem” by having ten times the population. They wouldn’t use ten times the power because all the infrastructure is in place, save for having to expand it a bit. (By the way, the ABC hate the word “infrastructure” – well at least the bloke who ran the media skills training course I attended back in the 90s did). Then the Greens can look their European counterparts in the eye and say that their country’s emissions are no longer a problem. Oh hang on, the Greens want less people don’t they? Gee this is hard!
10
I received this e-mail from a key member of the Great Southern Cross party. I quote it below. Although I expect that disclosing the author’s name would not constitute a problem, I have not yet confirmed that and therefore won’t include it:
He also Cc’d Tony Abbott. I know that the Opposition leader is trying to keep his message simple, but I don’t think it would do him any harm to expose the lies surrounding this tax. It’s rotten with fibs. Hell, realise that next year it’s due to start on the 1st of Juliar!
10
These lies will make our Minister MidNight Oil of the insulation fame look like a saint compared to our Minister of Climate Alarmism.
10
Haven’t I seen Australian emissions on a per area basis on which we are very low?
Obviously not politically correct to trumpet these –
BUT WHY NOT DO IT?
10
Combet’s a liar on so many fronts and we are certainly not the highest per capita emitter of co2. See these UN stats column per capita.
http://unstats.un.org/unsd/environment/air_co2_emissions.htm
10
If you look at the Un stats last column above you will notice that Australia has one of the smallest per sq kilometre emissions of co2 among developed and developing countries.
A number of countries have 100 or more times our level and yet we need energy to travel around a much larger country than the majority of other nations.
10
It is apparent that while real world temperatures are diverging from even the lowest IPCC expectation, a fact that in normal scientific endeavour would fasify the hypothesis. Our premier scientific organisation, CSIRO, must surely be aware of these latest results and are keeping it from the likes of Combet. If they are not aware then they should be sacked. If they have done their job and advised the government then Combet knows he is misleading the Australian people. The only other possibility is that the CSIRO have the latest data and are not passing it on to Combet for fear that their funding may diminish. No problem requires no solution.
10
Bob Carter, David Evans, Stewart Franks & Bill Kininmonth should sort out their Cnut analogy.
The legend of Cnut is that he ordered the tide to not come in, in order to demonstrate to his courtiers (sycophants) that the power of Kings had no control over nature.
That should be the lesson for CAGW theorists.
10
Jo,
Remember the movie “The Day After Tomorrow”?
The premise was on a climate model.
Huge mistake in this climate model is that it did not account that CLOUDS NEVER CROSS THE EQUATOR as see by any satellites. So, these models went way into the southern hemisphere and did not account also that the rotation from the northern and southern hemisphere is opposite of each other. Blamed the premise on AGW.
10
Following Neville (9),
Let’s face it, Australia is a vast, flat, mostly dry, sparsely populated continent (population density 234 out of 240).
Cheaply recoverable carbon-based resources is one of our few natural advantages — solar and wind are not viable replacements now, or for many years in the future, if ever.
Nuclear power could be a viable option in some areas but, unlike a comparable country Canada, it is expressly forbidden by Combet’s government.
Comparisons with European countries are absurd; let the EU go their own way, they are a salutary warning of what not to do.
10
It is also an obvious propaganda trick. By annulling the molecular relationship between carbon and oxygen, and focusing on carbon alone, the propagandist is subliminally focussing attention on smoke belching from industrial revolution style chimneys. Most people, even those with no formal scientific training, will have seen pictures of such chimneys, and will equate carbon with smoke. In fact having no formal scientific training actually reinforces the association.
The late Stephen Schneider even gets a mention in http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttLBqB0qDko, which is all about the ’70s fear of Global cooling.
He also expresses an opinion in the trilogy, “In Search Of… The Coming Ice Age”, listed below. A young and fit Stephen Schneider can be seen at about 6 minutes into episode three.
Episode 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=5ndHwW8psR8#at=17
Episode 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tokbiZW3gVY&feature=related
Episode 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nprY2jSI0Ds&feature=related
I am aware that most of the regular visitors to this site will have seen these before, and it is probably therefore off-topic, but sometimes it pays to compare the narrative used today, with the narrative used then. You could uplift Minister Combet’s words, and drop them into the Global Cooling scare of the seventies, and they would still make as much sense (or just as little sense, depending on your point of view, and how charitable you are).
The manufactured fears may have changed through a full 180 degrees; but the emotive words, the tense style of presentation, the sense of utter certainty, and the drive for immediate solutions, are so very similar across four decades.
From my perspective, this is a good thing, because it demonstrates that the “science” of propaganda is not developing at the same rate as the physical sciences. Be thankful for small mercies.
10
Ian Hill: #4
Ah, we always suspected that was where all those emissions were coming from. Every night on the telly, we have a nice weather person showing us all those horrible lines of emissions coming across the Tasman, but because we are supposed to be friends, we haven’t liked to complain.
They make all of the clouds grey, did you know that?
We want nice white clouds. Before you guys started sending us all your emissions, we used to be known as, “The Land of the Long White Cloud”. Your emissions are now ruining our marketing proposition.
So now that you have admitted that you are at fault, we have the means to seek redress. I shall write to my Member of Parliament and complain. I expect he will send you a bill.
10
Hi Rereke
How dare you use all our good CO2, box it up and send it back. It’s ours not yours.
10
It is encouraging to see that the failure of the predictions, about temperature increases as well as the failure of the many dire predictions associated with those temperature increases, supposedly due to increasing human CO2 emissions, forms the basis of this approach. It is that reality of prediction failure that eventually provides the soundest basis for rejecting CAGW and CACC.
The arcane and esoteric elements of the as yet poorly understood climate science are no more that a fudge tactic or an intellectual game. If the predictions all fail, as they apparently have, then there is little significance in debating the details of the science except as confirmation that CACC is based on debatable and possibly faulty science. In the end it comes down primarily to what the most likely effect is of human industrial CO2 emissions on the Earth’s climate system. There is no evidence of any overall negative effect in the past, now or through lack of evidence, likely in the future.
That a very strong alternative scientific argument can be built to show that natural and natural internal climate variability can adequately account for the observations the alarmist predictions are based on, should be adequate reason to cast doubt on the use of the primary evidence to construct the CACC hypothesis.
10
Rereke,
Yes, no worries mate. I had a chat room discussion with some of your countrymen a few years ago and they referred to the NZ’s “West Island” and it took a while for the penny to drop that they were talking about Australia!
I was in Oxford, England once and as soon as they heard my voice they assumed I was a Kiwi! Probably because I didn’t talk like Bazza McKenzie. I only recall seeing one windmill on that trip, back in 1988, and it would have been built in the 1700s probably.
10
Does that mean power stations in Aus are in part responsible for the prize-winning quality of NZ cheese? ( via the highly nutritious well grown grass)
10
Honourable Gentlemen,
Thank you so much for your comprehensive, though civil, rout of Combet’s garbled garbage. Surely history will show the full extent to which society and science weathered this infamous fiasco because of your most capable, consistent and courageous stand.
10
[…] Ten false assertions identified in his latest speech. There are multiple clouds of impropriety hanging over the IPCC’s advice: ClimateGate, thermometers next to hot concrete and artificial heating sources passed off as measuring “global” warming, vital graphs of past temperatures that depend on a single tree in far north Russia, global data sets that are missing, official forecasts of temperature and atmospheric warming that are nothing like the reality that later eventuated, and much more. […]
10
This is not the first time Greg Combet has been engaged in misleading and deceptive conduct in relation to his statements about climate change and the carbon tax.
On 3 March 2011, Malcolm Roberts produced a brilliant colour-coded analysis of statements by Greg Combet in an article in the Australian “Carbon price is the best way forward” – Greg Combet From: The Australian February 26, 2011
Read Malcolm Roberts analysis, which is located at the following link:
http://www.conscious.com.au/__documents/Combet2011March03.pdf
In the article of 798 words, Greg Combet was found to have made 16 falsities, 5 misleading statements, 4 unfounded statements and 5 statements contrary to science.
It is difficult to believe that Greg Combet is the Minister responsible for Climate Change! Incredible!
It is impossible to believe that Greg Combet is sufficiently competent to enable him to talk about climate change without engaging in falsities, misleading statements, unfounded statements and statements contrary to science.
10
The IPCC and all politicians/bureaucrats continue to make false claims and predictions regarding the climate. It’s great to see Carter et al. debunking the nonsense in a timely manner.
An additional interesting source of ‘climate prediction/claim’ failures by the “experts” can be found here:
http://www.c3headlines.com/predictionsforecasts/
10
Assume everything the IPCC says is true. Assume the Australian government implements the “carbon” tax and the effect on the climate is exactly what they say it will be. They will never know. The size of the temperature is so small it will be forever hidden in the natural variability. The corollary is that precisely the same effect can be achieved by doing nothing because no-one will ever be able to tell the difference.
On the other hand the impact on the Australian economy will be easily detectable.
10
I suggest that this article by Liam Halligan in today’s Sunday Telegraph (“The BRIC countries’ Hainan summit could make the G20 redundant“) is both interesting in itself and relevant to the question about whether the UK’s (or Australia’s) trying to cut emissions is likely to make the remotest difference – apart, that is, from destroying their economies. The BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China) plus other fast-developing economies, such as South Africa, are increasingly gaining economic and political power. They patently have no real interest in the West’s obsession with climate change and no intention of cutting emissions (viz. their torpedoing of the Copenhagen Conference) – hardly surprising as fossil fuels are the driving force of their economies, inter alia lifting hundreds of millions of people out of abject poverty. The idea that we have a duty to “provide leadership” on this issue is as absurd as it is embarrassing. Here’s a quotation from an article by the UK Cabinet Office minister, Oliver Letwin:
Hmm … perhaps he sees it as the White Man’s Burden.
10
Perhaps the whole idea with the tax is to increse the governments control and power.
Australia as such will not loose anything, but the government will get more control with all those tax money.
They just use the AGW and climate change as an excuse, and to make the tax look “green”.
10
Anthony Watts is starting a new feature to capture all failed climate predictions. I am sure that Australian politics can provide a rich harvest.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/04/16/new-permanent-feature-the-climate-fail-files-help-needed/#comments
10
Combet’s true colours are being revealed!
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/food-giants-join-war-on-carbon-tax/story-e6frg6n6-1226040635543
My reply comment
“Better off inside the room”? That sounds like a veiled threat! If business buckles now, this Govt will be in a position to dictate, at whim, the future viability of these businesses via handouts/compensation. They are telling independently owned business that they WILL fall into line. This isn’t Communist China, Mr Combet!
10
Supermarkets, banks, airports, toll roads, desalination plants, climate change … what is it about Australia and monopolies and scams? We’re the world capital of the get-rich-quick scheme and we’re the dunce when it comes to competition. So we’re going to go one-out and make ourselves the laughing stock of the world by taxing carbon dioxide. How funny (or pathetic) will that sound in 50 years?
10
The economics is frustrating on many levels and I wrote a piece on energy intesnity (in Australia) along those lines. The main conclusions are (copied from the piece I wrote):
The article contains all the data, graphs and references to back up those statements unequivocably. Greg Combet can go take a long walk off a short pier if he wants to keep spruiking outright lies and deceptions.
10
Thanks Jo for this fantastic article!
I wil be emailing it to all and sundry, particularly our politicians!!
10
PS> Combet’s per capita lie is easy enough to look up on Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_carbon_dioxide_emissions_per_capita
Not only are we behind the USA on a per capita basis, but 10 other countries including Luxembourg. Point 10 is an outright, baldfaced lie.
10
Bulldust, all and good but Combet would dismiss the International Energy Agency figures based on some rubbish like it was in the pay of big oil.
http://unstats.un.org/unsd/environment/air_co2_emissions.htm
10
A question for Combet
If we are to believe your ten points above then how should we safely dispose of fossil fuels to prevent this below from happening again?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1349981/Volcanic-eruptions-Canada-caused-largest-mass-extinction-250m-years-ago.html
Oh and would your government compensate citizens and industry that help with this disposal process?
10
Mervyn@22. Malcolm does very good work. Galileo.
Malcolm has basically put his life on hold, is self funding and determined to put this AGW rubbish to the sword. There are many others out there, that due to the threat on our future prosperity, are also making the sacrifice.
What I suspect, when this is all over they will just fade into the background and none of us will be the wiser for their dedication to this issue.
Great Australians in my opinion.
10
scaper…:
My data were UN-based … same results on your link.
As an aside I see the food producers are now joining mining, manufacturing and steel workers against the Governments carbon (sic) taxation push:
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/national/9213697/food-industry-joins-carbon-tax-fight/
10
This is about the same bunch of lies that were used to implement an ETS in New Zealand.
Combined with an increase of GST this has resulted in an inflation of almost 5% at the moment.
The costs of bread and milk are sky rocketing. Other foods, produce and energy prices are on the way up as well, partly because the real impact of the ETS is now filtering through to the consumers.
Is a carbon tax (in whatever form) a cost of living tax? It most certainly is!
10
Bulldust…apologies.
Yep, any support that Gillard and Combet had is diminishing daily. A lot of Labor chatter is going on behind the scenes. But how do they get out of the mess they perpetrated on themselves???
Knife Gillard and kill the tax until some time in the future?
Keep fighting at the risk of destroying their party?
What a mess they’re in! I would describe their predicament, “self wedged”.
10
OT _ new Herald poll – preferred PM – 74% Tony Abbott. 🙂
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/labor-popularity-slumps-to-six-year-low-poll-reveals/story-e6frf7jo-1226040687567
10
Good article by Terry McCrann on this idiot tax and the liars Gillard and Combet.
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/business/terry-mccranns-column/combet-gillard-and-brown-are-trying-to-sell-us-a-used-tax/story-e6frfig6-1226038757457
10
Combet is a union thug and his true colours show through as Imwd’s link @28 shows. From a scientific viewpoint every argument put forward by Combet is rebutted here:
http://theclimatescepticsparty.blogspot.com/2011/01/youre-so-wrong-wrong-greg-youre-so.html
10
The latest weird and wonderful alarmist news:
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/world/9214249/report-warns-of-crumbling-arctic/
The Arctic is crumbling!!11!!1!eleven
10
Of course the “scientific advice” that Combet relies upon is the “political” science that creates the spin he feeds to us. Not the sort of science that helps us understand the world around us. And at present,it would seem, not much help to Combet’s chances of a long ministerial career.
10
Janama in #39… ok polls are bad for Labor… but where do you get 74% for Abbott as preferred PM from. To quote directly from your link:
“But Ms Gillard still leads Mr Abbott as preferred prime minister – by eight points (50-42 points).”
10
Just a minor point, but I would like support the much maligned King Knud (Canute)
http://www.viking.no/e/people/e-knud.htm
He was showing to his politicos that even he couldn’t stop nature.
Unfortunately now they think they can…
10
Mervyn Sullivan: @ 22 and Art Ford @ 23.
I never cease to be amazed by what an excellent resource this site is due to the quality of it’s bloggers. Thanks Mervyn and Art for two more great links.
10
Matt b – halfway down the page in the left is a Poll by the Herald Sun.
10
But surely you can’t take a random herald sun online poll as more accurate than the actual poll results reported in the article?
10
lmwd –
in the Matthew Franklin and David Uren article in the Australian that u posted, we have the reference to “bipartisan” efforts to put a price on “carbon”, and a mere warning of dire consequences “if the tax was not carefully designed”. not exactly a “war” on the “carbon tax” as stated in the headline, is it?
“During the five years that the Howard, Rudd and Gillard governments have grappled with the need to put a price on carbon to tackle climate change, mining companies and power generators have been the biggest critics.
But yesterday it was revealed that 19 food and grocery manufacturers had joined the resistance, alongside mining and power companies, to sign a letter to Ms Gillard warning of dire consequences if the tax was not carefully designed”
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/food-giants-join-war-on-carbon-tax/story-e6frg6n6-1226040635543
10
Yes – you can Matt b because these are from coalition voters who read the Sun Herald. You’d get an entirely different result if you polled the SMH or the Age. That’s what matters – we don’t care if the labor voters would prefer Malcolm Turnbull over Tony Abbott – it’s what the coalition voters want and clearly that is Tony Abbott as they don’t trust Malcolm.
10
don’t recall seeing anything posted here about a recent Royal Society geoengineering pow-pow in England, which provided a fantastic Clive Hamilton quote in this 4-page article:
3 April: ABC: AP: Charles J. Hanley: Tweaking the Climate to Save It: Who Decides?
On secluded country estate, global experts ponder seizing control of Earth’s atmosphere
Britain’s national science academy, the Royal Society, subsequently organized the Chicheley Hall conference with Hamburg’s EDF and the association of developing-world science academies…
An Associated Press reporter was invited to sit in on their discussions, generally off the record, as they met in large and small groups in plush wood-paneled rooms, in conference halls, or outdoors among the manicured trees and formal gardens of this 300-year-old Royal Society property 40 miles (64 kilometers) northwest of London, a secluded spot where Britain’s Special Operations Executive trained for secret missions in World War II…
And Australian economist-ethicist Clive Hamilton saw other go-it-alone threats — “cowboys” and “scientific heroes.”
“I’m queasy about some billionaire with a messiah complex having a major role in geoengineering research,” Hamilton said…
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory?id=13284957&page=1
10
Bravo, Bob Carter, David Evans, Stewart Franks & Bill Kininmonth.
Now if only you chaps could arrange some air time on the ABC or in a nationally broadcast debate we could put an end to this whole carbon nonsense and get back to focusing on some the real issues confronting Australia’s future prosperity.
10
on abc radio last nite, john cleary’s “sunday nights” program was called “engaging sceptical minds”. heard it promo-ed during the week and just knew it would be about CAGW sceptics.
didn’t hear the program and don’t want to, but i guess u can listen to it on the website:
http://www.abc.net.au/sundaynights/default.htm
however, i did hear another abc presenter in the wee hours of the morning talking to a woman on the phone and both being quite hysterical about how cleary’s interview with some relgious fellow proved CAGW sceptics don’t want to know the science, they only want to ARGUE!!!! the abc presenter was saying u only have to go to the CSIRO website to get all the scientific proof u need to know it’s real blah blah.
anyone hear the program? it’s enough for me to pass by ABC radio, tv or website for a minute to get more CAGW advocacy than i can take.
10
How come this isn’t empirical evidence?
http://www.skepticalscience.com/empirical-evidence-for-global-warming.htm
10
“Into the Universe – Stephen Hawking” Discovery Channel 2 on the weekend …
“Carbon is a vital building block for everything.”
10
Ok Janama – I see your point. Your 1st post didn;t really explain you were interested in comparison with Turnbull not Gillard from that poll. You can see my confusion since your numbers were different from the article you linked to:)
10
Matt B. I know it will break your heart, but (from reliable inside sources) JG v5.01 is gone. She has less than 34 days.
10
Where would the go… a union type who will ditch the tax as it is clear that the Australian people do not want to act alone on cimate change. They’ve tried (twice) and now will adopt a policy of waiting on an international agreement?
Back to Kevin?
Smith – enjoying a bit of profile at the moment in Defence?
Who could get them out of the carbon tax with some semblance of dignity and direction? Could the get some wriggle room by claiming the natural disasters have placed too much pressure on the economy to consider a carbon tax?
Methinks if they went with a union type, broke the alliance with the greens and went to an early election… well it would be an interesting election for sure!
10
Sure Matt b. – I can understand your confusion – I should have pointed to the second poll.
10
The poll numbers for Gillard and courtier Combet today are awful. After a tough budget they will be worse. Easter is a traditional time for ALP cruxificitions of their leaders. By the way Matt there are no resurrections in the ALP so no Rudd. Over the Easter break the nervous ALP pollies sitting on five percent margins will have a lot of time on their hands to dial up the comrades. The factional lords from NSW and Victoria (both manufacturing states) that placed Gillard in power will have the numbers stitched up by Easter Monday. They will wait for the even more diasterous poll results after the horror budget to justify the removal of the liar and the hairdresser from the L Its all over red rover.
10
MattB they could go with a true clear thinking sceptic like Ferguson.
Just this morning Andrew Bolt said he could vote for him, at least Ferguson knows that CAGW is a total fraud.
I mean it might not seem like much but at least he can do simple sums to prove that there is nothing any country or countries can do to change the climate.
10
I see there is some well informed posters here.
My prediction is May 24.
10
Jeff the format of skepticalscience is just a thin veneer of AGW propaganda.
In a few brief sentences it purports to outline the complete skeptical argument, then goes on in great detail to discredit said argument.
Do you truly believe that the very same format can not be used to discredit/debunk any thing skepticalscience promotes. Just advance any point promoted on skepticalscience in one or two short sentences, then deconstruct it piece by piece using any of these 900+ peer reviewed papers.
In short dont use skepticalscience here as an unbiased independent authority.
10
I tried to explain to someone, CO2 doesn’t pollute. But he’d seen
one bearded wonder (might be MattB? LOL) at the Canberra protests stating “You breathe long enough into a brown paper bag and see what happens”! Well true, but that’s because you run out of nitrogen and oxygen as well as CO2. And it is a remedy for an anxiety attack when people hyperventilate.
I told them carbon pollution is not strictly CO2 with one molecule of carbon and two of oxygen. Pollution is caused by Carbon monoxide and Sulphur Dioxide, plus other elements. And smoke is heavy particles like burning coal or wood. Can someone describe that better for me, because I am not too sure of my facts here.
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Jeff R even if you believe that idiotic nonsense tell us what you would do to change the climate?
Even that religious fanatic Flannery conceded to Bolt we couldn’t reduce the temp for hundreds of years and possibly 1000 years.
Lomborg and his Nobel team of economists are a little more generous and state we could change the temp by 2095 or 2100 ( by bugger all ) by choosing to do an everything policy or nothing policy.
I just want you and Matt R to give us your remedy to change the climate, but I’ll give you a clue ,you won’t be able to give a sensible response.
The 2095 policy cost the world countless trillions and the do nothing policy cost nothing and you gain just 5 years.
10
pat @ 51 I read that report, what a sham. Playing God or Mother Nature. Actually there is an International law that states one can’t
try to meddle with the weather.
However, I read the Uni of Bristol report somewhere years ago, suggesting that adding Sulphur Dioxide to clouds would help cool the climate, are they mad! They based it on the fact volcanoes spew out SO4 (I think thats the right element symbol) and they do cool the planet after major eruptions from the dust in the atmosphere. Yeah, for a few years. But when it mixes with water vapor you create acid rain too. They tried adding some chemicals to clouds to make rain, that didn’t work either.
But dimming the sun? Now I’ve heard everything.
10
Re: Point #4,
“Natural climate events and change do indeed impose economic and social costs, as the bushfires, floods and cyclones of the last few years in Australia readily show.
There is no evidence whatever that these costs have been greater in recent years because of human influences on global climate.”
Absolutely, but the increased costs are directly due to human activity – namely increased development and density in areas that are prone to such events. And increased development and density = increased tax revenues, so governments are hardly likely to tackle the real cause of the cost of disaster relief.
10
Oh dear … despite all the posturing, promises and signing of Kyoto Australia has been increasing its CO2 emissions:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/climate/food-giants-join-war-on-carbon-tax/story-e6frg6xf-1226041087897
(Yes, I note the URL name makes no sense)
That 5% under 2000 emissions by 2020 target is slowly but surely drifting away and over the horizon. What a shame…
10
Bulldust – what do you expect given that we are not taking any meaningful action in that regard, and appear increasingly unlikely to do so in the future.
10
On the article, I have some issues.
#1 – Carbon Pollution (sic). I put it to you that “Carbon” is only not a pollutant if indeed the warming projections are incorrect. “the introduction of harmful substances or products into the environment” is certainly consistent with “Carbon Pollution” if indeed the consequences of warming are as projected by the IPCC. Many things can be a “pollutant” in quantities of consequence.
#1, #5, #6 and through article – Carbon (Sic). I do hope you update versions of the Skeptics Handbook, Jo, with this (Sic) annotation for where you use the term “Carbon” and even go out of your way to indicate it is appropriate. You are totally off-message here. As a rule I’d not be concerened but surely you proof-read David’s article for him once or twice?
#6 – it is only a hazard of low consequence if you disregard mainstream science. The Minister is thus not really making a faulty assertion here.
#7 – this is probably the worst point, as indeed many environmental problems have an economic solution, as they arise due to economic pressures, and nany successes have been achieved via economic means in the past.
#9 is hogwash as Flannery didn’t say that and you know it. It has been pointed out before but these 4 esteemed gents have misunderstood the King Canute/Cnut story, as he never believed the tide would stop rising at his line (unless that is just pro Cnutian revisionist history ha ha).
#10 relies on the dismissal of GHGs as pollutants. Pollutant does not mean poison or bad for our health, as I have demonstrated with my dictionary definition above. IPCC predictions certainly indicate that rising temps related to rising CO2 levels are harmful = pollution.
Did it really take all 4 of these guys to come up with this? Surely you could have got Monckton’s or your own photos up there too?
Basically this is a non-scientific argument based on opinion and a what I would consider a warped view of the science (and economics)… but you’d expect that.
10
Bulldust@67
Perhaps we skeptics are the only ones who take the warmists and their CO2 phobia seriously. There seems to be enough thoughtful Aussies still doing their bit to make this planet more hospitable for all its carbon life forms including us.
10
Update Alert!
MATTYBEE: Like 2 : Dislike 18
JANAMA: Like 8 : Dislike 0
MattyB – you’re losing your ability to attract some comment – get the humour back – even losers have to have a sense of humour? As is evident in all of COMBETS lies – otherwise how does he keep a straight face? He enjoys it?
Cnutian revisionist history Your comment is wrong – reread Hector Pascal at Number 11 please MattyBee
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Matt b@ 69
Perhaps you didn’t read very carefully and missed these caveats.
1. Carbon dioxide is an environmentally beneficial atmospheric trace gas;
2. Carbon dioxide is also a mild greenhouse gas that produces incrementally diminishing warming as its atmospheric concentration rises;
3. The amount of warming produced by human industrial carbon dioxide emissions to date is so small as to be indiscernible against natural fluctuations in global temperature, and is therefore not dangerous;
4. The unvalidated IPCC (and CSIRO) computer climate models that project significant human-caused warming in the future are faulty, with many known inadequacies; not surprisingly, therefore, these models have proved to be incorrect when compared with real-world temperature data;
That would seem to pretty adequately deal with the “Science” promoted by the professional warmists which includes hypotheses that fail to get predictions right. If they keeps scoring a big fat zero most rational scientists, one would expect, would begin to suspect that something was wrong. That’s I guess what happens to those “main stream” scientists who live in an echo chamber.
10
Um david I’m agreeing with Hector Pascal FYI. Canute’s cohort thought he was omnipotent, greater than the gods, so he set out to probe them wrong as they fully believed if he told the tide to stop rising then it would.
I agree though is amazing that I can get 18 dislikes for a polite chat with Janama.
10
or prove him wrong… probe could be painful.
10
Well Matt B chickened out again, just give us your plan to fix the climate.
Explain how Australia reducing emissions by 5% will reduce temps or change the climate at all?
10
Llew the point is that the argument presented is against mainstream climate science not Combet. Combet hasn’t said anything untoward so what’s the point of picking him to pieces when pretty much each of the 10 points is identical – i.e. CO2 is not a problem.
10
“Well Matt B chickened out again” I beg your pardon?
“just give us your plan to fix the climate.” – Cut emissions a lot.
“Explain how Australia reducing emissions by 5% will reduce temps or change the climate at all?” It won’t, but no one is saying it will. Much deeper cuts are required by all nations.
10
Why did Garnaut exaggerate the sea-level rise?
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/why_did_garnaut_exaggerate_the_sea_level_rise/
10
MattyBee!
Wrong again, COHORT – the term is a military ROMAN word bought to Britian (BC) – and Cunute ruled without “COHORTS” – he was a solitary ruler (given to him by his father)!
MattyBee – you’re on the wrong train – reread the article again (and history) – you’re on the Wrong Wong, Minister Midnight Oil, Elma Rudd, Julia GillGreen and Mr COMBETS Train.
Much deeper Cuts are required by all nations quoted MattyBee April 18th, 2011 at 7:19 pm – this will be listed in history as your
greatestremembered words of wisdom????10
Matt b@76
Mainstream climate science? Is this the science that cannot get one prediction right?
Climate science is a very new and in the process of being developed science. A reading of a variety of papers on what are essentially the building blocks for that in process edifice , called climate science indicates that much of it is still built on unproven conjecture with many uncertainties. These are at present enough to invalidate some of the implications for our environment that “main Stream” science draws from it.
My understanding is that Combet holds tertiary qualifications in engineering and he should have some grasp of the uncertainties in the science and thus should be aware of the foolishness of embracing its unproven tenets in such a way that it will have a serious negative economic impact on Australians now and into the future. I suggest he is being reckless with the potential future of many generations of Australians as yet unborn.
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Pat @ 51
That Chicheley Hall geoengineering conference link was hilarious. I tried to take it seriously but the opening scene of MacBeth kept popping into my mind with the three stirring witches at their fire incanting “double, double, toil and trouble, fire burn and cauldron bubble”!
I don’t know whether to laugh or cry !!
10
Combet is a former mining engineer who studied at UNSW.
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Matt B even Flannery admits the entire world cannot change the temp even if we stopped emitting co2 today.
He states that this will not reduce the temp for centuries or even 1000 years, I mean how much more severe can the cuts be than 100%?
We export 3 times more coal than we use domestically and Labor is trying to start more mines all the time.
Does this make any sense to you? I mean all the labor idiots have told us this is the greatest MORAL CHALLENGE of the age and yet they are mining and exporting more coal to be turned into more co2.
Sort of crazy leftwing crap isn’t it?
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MattB @ @ 69
“#10 relies on the dismissal of GHGs as pollutants. Pollutant does not mean poison or bad for our health, as I have demonstrated with my dictionary definition above.”
Matt, we all know they’re wrong but perhaps you should personally contact your warmist friends at the EPA in the US and tell them yourself!
WASHINGTON, Dec. 7, 2009
The Environmental Protection Agency declared today that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases are harmful to people and the environment.
“The administration will not ignore science or the law any longer, nor will we avoid the responsibility we owe to our children and our grandchildren,” EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said.
The EPA administrator ruled that six greenhouse gases constitute toxic air pollution and are therefore subject to regulation under the Clean Air Act.”
I’m sure you can Google the link if you need it.
10
Greg – False Accounting, Spin, or just Plain Deception ?
.
.
Below are two consecutive paragraphs from the Australian National Greenhouse Accounts Inventory Report. (2008 (May 2010) Volume 1 page 23)
QUOTE:
Australia’s total greenhouse gas emissions excluding the LULUCF sector were 549.5 million tonnes (Mt) CO 2-equivalent (CO 2-e) in 2008.
This represents an increase of 8.2 Mt or 1.5 % on net emissions recorded in 2007 …
.
.
When the land use, land use change and forestry sector emissions and removals are included in the total,
Australia’s net greenhouse gas emissions in 2008 were 618.1Mt CO 2-e …
END QUOTE:
.
.
OOPS:
There is a line of figures missing. – Where are the 2007 figures Greg ?
(I will fill them in for you, using exactly the same source that you used for the figures above, your own department).
(Missing Line:)
This represents a DECREASE of 262.8 Million Tonnes. Yes a DECREASE of 29.8 % on net emissions recorded in 2007.
No Wonder you HID the FIGURES.
Is this False Accounting, Spin, or just Plain Deception ?
.
.
(All Government copyright material is reproduced for Educational purposes only)
10
MattB @ 69
“these 4 esteemed gents have misunderstood the King Canute/Cnut story, as he never believed the tide would stop rising at his line (unless that is just pro Cnutian revisionist history ha ha)”.
Were you there Matt? Otherwise there seems to be some doubt about which version is correct!
From Wards Book of Days http://www.wardsbookofdays.com/12november.htm
Canute is famous for the tale of the incoming tide. According to legend, Canute’s courtiers flattered him into believing that his word was so powerful that even the tide would recede at his command. Canute is said to have taken this compliment literally and had his throne placed by the shore and vainly attempted to command the waves to recede until he almost drowned. An alternative version states that Canute was extremely wise and put on this practical demonstration to show his courtiers that he was not taken in by their flattery. The event is commemorated by a plaque at Bosham. [Bosham, near Chichester, West Sussex, PO18 8LS]
10
@MattB #77
““Explain how Australia reducing emissions by 5% will reduce temps or change the climate at all?” It won’t, but no one is saying it will. Much deeper cuts are required by all nations.”
Hmmm.
Could this be a bigger problem than you think MattB.
Australian figures, submitted to the UNFCCC have a MARGIN of ERROR.
plus or minus 8% per year and,
plus or minus 10.6% on yearly trends.
We could be reducing emissions by 13%
Who knows. (Definately not Combet)
10
Isn’t poor Matt pathetic?
I feel sorry for him. He’s trying his hardest, but even his best talking points reveal the utter defeat of the Alarmist argument.
As a veteran of a lifetime of politcal debates, I can fairly say that if the Carbon Poison Tax had a single spindly leg to stand upon we would be hearing it here loud and clear and not just by two obsessive true nutters – Matt and Johnny. There would be grass root comments galore. A real debate would ensue. A healthy debate, at that. But there is no “pro” carbon tax side, because one cannot defend the morally, logically and ultimately scientifically indefensible. All the sane environmentalists have already run for the hills to hide in caves while this particular climate change storm blows over.
The debate is truly over. We have won. Now is the time to prepare to be magnanimous in victory so as to allow as many of the fence sitters and the with-the-wind opportunists to come over to the side of reason and light with as little loss of face as possible. There’s no gain in rubbing people’s faces in their gullibility for alarmist rhetoric. We need an amnesty to allow the duped to come over and be forgiven.
This is the way a rational opposition evolves into the dominant political consensus.
10
The Gillard government has claimed that a carbon tax is necessary to reduce carbon dioxide emissions (from human activity) in order to reduce catastrophic man-made global warming.
The Gillard government relies on the 2007 IPCC Fourth Assessment Report (AR4)… deemed the gold standard in climate science. In turn, AR4 is underpinned by the greenhouse effect, which is a supposition and not a proper theory, let alone a law of physics.
Well, the IPCC warmist theory has just been dealt another BIG blow. Read about it at the following link:
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2011/04/another-blow-to-warmist-theory.html
What does this mean? It means that the greenhouse effect has been truly debunked… not that others haven’t already debunked the greenhouse effect. In effect, the recently published study demolishes the key point on which the IPCC formulated its mantra… and which is ingrained in the computer climate models… that Co2 emissions from burning fossil fuels is causing catastrophic global warming.
So… if yet again, scientists have debunked the greenhouse effect, this leaves the IPCC totally legless, so to speak. It means all the governments around the world have been wasting hundreds of billions of dollars trying to fix a problem that actually does not exist.
Surely, for governments to be wasting obscene amounts of money on a non-problem, when the world has far greater real priorities, is tantamount to committing crimes against humanity!
10
@Bulldust: #67
“That 5% under 2000 emissions by 2020 target is slowly but surely drifting away and over the horizon. What a shame…”
Hey bulldust, I have a solution to that which should even make MattyB happy.
We change our Kyoto Start Year from 2000 to 2002.
That way, we have already DECREASED our emissions by over 34%
(2002 = 847.4 Mt CO2-e – 2010 = 548.0 Mt CO2-e DCC figures)
10
mattb#58
In answer to your question; because they know they will lose (but no too badly) they will chose a sacrificial lamb who sole task is to bind and build some sort of future. This is considered a better outcome than a whitewash in 2 years time. Tip: Look for senior people who have been out of the news lately.
10
@89 yes Greenhouse effect in a planetary atmospheres is pure physical bunkum. It is a total mis-nomer and should be dropped EVEN by skeptics! there is NO correspondence between a green house and a planetary atmosphere.
10
I think if the Gillard government has any respect for the Australian people, before they take our money in the form of a carbon tax, if they can quantify and advise to what degree they are able to control the weather.
10
Is a semblance of sanity beginning to appear in Old Blighty?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/8453921/Government-solar-project-cancelled.html
Coming as this does from the pen (keyboard?) of Louise Gray this must represent a significant climbdown for the government.
10
I am not the smartest bloke in here so my question might be laughable…
but if CO2 is 2 parts oxygen and 1 part carbon, and it is increasing… does that mean there will be 2/3 more oxygen in the air?
10
This rush by the Gillard government to have a carbon tax… when you read the following link, no wonder the government is in a hurry:
http://unfccc.int/files/press/press_releases_advisories/application/pdf/pr20110415gcfcommittee.pdf
This UN Press Release is frightening… “Governments agree Transitional Committee members for new Green Climate Fund”.
“The high level of interest among governments in contributing to the design process is a demonstration of the great interest among Parties in the Green Climate Fund,” UNFCCC Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres recently said.
The Fund will divert $100 billion dollar (USD) per year from developed nations to developing nations ostensibly targeted for projects to “stop climate change”, a physical impossibility.
The “Transitional Committee” that is now charged to design how the “Green Climate Fund” will operate consists of 15 developed nations that will contribute to the fund and 25 developing nations who will receive the money.
The 25 developing nations are:
Gabon , Egypt , Morocco , Ethiopia , South Africa , Democratic Republic of the Congo, Burkina Faso, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Republic of Korea, Pakistan, Philippines, India, China, El Salvador , Mexico, Argentina, Peru , Belize, Nicaragua, Brazil, Zambia, Bangladesh, Samoa and Barbados.
The Transitional Committee meets for the first time on April 28 to begin preparing “operational specifications for the fund in time for approval by the next UN Climate Conference in Durban, in December”.
How the hell is this money going to “stop climate change”? This is insane! Gillard better not think she’s going to contribute any of our money to this Fund!
10
I don’t understand what all the fuss is about. If Greg Combet is, indeed, the man responsible for Climate Change then just get rid of him!
Simple really.
10
Keith H in 86. What’s your point… I even said that maybe my version was just post-Canution revisionist history.
10
Lol @ Wes in #88. That’s right you’ve won because most sane people would avoid this site like the plague.
10
Alarmists may be sensing that their grip on that debate is on the skids, if an article in Environmental Health Perspectives is any guide.
My take on that is that CO2 has not proved to be scary enough, so alarmists are devising other diabolical threats to keep their agenda rolling. Enter
Is this a sign of alarmism breaking out on new fronts?
10
MattB @ 97
The ol’ UNIPCC wriggleroom trick eh!? You seemed more certain of “your version” in your 73 post. If you knew there were two versions, what was your point in raising it in relation to the “four gentlemen”? Wouldn’t have been trying to cast aspersions or denigrate them in some way would you Matt? Nah, perish the thought! Sheesh !!- and to think I even gave you a tick at 58; now you’ve lost me again! BTW, no wriggleroom on my post @ 84?
10
Keith I was typing my response and actually it was precisely at that moment it occurred to me that maybe indeed my version was revisionist, and I typed as I thought. Call me the Kerouac of the climate blogging world with my spontaneous beat-blog prose.
10
When carbon is burnt (say in a coal-fired power plant), each carbon atom combines with 2 oxygen atoms from the air — removing one oxygen molecule (O2) from the air and replacing it with one carbon dioxide (CO2) molecule.
So, burning coal removes oxygen molecules from the air.
However, since there is 500 times as much O2 (20% of the atmosphere) as CO2 (0.04% of the atmosphere), the effect is unmeasurable, especially compared to the uncertainties in the rates of the other processes creating O2 (photosynthesis in plants) and removing O2 (animal respiration, fires, weathering).
(Numbers are approximate.)
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MattB @ 103.
Gee Matty. I hope you don’t die at 47 from internal bleeding due to alcohol abuse like Kerouac, but yes, in your AGW-inspired enthusiasm, you are a bit “slapdash” at times.
Enjoyed the jousting. Nighty-night!
10
Yeah, my discussions with “sane” environmentalists usually end with them cutting off the conversation because they don’t want to know what the facts are. And, before MattB makes some smart-ass comment, I never initiate these conversations — they usually start with the environmentalist saying something like “I hear you don’t believe in global warming!” — thinking they are about to humiliate me by exposing my “right wing fundamentalism”. (I do live in Boulder, Colorado after all.)
When it starts to become clear to them that I have facts to back up what I say and all they have is easily debunked talking points (that they don’t know how to defend because they’ve never had to) they back out pronto.
I wouldn’t doubt that these “sane” people avoid sites like this to avoid levels of cognitive dissonance that threatens to overload their “double-think” capacity.
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Dear Jo,
The obvious way to wipe out 30% of carbon dioxide pollution and get rid of 70% of Australian pollution is to bulldoze Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane into the sea.
Immediate benefits will be an increase in fish habitat, a chance for native fauna to populate their rightful space and more area to grow Gaia hugging trees.
Once we’ve done that we can send the bulldozers to Canberra
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I made an interesting observation from the links to the per capita CO2 emissions per country. The biggest per capita emitters of CO2 are small countries with economies based on petroleum, such as the Gulf States and Trinidad & Tobago. Also, the single largest man-made source of CO2 emissions in the world is – not Port Kembla or Newcastle – the oil refineries in the Niger Delta in Nigeria. Funny, I don’t hear anyone telling Qatar, Trinidad or Nigeria to cough up billions of dollars for a UN Green Climate Fund.
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#Mervyn Sullivan: #97
“This UN Press Release is frightening”
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I got a feeling of’Deja Vu’ when I opened your link Mervyn.
I have been posting on this for a while, but it is very ‘Australian’ of me to assume that everbody has read the same UN and Government Documents that I have, and it is also very arrogant of me to assume that everyone here knows all the background information from the UNFCCC regarding Fast Start and the Green Climate Fund.
I appologise sincerely, it is a definate oversight, and a lack of communication on my part.
Everyone – Give me a ‘Thumbs Down’ if I am not clear in what I am posting, at least then I will know that I am being obtuse.
Anyway, back to the Green Climate Fund.
The Green Climate Fund is supposed to start in 2012, and is designed to take over from another UN Fund called Fast Start.
(This is the same year as the Carbon Tax is supposed to start, and I don’t think it is a coincidence)
BACKGROUND:
Even before the $100 Billion (per year) Green Climate Fund starts, there is another UN Fund, (a kind of pre – Green Climate Fund) called Fast Start, to which the 21 Developed Countries (which the UN calls Annex 1 Countries) pledged $30 Billion.
Australia’s contribution to this fund was $605 Million USD, which represented 2.06% of total contributions from all ‘Developed’ countries.
(I use US Dollars only for ease of conversion from the currencies of all the other developed Countries)
Australia has currently contributed around $430 Million of it’s pledged amount to the UN’s Fast Start, and we have spent it, mainly in Indonesia, and almost exclusively on ‘Infrastructure, and Computer modeling systems for CO2-e ACCOUNTING, rather that anything that would actually reduce CO2-e emissions.
(A point worth noting is that Japan contributed $15 Billion, just over 50% of the TOTAL of the UN Fast Start scheme).
The UN Green Climate Fund is designed to raise $100 Billion a year.
If you read the UN documentation carefully, it is apparent, that any shortfall in a countries contribution to the UN Green Climate Fund, (that is – it cannot be raised from either an ETS or a ‘Carbon Tax’), is expected to be taken from, and allocated in that countries BUDGET.
(I will be reading our Budget in detail this year)
Japan never could contribute anything like 50% to the $100 Billion Green Climate Fund, It was always expected, by the UN, that the other (20 Developed Countries) would have to pick up the slack.
This would mean that Australia would have to pay, to the UN, $3.54 Billion per year, (if Japan could still manage to contribute the same as the USA would contribute) and even more if Japan couldn’t now contribute at all.
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No Wonder Julia and Wayne want a ‘Carbon Tax’ Combet must have told them what Kev made him sign up to in Cancun.
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I am not quite as worried about the UN Green Climate Fund now, as I was earlier, because I really now don’t see how, given the state of play in the world, the UN can get their Green Climate Funding. (Unless Julia, Greg and Kev decide to pay it all)
The USA has a Republican Congress (and is just about broke anyway)
Canada is due for Elections. (and an ETS proposal hurt the left badly last time)
The European Union is such a ‘basket case’ at the moment – it even had to ask Germany to use more ‘dirty’ power – (yes churn more CO2-e) – just to keep its ETS Carbon Permit (CER) price from crashing.
Last but not Least.
Australia has us, all the “Carbon Tax” doubters (Deniers and Extemists – and now Union Officials) lined up behind her.
In my personal opinion Mervyn.
Th UN has about as much chance of funding it’s Green Climate Fund as Julia has of being re-elected.
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REFERENCE:
List of Developed – (Annex 1) Countries
Australia
Belgium
Canada
Denmark
European Union
Finland
France
Germany
Iceland
Japan
Luxembourg
Malta
Netherlands
Norway
Portugal
Slovenia
Spain
Sweden
Switzerland
United Kingdom
United States
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Denis of Perth: #107
“…bulldoze Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane into the sea.”
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Just send the Dozers to Canberra mate. We could save our 5% Kyoto agreement by dozing Parliament House alone.
Maybe then I could could send them, just round the corner from me, to your house Denis.
What Suburb in Perth do you want them delivered to mate, Crentinsville ?
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Re: Mervyn Sullivan @ 97
Thank you very much for that link! It certainly shows that we are trying to stop a mindless bureaucratic machine with the momentum of a runaway train and the all the money they can possibly suck out of the pockets of hapless populations. No wonder those politicians like to jump onto that bandwagon. The wealth and power this unelected cabal is going to control must be the wet dream come true for any politician without a conscience…
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Jannes Kleintje @ 111
Note that they claim the Cancun Agreements are designed to “address longterm climate change” but read the real purpose from a UNIPCC co-chair: Google ‘Ottmar Edenhofer and NZZ Online’ for his 14th November 2010 interview in which he let the real UN cat out of the bag!
Excerpts:
“The climate summit in Cancun at the end of the month is not a climate conference, but one of the largest economic conferences since the Second World War. ……….
one must say clearly that we redistribute de facto the world’s wealth by climate policy. …….
One has to free oneself from the illusion that international climate policy is environmental policy. This has almost nothing to do with environmental policy anymore!”
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MattB:
April 18th, 2011 at 11:02 pm
Lol @ Wes in #88. That’s right you’ve won because most sane people would avoid this site like the plague.
That tells us quite a bit of what you think of Jo, matt.
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Keith H @ 112: THank you for that link!
Almost refreshing to see the truth written down if it were not so scary.
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Global warming is real, it is happening and it is a direst result of our emissions of greenhouse gasses including CO2. Putting a price on these emissions is the only way we can signal to the market that we need to account for the effects of these emissions and find alternatives to burning coal, oil and gas. Saying on one hand that the world isn’t warming and on the other that it is warming, but that it is all due to natural variation is as nonsensical as saying that Australia is leading the world by proposing a tax on CO2 emissions.
Atmospheric CO2 alone explains 80% of the variation in global temperatures over the past 100 years. The probability of this correlation being due to chance is less than 1 in a billion billion. There is no argument that CO2 concentrations have increased by 30% over the past century and temperature records have been gone over in minute detail to remove any chance of bias. Saying that the world has cooled over the past decade is equivalent to saying oil prices are falling because they are now lower than what they were 3 years ago. Temperatures have not decreased and oil is not getting cheaper!
I just wonder how CO2 concentrations and temperatures will have to go before Joann, Bob, David, Stuart and Bill acknowledge that we may have a problem!
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Barrie, you have no proof of your assertion in paragraph one. You are incorrect in multiple ways in paragraph two.
Making paragraph three just funny: (“may have a problem”)
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Barrie, I have a feeling you have come here from one of those “rent-a-troll” sites that encourage the naive to come to “denier” sites, hold forth with a bunch of unsourced statements, and set us all straight. (Gosh, I’ve never heard that before!)
You’ve been had, Barrie. Stop being a mindless tool and start thinking for yourself. Chances are, you are just as smart and (potentially) more logical than most climate scientists.
Go here, download Joanne’s “Skeptic’s Handbook” and read it. If that doesn’t convince you that everything you just posted is complete nonsense, then come back here and we’ll discuss it rationally.
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[…] been lied to, and the politicians (on both sides and with the support of the AGW scientists) are still lying to us. They treat us like children, telling us what is best. Anyone who speaks out publicly […]
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