# Climate Science Predictions Prove Too Conservative



## PStechPaul (May 1, 2012)

And yet the AGW and climate change skeptics/deniers claim just the opposite. The reality is that Big Energy wants people to believe their hype and continue with business as usual until the last drop of "low hanging fruit" is plucked, which will keep their profits steady and then even increase when oil becomes scarce and more expensive to extract. And the newer oil drilling ventures, as well as coal mining and fracking, have dire environmental impacts that may soon make clean water more precious than oil. 

Two weeks ago Dr. Will Candler presented at our www.baltimoregreenforum.org meeting, where the topic was "Climate Change and Sandy: What's next?". His powerpoint slide presentation showed some alarming new statistics that predict a very profound effect, and there may be some "positive feedback loops" that further destabilize the climate. See his book: http://www.amazon.com/Global-Warming-Answer-Energy-Dividend/dp/1434345084

Something he said, however, makes me rethink what our priorities should be. In essence, AIUI, there is a fairly large amount of inertia that shows a lag of perhaps 20-50 years, so we are now feeling the effects of our activities in the 1950s to 1970s, during which time we were accelerating our consumption of fossil fuels and drastically increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases. And even if we stopped this consumption right now, the effects will continue to worsen for 20 years or more before possibly improving. 

My comment was that our priorities should be to take steps to deal with the expected increase in violent storms and droughts and other environmental events, to protect ourselves from them, because no matter what we do about curbing our influence on climate, we cannot change the inevitable disasters that will happen in the next two decades. We could have built seawalls that would have saved much of the areas devastated by Sandy, at a cost of about 1/4 that which will now be needed to repair the damage, and of course nothing can replace the hundreds of lives that were lost. 

The problem is that we have become reactive rather than proactive, and our policy of not being willing to spend money in advance to provide protection and rebuild our aging, failing infrastructure, will cost us many times as much in the future. This would also create many more jobs and would be a boost to the economy as private enterprises will perform much of the work and supply the materials. We cannot afford Draconian cost cutting measures and austerity policies, even if we must use deficit spending for awhile as a Keynesian stimulus. 

Of course, we also need to implement the same policies as have been proposed for reducing energy consumption and switching to sustainable and clean energy sources. This will not really impact the expected volatility and severity of climate change and natural disasters, at least for the foreseeable future, but it will help us retain more of our natural resources, such as oil, which are needed for things other than energy. Oil is a precious resource and simply burning it as a "cheap" source of energy is no longer tenable.


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## IamIan (Mar 29, 2009)

PStechPaul said:


> The problem is that we have become reactive rather than proactive


As a species ... Humans seem to me ... to have a long history of being more reactive than proactive ... So I don't think it is something we've "become" ... instead I think it is something we have always been ... the proactive part I think is newer to us as a species ... something we still struggle with at times.

Also ... just to make it a bit more complicated ... there are advantages to both / either side.

Reactive has advantages.
#1> Less resistance to action.
#2> No chance of wasted finite resources on a incorrect prediction.

Proactive also has advantages.
#1> Ultimately less resources to address the same issue.
#2> Reduced impact of that issue.


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## PhantomPholly (Aug 20, 2008)

Belongs in the Climate Debate thread guys...

Don't forget to hide the decline!http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMqc7PCJ-nc


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## Sunking (Aug 10, 2009)

PhantomPholly said:


> Belongs in the Climate Debate thread guys...
> 
> Don't forget to hide the decline!http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMqc7PCJ-nc


Love the Video Phantom. Good post.


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## PStechPaul (May 1, 2012)

Cute video, but just another example of denialist propaganda that many people jump on and cling to because the reality is inconvenient and scary. But, as I have said, most of the damage has probably already been done and the effects will linger and escalate "weather" or not we take immediate and drastic action to reduce the effects of CO2 by reducing fossil fuel consumption. More important is to invest in infrastructure and measures to protect against the more frequent and severe catastrophes like Sandy. And we should consider oil as a valuable resource for the manufacture of plastics, pharmaceuticals, and other materials, and NOT as a convenient and historically cheap fuel to be burned at 20% efficiency to support a soon-to-be-obsolete and unsustainable economic model.


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## PhantomPholly (Aug 20, 2008)

Sunking said:


> Love the Video Phantom. Good post.


Hehe - you gotta have a sense of humor about life. After all, none of us are going to get out of it alive!


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## PhantomPholly (Aug 20, 2008)

PStechPaul said:


> Cute video, but just another example of denialist propaganda that many people jump on and cling to because the reality is inconvenient and scary. But, as I have said, most of the damage has probably already been done and the effects will linger and escalate "weather" or not we take immediate and drastic action to reduce the effects of CO2 by reducing fossil fuel consumption. More important is to invest in infrastructure and measures to protect against the more frequent and severe catastrophes like Sandy. And we should consider oil as a valuable resource for the manufacture of plastics, pharmaceuticals, and other materials, and NOT as a convenient and historically cheap fuel to be burned at 20% efficiency to support a soon-to-be-obsolete and unsustainable economic model.


Your post is in violation of our host's posting rules. Take your opinions into ChitChat...


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## PStechPaul (May 1, 2012)

PhantomPholly said:


> Your post is in violation of our host's posting rules. Take your opinions into ChitChat...


That is your opinion, as is your cute little video. I am stating verifiable facts that are directly relevant to the title of the thread. 

For more factual information, showing that we have known about the problem since at least 2008, see:
http://www.sorryaboutthat.net/reading.html
http://newkoinonia.com/environment/081013.theCompleteAnswer.pdf
http://newkoinonia.com/environment/BGF.121201.ppt


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## PhantomPholly (Aug 20, 2008)

PStechPaul said:


> That is your opinion, as is your cute little video. I am stating verifiable facts that are directly relevant to the title of the thread.
> 
> For more factual information, showing that we have known about the problem since at least 2008, see:
> http://www.sorryaboutthat.net/reading.html
> ...


Yep. Keep violating the host's rules and you'll get a time out. Maybe I can goad you into some more stupidity...


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## david85 (Nov 12, 2007)

While I realize the original poster is the newsbot it is indeed true that climate debates are to be kept on the "climate change debate" thread of the chit-chat section (The thread is a sticky so you can't miss it). Usually when EV world posts something like this, nobody here makes much of it.

In the past these political AGW discussions were allowed to continue by the intrenched views on both sides on this particular issue have a tendancy to derail other threads which is why climate change has become a restricted topic.

If anyone still wants to express themselves on this topic, please take it to the correct place in the future.


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