Erik Rasmussen On The 'Epidemic' Of Climate Change (Exclusive Video Interview)

Erik Rasmussen believes we have passed the tipping point in preventing what he refers to as "the world's most dangerous epidemic" -- climate change. But since there's no turning back, he's created a plan to move forward. Rasmussen, founder and CEO of Scandinavia's leading independent think tank -- Monday Morning -- and founder of the Copenhagen Climate Council, recently sat down for an interview with Huffington Post's Green Editor, Travis Walter Donovan.

According to Rasmussen, while climate change is inevitable, the damage is not. Rasmussen tells us, "Your generation is the last generation who can... to a certain extent, influence their own future. The next generation may not have that possibility." Because the world still has the power to enact change, Rasmussen believes we must do so.

Not enough progress has been made so far. Rasmussen found that while the Cancun Climate Change Summit was a political success, it didn't address the real problems of climate change, and thus "we are still further behind in solutions than ever."

What is the solution, then? For Rasmussen, the most important thing to do right now is improve communication. According to him, people don't understand the language of scientists, and people don't believe politicians. Instead of relying on their dialogue, there must be a shared language for all people. This language can be found in Planet Call, Rasmussen's global awareness campaign, detailed in his Huffington Post blog.

But until people start to communicate the message of climate change more effectively, our world will continue to be destroyed. As Rasmussen exclaims with frustration, "Here we have an epidemic with so many casualties, millions involved, and you don't do anything."

WATCH Rasmussen's exclusive Huffington Post interview:

Comments

[StephenBP]

07:27 PM on 02/27/2011

Food prices are rising. Petroleum insecurity is driving up energy costs, which will further drive up food prices. What will food costs look like if China's drought continues? How is Australia's current flooding affecting their crops? What if Russia and Ukraine have another record hot summer?

I think that food prices may be the the hook that finally grabs the attention of the people who are not acknowledging the seriousness of the crisis that is bearing down on humanity.

We take cheap food for granted in the US. When it is no longer available, and when the media is talking about weather/climate related crop failures at key points around the world, it will be a turning point in US attitudes towards climate.

Until then, it is going to be a slow slog, trying to ask people to look at the preponderance of the evidence, trying to educate people, trying to get people to discuss and consider that others have been digging very deeply into this topic for years, and that their effort should be respected, not insulted.

I for one find it very difficult to not answer an insult with an insult,but I guess we would probably all profit from more civility.

Have a good evening.

[Overtone]

04:17 PM on 02/19/2011

Black Swans have begun to emerge and can change the energy ballgame.

See Green Light at www.aesopinstitute.org for an overview of how and why.

Communication is not the problem. It is an absence of cheap green energy. And Black Swans are likely to provide it. Perhaps, faster than might be imagined.

A 24/7 development program is pregnant and can accelerate the births.

[Richard2]

06:00 PM on 02/16/2011

Philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer recognised abuse as the last trick of person whose arguments have collapsed...

A last trick is to become personal, insulting, rude, as soon as you perceive that your opponent has the upper hand, and that you are going to come off worst. It consists in passing from the subject of dispute, as from a lost game, to the disputant himself, and in some way attacking his person.... But in becoming personal you leave the subject altogether, and turn your attack to his person, by remarks of an offensive and spiteful character. It is an appeal from the virtues of the intellect to the virtues of the body, or to mere animalism. This is a very popular trick, because every one is able to carry it into effect; and so it is of frequent application. Now the question is, What counter-trick avails for the other party? for if he has recourse to the same rule, there will be blows, or a duel, or an action for slander…

A cool demeanour may, however, help you here, if, as soon as your opponent becomes personal, you quietly reply, “That has no bearing on the point in dispute,” and immediately bring the conversation back to it, and continue to show him that he is wrong, without taking any notice of his insults. Say, as Themistocles said to Eurybiades — Strike, but hear me . But such demeanour is not given to every one.

Herald Sun, 16 February 2011

[realpolitic]

08:21 PM on 02/19/2011

R2, almost all of your posts "have no bearing on the point in dispute,"  but you are smart enough and well schooled in propaganda enough to know that.

[econ1]

02:37 PM on 02/16/2011

Controlling population growth will go a long way in reducing climate change, as well as hunger, pollution, over crowding, water issues, disease etc.. Not addressing population will make many efforts at controlling climate less effective. Having more than two children, especially in the developed world, is far worse than driving a Hummer.

[Get Skinny Go Vegan]

03:17 PM on 02/16/2011

So eat a plant based diet and don't have kids. Adopt if you would like and have the government quit giving hand outs to all the people who reproduce without even the financial means to support them. When the government gives major tax breaks for reproduction, it's difficult to think there is any consequence for having kids. Eat Plants, Wear Plants, Make Love with Latex or get Snip Snip. :)

[methodman]

12:13 PM on 02/16/2011

The populist knowledge vocabulary does not match up to the working vocabulary or the historical vocabulary. The problem is worse than that; the Academic vocabulary is different than both those. That is where people get turned off from the working or historic knowledge.. Some of the Dummy's books like Dummy's for Java bring out very important but hard to convey ideas. Kids are missing that because our world is so passive(TV) or Action Based and this stuff is intellectual structure like separating Bach orchestration into 2 beat changes, 3 beat changes and 4 beat changes keeping close to triads, away from a triad. That is intellectual pre science. However we have scored a big victory in that Religion is doing a good job of dismembering itself.

[methodman]

12:09 PM on 02/16/2011

I fully agree with you. One problem is that in America our school system doesn't suggest any archiving so people don't think about jumping back. For example My first computer was a commodore 64. When I was a kid I was in charge of what I looked at. My parents although well menaing were overly conservative and I had no spacing symmetrical symbol and group marking memory. So I could not tell the difference between an easy project or a hard project. So I ended up buying the most difficult things to learn and never finishing my projects because instead of framing from the common to the far-reaching. I tried it all. Now We have the Atari Age preservation society and Bombjack.og/commodore and the Tosec Trs-80 and the Acorn computer Book collections. and the Amiga programming books. Quite a few of these books are very challenging. But they are available for free and then you emulate the computer and they back you up into becoming interested and seeing where the seams between computers, math, mechanics , chemistry and physics are.

[disabledjim]

11:17 AM on 02/16/2011

iIf so many people believe,then why arethey still engaged in all of the things that cause planet destruction.

[Katmandu01]

12:12 PM on 02/16/2011

Even a heroin junkie knows how self-destructive his habit is and wants to get clean but it's easier said than done. President Bush was right when he said that America is addicted to oil. If every aspect of our lifestyle is based around the use of fossil fuels it won't be easy to change. But just because someone is not wearing a hair shirt and living in a house of daub and wattle it does not mean that he doesn't genuinely care about the environmental health of this planet.

[elmojo]

12:40 PM on 02/16/2011

I had a conversation once with an expert on ancient China who said that the original meanings of 'yin' and 'yang' were not female-male or earth-heaven but 'the Easy' and 'the Simple'. They considered Easy and Simple as opposites. So the solution is simple: stop smoking cigarettes, stop burning fossil fuels... but quitting these habits is a nightmare.

[disabledjim]

01:57 PM on 02/16/2011

True believers that wont quit using carbon based products are no better than the preacher who visits the whorehouse on sat only to preach of the evils of prostitution on sunday

[Publicola]

05:56 PM on 02/16/2011

disabledji­m's Revolution­ary War-era ancestor, disabledja­mes:

True Independence and Liberty believers that wont quit using slave based products are no better than the preacher who visits the whorehouse on sat only to preach of the evils of prostituti­on on sunday

[disabledjim]

11:14 AM on 02/16/2011

If al gore buys beachfront property in malibu,It very hard for me to believe what he says

[john649]

12:29 PM on 02/16/2011

does your world revolve around al gore?

[DocSkull]

12:48 PM on 02/16/2011

"If al gore buys beachfront property in malibu,It very hard for me to believe what he says"

1. Gore believes the problem is solvable and that we can forestall the worst effects of global warming.

2. Malibou is more than 100 feet above sea level.

3. His actual house in Montecito is even higher.

4. Gore is a policy maker and nothing he says changes the science of global warming.

[daultman463]

02:18 PM on 02/16/2011

Sorry Docskull but Al Gore is such an easy target for us righties. Its not the house in Malibu or even the yaht on the tenn. river. Or even the private planes or limos at every speaking engagement. Its that with a little research you find out that if we do what this fraud actually wants us to do he would through these green companies he owns becomes a billionare.Money And Power have always been the root of all evil even in this debate my friend.By the way which is it global warming or climate change that we call this now.

[disabledjim]

11:06 AM on 02/16/2011

If all these things are true then why dont the true believers stop using all of the things that causes climate change.How do the true believers expect to be believed when they continue to do all of the same things that cause global climate change.If the true believers actually believed what they said then there would be alot of people walking,not driving their cars.There would be millions of vegans,if the true believers actually had the courage of their convictions.When Al Gore buys beachfront property in malibu , it makes it very hard to believe the true believers.If your house uses 20 times the national average like big al's house,it makes it very hard to trust what the believer is saying.When we find out that so many of the believers had to falsify findings in order to get to the result that they wanted,it is very hard to trust what they are saying.For me it is not a matter of not understanding the language of science,it is not being able to trust what the typical progressive liberal democrat says

[spqesq]

11:43 AM on 02/16/2011

That's like asking people who are hot on a sunny day why they aren't walking around naked and then assuming it's cold outside because they're wearing clothes. Brilliant.

[ssgman]

11:47 AM on 02/16/2011

Well, he's not called disabledjim for nothing!

[chrisd3]

12:09 PM on 02/16/2011

"­If your house uses 20 times the national average like big al's house,it makes it very hard to trust what the believer is saying."

Seriously, do some fact checking before you regurgitate what you've read or heard. Here are the facts about Al Gore's home:

First, comparing it to the national average is pointless. The appropriate comparison is to the Nashville average, which is significantly higher due to its climate.

Second, this comparison was made BEFORE Gore spent tens of thousands of dollars on energy-saving improvements.

Third, it's not just "Gore's house", it's also the headquarters of a moderate-sized business. The appropriate comparison is to a business, not to a house.

Fourth, one of the reasons Gore's bill is higfh is that he spends extra to buy all of his electricity from renewable sources. The appropriate comparison would be to enegy USE, not energy COST.

To sum up: You are comparing the wrong thing (cost instead of usage) to the wrong thing (house instead of office) from the wrong time (pre-upgrades instead of post-upgrades) using the wrong average (national instead of local) and ignoring critical information (that he spends extra on energy from renewable sources).

So, would you like to try that again? The fact is, you're the "true believer" here. It appears that you believe whatever you're told without doing any research at all.

[Get Skinny Go Vegan]

11:04 AM on 02/16/2011

But what can everyday people do themselves? Why are we not pushing plant based diets when eat plants is even more effective than buying a hybrid. Eating meat and dairy is destroying the environment, killing our children and our moms and dads, and creating more suffering in the world. We cannot economically continue on the meat and dairy path either. If you have children you really need to think about whether you care if they actually have food and water in the future and make your life choices accordingly. If you believe God put everything here to just be used up for you, then you will be fine when "God" starves everyone to death and you claim you had nothing to do with it. And it's hilarious when the "educated" and "progressive" HuffPost crowd has to fight to death their arguments against plant based diets. They vote for Gore or Kucinich, or Howard Dean yet eat meat and dairy and complain no one is listening about climate change. And buy their clothes made from Oil from Macy's. You vote with your money. Make it count.

[mrpossumtail]

05:11 PM on 02/16/2011

You might be interested in this article. I have quite eating all sweetening products derived from cane, corn, beets, and maple trees. Honey is the low carbon sweetener.
http://environment.about.com/gi/o.htm?zi=1/XJ&zTi=1&sdn=environment&cdn=newsissues&tm=517&f=10&su=p504.1.336.ip_&tt=2&bt=0&bts=0&zu=http%3A//assets.panda.org/downloads/sugarandtheenvironment_fidq.pdf

[bigdaveh]

10:51 AM on 02/16/2011

But the climate change deniers won't be around in 100 years or so to see the damage, so why should they care.

[lbsaltzman]

10:52 AM on 02/16/2011

The damage has started, the deniers are either to greedy or too wilfully ignorant to see what is in front of their eyes.

[Barton449]

10:34 AM on 02/16/2011

Perhaps if climate change scientists were truthful, people would believe them.

[john649]

10:52 AM on 02/16/2011

you mean truthful like fox news?

haha.....they've got you wrapped around their pinkie like a tin soldier.

[Barton449]

11:00 AM on 02/16/2011

A labored canard...

[Under Fed yet Fed Up]

12:19 PM on 02/16/2011

Did maturity skip a generation in your family?

[lbsaltzman]

10:54 AM on 02/16/2011

That is a general assault implying that thousands of climate change scientists from all over the world are untruthful. It is an absurd charge. Why have all the dishonest scientists congregated in this one field or do you believe that scientists in general are untruthful?

[Barton449]

11:03 AM on 02/16/2011

Are scientists without human faults?
I know many. They have faults, too.

When money is free for the grant writing,
most anything that is popular,
and will get that money, will be written.

The government has declared Climate Change to be real.
So, you expect scientists looking for Federal Grants to say it isn't?

[mioffe]

01:44 AM on 02/16/2011

Rasmussen is not a scientist, the same as Prince Charles.
Why they and like them mostly published in The HP?
Why scientists, not politicians answer on maybe wrong statement from Dr. Heinz Hug and Dr. Jack Barrett?
How long believers, deniers and usual poster will argue, without real information from real scientists?
Next was published in 1996, repeated in 2005, in 2010 and nothing against their serious accusation about properties of carbon dioxide.
In my opinion it is serious problem.

Dr. Heinz Hug, lecturer, Wiesbaden, Germany
Climate Change White Paper June 22, 2010
F.W. Pontius 1
Appendix A
Leipzig Declaration
The Leipzig Declaration was originally published in 1996, and revised in 2005.
The 2005 text is provided below. More information can be found at:
http://www.sepp.org/policy%20declarations/LDrevised.html

http://www­.john-daly­.com/artif­act.htm
Conclusions
It is hardly to be expected that for CO2 doubling an increment of IR absorption at the 15 µm edges by 0.17% can cause any significant global warming or even a climate catastrophe.
The radiative forcing for doubling can be calculated by using this figure. If we allocate an absorption of 32 W/m2 [14] over 180º steradiant to the total integral (area) of the n3 band as observed from satellite measurements (Hanel et al., 1971) and applied to a standard atmosphere, and take an increment of 0.17%, the absorption is 0.054 W/m2 - and not 4.3 W/m2.
This is roughly 80 times less than IPCC's radiative forcing.

[peterz]

06:32 AM on 02/16/2011

David Olinger of the St. Petersburg Times investigated the Leipzig Declaration and discovered that most of its signers have not dealt with climate issues at all and none of them is an acknowledged leading expert. Twenty-five of the signers are TV weathermen - a profession that requires no in-depth knowledge of climate research. Some did not have a college degree, such as Dick Groeber of Dick's Weather Service in Springfield, Ohio. Did Groeber regard himself as a scientist? "I sort of consider myself so," he said when asked. "I had two or three years of college training in the scientific area, and 30 or 40 years of self-study." Other signers included a dentist, a medical laboratory researcher, a civil engineer, and an amateur meteorologist.

A journalist with the Danish Broadcasting Company attempted to contact the declaration's 33 European signers and found that four of them could not be located, 12 denied ever having signed, and some had not even heard of the Leipzig Declaration. Those who did admit signing included a medical doctor, a nuclear scientist, and an expert on flying insects. After discounting the signers whose credentials were inflated, irrelevant, false, or unverifiable, it turned out that only 20 of the names on the list had any scientific connection with the study of climate change, and some of those names were known to have obtained grants from the oil and fuel industry, including the German coal industry and the government of Kuwait (a major oil exporter).

[mioffe]

06:37 PM on 02/16/2011

I read this site, and see there only political answer.
Dr. Heinz Hug and Dr. Jack Barrett made real experiment and according their data I could see saturation effect in CO2 trapping infrared radiation.
How trustfull their experiment?
Are they made mistake?
These questions need to be answered by real scientists.
Answer that German coal industry or Government of Kuwait give grant to them, without their mistakes and real band of CO2 absorption is not good enough.

[mioffe]

06:38 AM on 02/17/2011

"...purveyers of misinforma­tion often use pettitions and such to fool the general public into thinking that the amount of dissent is greater than it really is."
It was one Copernicus, one Newton, one Einstein, which in their time fight 99.999% of supporters different points of views.
It is nothing wrong if scientists of climate change one times a week will put their opinion on new misinformation, instead of politicians, bloggers, royalty, or presidents.

[Timothy Grome]

11:37 AM on 02/16/2011

The conclusion does not deny that CO2 absorbs Infared Radiation causing radiative forcing. So there is no denial of the basic premise that increasing atmospheric CO2 concentration causing increased global temperature. The Earth is a complex multi-factoral system. Making models would require cutting corners that is leaving out factors or not taking factors into account. So any projection is likely not to be accurate. Why is this political? Because it's finacial. The last time there was a politicization of science it was when physicians started seeing a coorelation between cigarette smoking and lung cancer.

[mioffe]

07:31 PM on 02/16/2011

Of course, you are right, that carbon dioxide absorbs IR radiation.
In my opinion properties of water actually cooling air, despite carbon dioxide is GHG.
Let look what kind of forces mix air in troposphere without water.
1. Convection forces, which will stop working around 1 km high, because of cooling air with height.
2. Brownian motion, which is very slow process.

Water need huge energy for evaporation. This energy cool air close to source of evaporation.
Water vapor is lighter than oxygen and nitrogen, and help convection forces move up part of air.
When convection forces will stopped work because of cooling, water vapor will condenced to water DROPLETS. This process released heat and recreate convection forces. It will be repeated many times till upper troposphere, where so cold, that 99% of water vapor will return back to oceans, land as rain.
Energy released on upper troposphere (10 km), will go to space easy, than from oceans level.

Situation with climate change is not so clean as with lung cancer.
If my picture correct, we need others tools to fight climate change, than only carbon dioxide reduction.

[ivanalkilovic]

10:08 PM on 02/15/2011

Rasmussen is right about people not understanding the language of scientists. At school I'm always around people who think quantum mechanics is trivial and then when I go back home I can talk to people who don't know that the Sun is a star...

[mioffe]

02:39 AM on 02/16/2011

About quantum mechanics you could read in books from real scientists.
About climate change, you could read articles by Rasmussen, Prince Charles, Presidents Clinton, Obama, Bush, Tony Blair...
How people will understand language of science, if they read language of politician?

[chrisd3]

06:20 AM on 02/16/2011

There are plenty of books abut climate change from real scientists. This is a very silly argument.

[ivanalkilovic]

10:33 AM on 02/16/2011

I think you've got a good point. While there are a lot of books about climate change written by actual scientists, the most accessible ones are written by politicians. But I think what's more concerning is that people's lack of understanding of science prevents real scientists from trying to reach out to them. I guess they see it as a losing battle.

What I'm saying is that I wish people had an understanding of science *before* they ever picked up a book about climate change. But that's wishful thinking and it saddens me that science is such an enigma to so many Americans.