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A Critical Week in the Global Warming Debate
Today, the U.S. Senate begins debate on the Climate Security Act, a critical bill that will address the global warming crisis head-on. After many months of committee hearings and testimony, our bill has finally reached the Senate floor. It's a day we've been waiting for a long time.
The Climate Security Act would enact the world's most far-reaching program to fight global warming, instituting an economy-wide cap on emissions that would cut greenhouse gases below 1990 levels by 2020 and slash emissions by nearly 70% by 2050.
In addition to fighting global warming, our bill will provide cleaner air, greater energy efficiency, relief for consumers, and the alternative energy choices that American families deserve -- significantly reducing America's dependence on foreign oil. What's more, by acting wisely on global warming, America will regain much of the leadership and respect we have lost around the world these past seven years.
Some will say that the Climate Security Act would be better if it was strengthened. I agree, and that is why I will be supporting amendments to make the bill even stronger on the floor of the Senate. In addition, I will be fighting weakening amendments from our right-wing opponents to ravage the bill.
But here's the bottom line: It's so critical to start fighting the global warming threat right now. We can't afford to wait another year or two and hope for the best.
The Climate Security Act is a good bill that gives us a real chance, at long last, to put America on the path to solving the global warming crisis. It's time to get started.
Make no mistake about it -- the far-right in the Senate is organizing a brutal fight against this bill, which, if enacted, would be the strongest global warming legislation in the world. This will be one of the toughest fights of our generation. Getting the strongest global warming bill possible passed through the Senate will send a strong message that we do not intend to stand idly by while scientists warn us again and again that our planet is in jeopardy.
We're going to have to fight hard to get the Climate Security Act passed -- and I need your help to do it.
This is a critical week in our fight to address the global warming threat. With the far-right gearing up for a bruising battle on the Senate floor, I need your help like never before. Please speak out.
Follow Sen. Barbara Boxer on Twitter: www.twitter.com/Barbara_Boxer
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This is just another piece of legislation that Congress gets passed before a new administration gets into action. As with the CFC and ozone hole legislation, this potentially could ever be more seriously erroneous. Was global warming driven by politicians to begin with? (Pelosi and Kerry) What were they thinking of?
Because of the strange way the concern about global warming evolved, and because there has been no legitimate debate about global warming among scientists, any legislation would be foolish, and I would be thankful for a Bush veto if that is needed.
If they wish to discuss conservation of oil, then that is a different matter, and one worthy of discussion. In addition they should discuss what domestic sources of energy might be tapped, and whether or not this oil will be placed on the open global market.
There is also the discussion of how oil from Iraq will be used, perhaps blended in to domestic supplies and used to lower the price, the same way oil from the strategic petroleum reserve would be used.
CFCs weren't going to kill our economy, this one has the potential to hurt a lot of people.
Congress always shifts into overdrive when an interest group or a coalition of interest groups that contributes heavily to the party in power starts screaming, "Do Something!! DO SOMETHING!!!"
And almost invariably, Congress ends up doing something wrong. Again, I want to know what assurances we have that we are entering a phase of intense warming and not a phase of cooling, which is what many of the solar experts are saying? Is it possible that the atmosphere has some counteracting mechanism unknown to the cabal of climate scientists pushing AGW that alleviates the warming affects of CO2? If we are experiencing relatively stable temperatures for the past ten years, what's the rush, other than the rush to invest billions in the climate change industry to keep its scientists happy and flush with cash?
I have no clue what the rush is, especially when a bill like this is going to be a massive tax increase to every American.
Senator, I'd like to see the details of what's in this bill before I sign a letter of support; can you provide links to that info?
It's like 1000 pages and most of the Senators don't even read it before they vote.
Yeah, but they do read the parts that send pork to their own districts.
Since this bill doesn't adequately support new nuclear power infrastructure, it's a mammoth failure.
Even the founder of GreenPeace admits that the only viable solution going forward is nuclear power.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/14/AR2006041401209.html
Why ignore the most obvious and most reasonable solution in favor of pipe dreams?
My previous post got clipped somehow. Add Bush's WMD at the end.
The Climate Security Act is another example of Congressional malfeasance - even worse than their rush to biofuels. Senator Boxer and the AGW believers seem unable or unwilling to face the reality that the earth is cooling not warming. Data from Britains CRU ( google --Hadley CRU- scroll down to the SST GL data base ) show that the earth has been cooling since 2003. The average sea surface temperature for the first four months of 2008 is cooler than for any yearly average post 1996. 12 years of no net warming while CO2 rose 6%. There is no measurable relation between anthropogenic CO2 and temperature,
Solar studies and the lack of activity in Solar cycle 24 suggest the possibilty of serious cooling until mid- century. This would be much more threatening than a little warming with food production cut by early and late frosts and shorter growing seasons. Already ,this year, corn crop estimates are down in the US because of a cool and wet spring. CO2 is the major plant food. not a pollutant. 15% of the increased food crop increase in the last century was due simply to the increase in CO2. If the cool spell does indeed develop we would benefit from increasing CO2 not reducing it. Wanting to save the planet is commendable but to act on the flawed IPCC - Al Gore paradigm is pandering to the hysteria and fear generated by a media who are as wrong on this as they were on
For those wondering "WTF? net NEGATIVE emissions? how do we do that?"
Well, you first must cut emissions down to close to zero. Also, while some think they're brilliant on this thread pointing out that plants use CO2, evidently they haven't looked into the role of deforestation in global warming, or perhaps they systematically disbelieved whatever was responsibly said. OK, you plant more and more trees, and stop deforestation as much as humanly possible. A Columbia University scientist recently developed a VERY carbon-efficient atmospheric filtration machine that costs about 100,000 British Pounds to build (hopefully the cost will come WAY down with further R & E & D) and it removes ONE TON of CO2 from the atmosphere per day. 100,000 of these would cost about $10 billion to build and remove 100,000 tons of CO2 from the atmosphere per day.
In Britain, they pay much more attention to this. My relatively short and crisp LTTEs to the NY TIMES don't get printed, but the Guardian in the UK addresses these issues, giving Hansen PAGE ONE coverage:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/apr/07/climatechange.carbonemissions
those of us really ready for whatever the truth of the issue is have our work cut out for us -- the movement has to start demanding what is needed before even the most forward-looking mainstream coalitions will embrace it.
"Well, you first must cut emissions down to close to zero."
This reminds me of the old Steve Martin gag: "Wanna know how to not have to pay taxes on a million dollars? First, get a million dollars, . . . "
When you cut emissions to zero, you cut growth, prosperity and human welfare to zero. But I guess that's the point: make life on earth so miserable, no one will want to reproduce.
If this thing passes, I just want thing one thing:
Al Gore, and ALL of the wealthy Liberal Democratic Elites MUST live life just as the averge American does. No more jetting around the country, driving SUV's, and 15,000 Sq. Ft houses.
NO EXCEPTIONS!.
Then, they'll have plenty of time to ponder why Global Warming has happened consistently over the centuries, and we're still here today.
EXTREMELY IMPORTANT
While some, citing bogus "facts" galore, try to confuse debate w/ global warming denialism, those who point out that global warming is indeed REAL, & an urgent issue we must address right away are lulled by this contrast into complacency.
But the servers of death still get the last laugh (as usual). Jim Hansen, the LEADING US climatologist, has recently concluded that we've already passed at least 1 of several crucial global warming tipping points. He's argued what I'd intuitively been advocating even before, namely: we need not merely to lower or even ELIMINATE greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, but to actually get to NET NEGATIVE GHG EMISSIONS GLOBALLY and well before 2050.
Senator, & others, I urge you to look into this urgent issue further.
Hansen's concluded that the present atmospheric LEVELS -- not EMISSIONS BUT ALREADY REACHED LEVELS -- at ~387 parts per million of CO2 are already catastrophically too high. We've passed the tipping point for the melting of Arctic summer sea ice, & possibly others. Current 'conservationist' goals of stabilizing CO2 at 450 ppm are catastrophically inadequate, & the time frame must be HUGELY shortened from some 42 years to not just eliminate 70% of CO2 emissions to start REDUCING CO2!
Incidentally, we would NOT even with this bill, have the most positively aggressive policy in the world. Norway and several other countries already have a policy (critiqued as having too many loopholes) of reaching net carbon NEUTRALITY by 2030.
(more -- as this is
truly crucial)
Here are some links, as well as terms one can try to google:
http://mwcnews.net/content/view/20133/42
(this piece at MEDIA WITH CONSCIENCE, heavily quotes Jim Hansen)
There are also websites, such as "Climate Code Red", which is the name of a book scheduled to be published in summer 08 explaining these concerns in greater detail:
http://www.climatecodered.net/
In mid-February, Democratic Underground (which has lots of great stuff and lots of garbage -- you just have to sift, as I do, for the good stuff) has a handful of people interested in this, such as "RedEarth", from whose post(s) I first learned about Jim Hansen and his John-Gofman-on-radiation-type analysis:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=133777&mesg_id=133777
There is also a website called 350.org, that tries to follow the general concerns raised by Dr Hansen,
and they have a critique of the current legislative battle in Congress:
http://www.350.org/4/?p=153
Unfortunately, McKibben (the founder and head of "Project 350" and a noted environmental activist) looks to getting to 'net negative GHG emissions' by the end of the century, while Hansen clearly means we need to reach that point WAY WAY sooner.
(Still more to come)
Thank you for pushing this along Senator Boxer. Not surprisingly, Bush began his "insurgency" yesterday by focusing on some extravagant estimates of the cost of implementing cap & trade controls. It's very important for supporters of this legislation to respond with the costs of NOT implementing any controls. I am not the expert who can provide that data, but surely "our side" has enough scientists and economists to counter the media blitz which BushCo will undoubtedly unleash to kill this bill. We need stay on-topic and not allow the corporatist concerns over a small dip in their personal profits to override the concerns of everyone else on Earth with regard to preventing total ecological collapse and mass extinctions.
Thanks Senator Boxer. Hopefully we can start moving toward a better future. Every step towards our goal will help. Next year we can move farther towards some energy effiency with a new Congress. If we can get rid of President Bush and his supporters in Congress next year we can move ahead. But this is a start.
Senator, you need to be a little more honest about what this bill is really going to do:
It will price cars out of the range of the poor and lower middle class Americans.
I remember reading a similar warning when catalytic converters were first introduced.
Yes, and I remember a similar warning about switching to Ethanol, causing a food shortage.
Why is it critical? Do you have any evidence at all that the U.S. can meaningfully impact the temperature of the earth? I didn't think so.
Use Google. There is overwhelming evidence that U.S. can meaningfully impact CO2 emissions. Additionally, other countries are more likely to take action if U.S. takes the lead.
Will reduced CO2 emissions reduce temperature? How much? Too much or too little? Does anyone know? Why have temperatures have leveled off in the past ten years? What if we are heading into another Little Ice Age? Should we be attmepting to "cool" the planet? Or should we be warming it?
The proposition that we can affect climate by tweaking CO2 emissions is dubious.
The fact is that little is known about what is happening with climate now and what will happen in the future. The distinction between climate and weather turns out to be false. They can't predict climate either.
My energy company tells me that no one is available to advise home owners in my area on how to cut energy bills anymore. This comes at a time when it is most critical to reduce energy. Many people struggling to get from month to month cannot afford technology to reduce their consumption. Please continue to promote legislation to make energy conservation affordable.
P.S. John McCain is my senator.
Few things are more depressing than reading an article on global warming in the American press. The Exxon-paid koolaid has really been drunk and everyone who completed high school thinks he/she knows more than the world's best climate scientists. The comments are always full of denial - and not just any denial, but hatemongering denial. That's even true on Huffpo or Salon; the comments section of the Washington Post after such an article is simply unreadable, and I can't even imagine how it must be on right-wing media.
This is the more depressing since all efforts we in Europe do are immediately undone by higher emissions in the US and China. If you Americans don't do something there is simply no point to anyone else doing their best. Might as well put TNT on the corral reefs, burn all the rainforests, and kill three quarters of the world's population right now, since they're all doomed anyway if we don't rein in emissions on a global scale.
And God, we're angry about it too! During the Kyoto negotiations you stuffed cap-and-trade down our throats when we wanted stronger measures. And then having watered down the Protocol, you didn't even sign it! The Bush Administration sent people to follow-up negotiations - not to participate but to sabotage them, even though those negotiations required no US participation whatsoever.
Bless people like Barbara Boxer, you redeem your nation. At least, here's hoping.
The only thing more depressing is the coolade drinking supporters who never go anywhere near a feasibility or cost-benefit analysis.
Judging from your other posts in this thread, my expectations are, well, ultralow, but tell me (including links) where are the very BEST 'feasibility' & 'cost-benefit' analyses of this overall problem? I am NOT interested in, as they've been in the past (like Lucy & the football), a bogus concoction of partisan drivel merely to promote an anti-environmentalist agenda that always turns out to be completely wide of the truth, but by the time we learn that, no one cares.
All my adult life I've been hearing not the chicken-little fears of the left (although sometimes you have bogus choruses of protestation that are readily identifiable, like HIV denialism which are readily obviously nonsense to any reasonable observer), but the chicken little fears AND bogus assurances of the right.
Nuclear energy was perfectly economical & safe, & we'd never be able to do without it; a Three Mile Island let alone a Chernobyl just won't happen. & the electricity'd be "too cheap to meter". Nuclear energy, in addition to being irreducibly dangerous (pebble bed reactors notwithstanding -- they're MORE vulnerable to terrorists), is too expensive to meet the problem of the Greenhouse Effect.
Vietnam [admittedly before my time] was a sure bet, & pulling out would be 'pulling the cork out of the bottle of Chinese expansionism'.
Iraq ... need I explain?
The list goes on & on -- but it never matters how many times progressives are right, after all, the other side are "serving" and "God is on
Feasability analysis! Good Lord. No need to analyze, just do it. Sorry but after the 1970s oil shock we made our cars three times more efficient, reduced our electricity production emissions, tightened building standards, and we now typically emit three times less CO2 than you do for approximately the same income levels. And all of that is not enough and we know it and we're willing to do more, but if you can just at the very least play catch up using methods and technology that are tested and proven and that didn't make us broke, instead of stubbornly sticking to 19th century power plant and car engine technology which ARE making you broke.
Jeez if you guys had taken the road of fuel efficiency, how much do you think gasoline would cost now? In 2000 't was said, "Oh if we do as Gore says we'll be paying almost 2 $ for gas! Can't do that, let's destroy the world instead." What are you paying now? Cost analysis indeed.
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