Emissions match Hansen Scenario B; Keystone delay is a victory; EDF Insider podcast; and Machete Order Star Wars
Three climate shorts here.
First, maybe others have already known this for years, but I'd been bothered by claims that Hansen's 1988 worst case emission scenario matched actual emissions while temps were far cooler. Of course that's not true. Actual emissions were slightly under Hansen's middle road scenario. Temps were also under the middle scenario, partly because of emissions. His model may have been slightly oversensitive for temperature reaction to GHGs but overall looks good. David Evans sadly has it wrong, is strongly criticized by William.
Second, in my comments elsewhere:
In my career, I've won much more often than I've lost when I'm on defense, trying to stop something I oppose, rather than trying to achieve something I support.We're on offense on many aspects of climate, but on Keystone we're on defense. I've also found in my career that delay is good when you're on defense. Keystone now has to spend money while waiting longer to make a profit, making it somewhat more likely that they'll throw in the towel. And even if they do build their monstrosity, doing it later makes it more likely to happen when the evil Harper/Santorum government of Canada is replaced by something reasonable that would put some restraints or mitigation on the project.
Third, Environmental Defense Fund did another of their irregular podcasts. Highlights include a non-rejection of a carbon tax approach to climate mitigation. OTOH, they say that in the end, groups should coalesce around a single approach at the national level, and we can predict what has the best chance of being that approach. They also say that things may get so bad that we might need to consider geoengineering and should be trying to figure out how we can research that approach carefully. Sounds reasonable enough, sadly.
Finally and unrelated: watching Star Wars movies in Machete Order. Good way to introduce them to newbies.
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4 comments:
Eli,
Look up the PATH project in West Virginia (http://www.pathtransmission.com/). Serious opposition led to withdrawal of the proposal, and as time goes by, it is less and less likely that the proposal will be submitted. In the meantime, the opposition has been galvanized, so the defense is stronger. The Keystone project is analogous. The longer the delay, the better the defense will be organized.
Rob
That's a pretty pathetic defense of Hansen's 1988 predictions. Dr. Evans never even says that Hansen's worse case emission scenario was achieved.
Also, you claim that emissions did not reach the levels of scenario b. What about scenario c? Clearly emissions were at least as high if not higher than scenario c, yet the temperature rose less than he predicted.
Love this.
"Keystone now has to spend money while waiting longer to make a profit, making it somewhat more likely that they'll throw in the towel. And even if they do build their monstrosity, doing it later makes it more likely to happen when the evil Harper/Santorum government of Canada is replaced by something reasonable that would put some restraints or mitigation on the project."
spoken like a true command and control communist, Eli. This is why you're a fool though. Let's pretend for the sake of pretending that the keystone pipeline does not get built. Will nothing be shipped as a result? No! Burlington Northern, Warren Buffett's railroad company, is going to get all the shipping. So you lose no matter what Eli, but I guess you would rather see Warren Buffett get the money because it's now become common myth in leftwing ideology that Buffett is going to give a bunch of money back to society. Pffft.
The denialati over at WTF remnind me of nothing so much as the stupid kid in the class who decides he's going to cheat on the exam and proceeds to sit down next to the stupidest kid in the class to copy answers.
Anon - Fig 3 at David's post says CO2 emissions match Scenario A. Reality is that CO2 didn't match Scenario A, and exceeded Scenario B by a tiny amount, while other emissions significantly undermatched B. David readjusted the lines in a way that makes no sense to me. Use the original found at the Skeptical Science link and you'll see what I mean.
Burlington is a new argument to me - got a link to match your confident prediction? I always heard about an alternative pipeline to Vancouver BC, which has its own issues.
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