This blog uses the best up-to-date peer-reviewed climate science, quality sources, logic and critical thinking to explain man-made climate change and to debunk fake news, propaganda, myths and conspiracy theories.
Bloggen bruker den beste oppdaterte fagfellevurderte klimavitenskapen, kildekritikk og kritisk tenking til å forklare de menneskeskapte klimaendringene og til å svare på falske nyheter, propaganda, myter, konspirasjonsteorier og alternative virkelighetsoppfatninger om klima.
Since all the warming since 1950 is due to our C02 emissions, the obvious answer will be to reduce our carbon footprint ,which is now 45% of the atmosphere C02.
Use public transport and vote for politicians who are willing to facilitate for greener energy.
“Our only hope is to change the energy and transportation infrastructure of our society — for us to drive electric cars powered by clean energy sources like wind, solar, nuclear and hydropower. We must advocate for clean energy production at all levels — energy that doesn’t emit greenhouses gases — and especially vote in representatives who recognize the the threat of global warming and will do something about it at the state and national level.”
Five things you can do to fight climate change
1. Eat less meat, particularly beef
2. Consider your transportation
3. Insulate homes
4. Reduce, recycle, reuse
5. Vote
Five things you can do to fight climate change
If we are to reach the 2 C goal, emissions must begin to descend, and then sink rapidly for decades. That this will require a blend of renewable energy, efficiency, carbon capture and CO2 removal from the atmosphere, we can say without taking a strong political standpoint. But the concrete solutions become political. Do we choose to facilitate strong growth in solar power and a global carbon tax that will go beyond the fossil industry? Are we focusing on carbon capture and storage, which can extend the use of oil and gas? Do we have the capacity to do both, which will be even better for the climate, without going beyond the rest of society?
Researchers should not take these choices. However, their job is to help understand the consequences of them. The challenge for the dissemination is that the debate debate moves beyond the research front.
The scientific method is slow and thoughtful by nature. Are we supposed to say that we would like to have a few decades to consider every single measure? Or should we dare to guide, with the proviso that we speak out of the best of today's knowledge?
In my opinion, our social responsibility requires us to do more of the last than we do today.
Luckily..
More and more countries are preparing for the end of the Petroleum Age:
MORE AND MORE OIL COMPANIES AGREES ON AGW AND WORKS TO REDUCE GAS EMISSIONS. Its over. Climate change skeptics have outlived their usefulness to the fossil fuel industry.
Climate deniers are like those japanese soldiers who was unaware that the war had ended 60 years ago.
GCI is a voluntary, CEO-led initiative which aims to lead the industry response to climate change. Launched in 2014, OGCI is currently made up of ten oil and gas companies that pool expert knowledge and collaborate on action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Going green is getting cheaper and cheaper:
Solar and wind power cheaper than fossil fuels for the first time
In recent years the costs of wind and solar energy have declined substantially. Today renewable technologies are the most economical solution for new capacity in a growing number of countries and regions, and are typically the most economic solution for new grid-connected capacity where good resources are available.
• Citigroup: The age of renewable energy is beginning. Increasingly cost competitive with coal, gas and nuclear in the US. Source
• HSBC: Wind energy is now cost competitive with new-build coal capacity in India. Solar to reach parity around 2016-18. Source
• Deutsche Bank: solar now competitive without subsidies in at least 19 markets globally. In 2014 prices to decline further. Source
• Unsubsidised renewable energy is now cheaper than electricity from new coal and gas fired power plants in Australia. Source
RENEWABLE ENERGY BENEFITS:
1. reduction and ultimate elimination of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the energy sector;
2. reductions in air and water pollution, water use and land degradation;
3. reduction in respiratory diseases and cancers from pollution;
4. energy security for as long as human civilization exists;
5.a cap on energy costs, because most RE sources have no fuel costs;
6.more local jobs, per unit of energy generated, than fossil or nuclear power;
7. no risk of causing a nuclear war, or radioactive waste escape, or devastating accident.
How their denialism is part of a shameful and devastating attack on science in general.
How their submission to a polluters industry who depends on having the public embroiled in doubt and suspicion by degrading the publics confidence in science and scientists, harm America’s future—and the world’s future—so that one of the wealthiest industries on Earth can engorge itself in even more wealth.
It is also scary and striking to see how climate denialism is spreading in nationalist environments. Every nationalist party in Europe now have climate denialism high up their agenda.
It is also scary and striking to see how climate denialism is so strongly connected with xenophobia and conspiracy theories.
The War On Science from this administration is shameful and devastating to the United States reputation as a pioneer science nation as well as for the US's further ability to develop new technology mankind needs to progress .
Anti science attitudes and policies actively hurt science's ability to do great things. The "Best and the Brightest" no longer come to US universities to study or do research, because there is simply too little funding of the sciences.
Its become tribal. Often its enough for the polluters to label environmental laws for “tax scams”, and their tribe will have another reason to hate the government (which in reality wants to protects its citizens from pollutions).
The rise of idiot America today represents - for profit mainly, but also and more cynically, for political advantage in the pursuit of power - the breakdown of a consensus that the pursuit of knowledge is a good. It also represents the ascendancy of the notion that the people whom we should trust the least are the people who best know what they are talking about. In the new media age, everybody is an expert."
Richard Hofstadter, who won a Pulitzer Prize in 1964 for his book, Anti-Intellectualism In American Life, describes
“how the vast underlying foundations of anti-elite, anti-reason and anti-science have been infused into America's political and social fabric.” Tom Nichols’ bok, “The Death of Expertise:
“The culture and our educational system have created a generation that has little experience being told they are objectively wrong. Everyone feels they are entitled to be right. Combine this with the illusion of knowledge provided by Google, and everyone thinks they are their own expert in anything.”
Because mighty polluters industries has spent billions on disinformation campaigns attacking science which comes into conflict with their self interests. The polluters has always hid their self interests into politics and ideology.
For the professional deniers it’s called Denial for Profit, and for the amateur deniers its about self interest, regulation fobia, ideology/politics, religion, tribalism and cognitive biases.
Lets explain how climate science became a political and ideological issue.
The goal of the fossil fuel industry is to keep its profits rolling in without interference by government or by new, competing energy sources. The polluters know they dont have any science to back up their arguments. So instead they use the best defence method they can. Which is to polarize and politizise the science.
To do this they need the public embroiled in doubt and suspicion; they need to degrade public confidence in science and scientists; they need to harm America’s future—and the world’s future—so that one of the wealthiest industries on Earth can engorge itself in even more wealth.
"Denialists know that they have no valid scientific argument; if they did they would present it in scientific journals, conferences, and debates. Their goal isn’t to demonstrate science, it is to manipulate public opinion. That is what lobbyists do, and they do it well. Their goal is to create the illusion of debate, the façade of uncertainty. By continuing the “discussion,” such as it is, in the media, they win. They know that a majority of the public won't understand the intricacies of the science, either by choice or by its complexity. Denialists know that the public will get an overall sense of whether the science is settled or not, and that it is on this vague feeling the public will make judgments as to whether immediate action is needed. Perception is more important than fact, and illusion of reality is much more powerful than actual reality. [...] What is critical in this game is not what the science tells us, it’s the fact that to the public it appears as if there are two sides arguing with each other. Two sides + arguing = not settled.”
To pander their gullible “people on the streets” its often enough to label environmental laws for “tax scams”. This will trigger their tribe into believing its about them. Thats how they have kept america polluted for 100 years.
Thats why cynical industries and free marked fundamentalists which are dependant on polluting the environment in order to make their profit - will accuse anyone and anything and everyone, including governments, of using "politics" to try and "stop" them polluting.
The Oil and coal Industry does not want to give up it’s cash cow.
The polluter industries are accusing the climate science of being so "political", but they themselves have deliberately worked to make it appear as political. Because they have no science to defend themselves, this is their only defense against those who try to stop their pollution. To get a focus away from the fact that basic physics alone is 100% clear on that our CO2 causes climate change.
It's much easier for them to defend themselves when their own interests are wrapped up in ideology and politics.
The science was not politicized until the implications of doing something about it were realized by those who saw a harmful side of doing so to their particular concern. That usually involves big money but also becomes a threat to ideologies which abhor government interference into free market capitalism. Effective global warming intervention necessarily requires that the governing bodies of the world unite in the effort in a comprehensive and coordinated way.(Russel Swan)
When think tanks and fossil fuel front groups started to lobby for the fossil fuel self interests 30 years ago, the first thing they did was to camouflage those interests as an anti government anti regulation anti tax ideological anti socialist "struggle".
“They connected their audience’s underlying ideologies to climate change: Because cutting GHG emissions requires intervention regulation or increased taxation of carbon emissions—that curtail free market economics, people whose identity and worldview centers around free markets became particularly likely to reject the findings from climate science when the logic was laid bare.”
Non-science free market lobbying groups have a long history of setting up fake front organizations and now blogger networks to saturate the public domain with intentional misinformation.
“Back in the late 1980s, when it became pretty clear that there was no persistent Soviet threat, conservatives needed a new bogeyman, and they found it in the environmental movement. “Green is the new Red,” became a common phrase in the conservative magazines of that era. Rather than suggesting that America strip away protections designed to keep air and water clean, commentators and pols railed against controls on less visible threats, like pesticides, ozone holes, and global warming. Cries for environmental regulation were twisted into calls for socialism and the end of economic progress.
Conservative think tanks and politicians took up the mantle of climate change denial and, for more than 25 years, they’ve kept at it. Just like tobacco industry did before them.
Accepting that climate change is real and bad is fundamentally harder to do for those who have benefited from industrial capitalism, which runs on cheap fossil fuels. It’s doubly hard for conservatives, who by definition tend to resist change more than liberals.”
You recognize them when they start to attack environmental laws. They always attack environmental laws.
These laws are made so that you and I can enjoy clean air and waters. These same laws are called “tax scams” by the polluters. The term “tax scam” will very likely be embraced by anyone who doesn’t like “the government” in the first place.
THE CONSENSUS GAP CREATED BY 30 YEARS OF DISINFORMATION
A widespread consensus among climate scientists exists on the reality of substantial human-caused climate change. Unfortunately, fewer than 20 percent of Americans are aware of this consensus, despite extensive communication about this consensus by scientists.
Why? Research shows this low level of awareness comes from economically and politically motivated challenges to the reality of climate change from groups with substantial access to resources that influence public opinions. Most notably, the fossil fuel industry has funded the research of a tiny minority of scientists in order to cast doubt on human-caused global climate change.
Why do people believe this tiny minority of scientists? Because the fossil fuel industry then used its enormous financial and political resources to spread this paid-for “research” widely.
People who are not experts in climate change are thus exposed extensively to false information due to the huge megaphone of the fossil fuel industry.
Such exposure triggers the “illusory truth effect,” a psychological phenomenon where the more we are exposed to a lie, the more likely we are to believe in. Indeed, research on climate denialist messaging demonstrates that exposure to such information substantially reduces both people’s belief in human-caused climate change and the truthfulness of climate science.
A study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences suggests that over the last 20 years, private funding has had an important influence on the overall polarization of climate change as a topic in the United States.
Truth is these interests are spending billions on lobbying officials:
"Lobbying is conducted away from the public eye," explained Brulle. "There is no open debate or refutation of viewpoints offered by professional lobbyists meeting in private with government officials. Control over the nature and flow of information to government decision-makers can be significantly altered by the lobbying process and creates a situation of systematically distorted communication. This process may limit the communication of accurate scientific information in the decision-making process."
As the study concludes, “the environmental organization and the renewable energy sectors were outspent by the corporate sectors involved in the production or use of fossil fuels by a ratio of approximately 10 to 1.”
How lobbyists buy climate change legislation
Climate change is a side effect of industrial capitalism. Industrialized nations were built with energy from cheap fossil fuels, and this released enormous amounts of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere.
This is what economists call an externality — a consequence that is not built into the cost. There are market solutions to externality problems, like carbon taxes or carbon trading schemes, which incentivise industries that don’t pollute as much. These are the sort of solutions that conservatives tend to like, but implementing any solution means acknowledging the problem in the first place.
"It’s not surprising that high-profile deniers are almost exclusively conservative white men, since they have most benefited from the industrial capitalist system, and therefore have the most skin in the game when it comes to protecting the powers that be — even if they aren’t those powers."
[...] “conservative white males are likely to favour protection of the current industrial capitalist order which has historically served them well”. It added that “heightened emotional and psychic investment in defending in-group claims may translate into misperceived understanding about problems like climate change that threaten the continued order of the system.”
Smearing scientists and undermining "unwanted" science which comes into conflict with self interests and ideology, is all part of the denial propaganda machine:
"Cynicism about the motives of public servants, including government-backed climate scientists, can be traced to a group of neoliberals and their ‘toxic’ ideas".
"The concerted effort to discredit the scientific consensus over man-made global warming has been continuing for two decades in the United States, and shows no sign of weakening. It is very often described as an attempt on the part of corporate America, most notably the fossil fuel industries, to hinder governmental regulations on their activities. While emphasising this dimension of the US climate denial movement, this article also aims to show the complexity of the movement, rather than the mere defence of the narrowly-defined and short-term economic interests of the oil and gas industries, by shedding light on two additional factors which have been instrumental in blocking strong climate action. First, climate denial stems from the strong ideological commitment of small-government conservatives and libertarians to laisser-faire and their strong opposition to regulation. Second, in order to disarm their opponents, US climate deniers often rest their case on the defence of the American way of life, defined by high consumption and ever-expanding material prosperity. It is the contention of this article, therefore, that the US climate denial movement is best understood as a combination of these three trends."
"The AEI was one of dozens of the new think tanks bankrolled by hundreds of millions from the Kochs and their allies. Sold to the public as quasi-scholarly organizations, their real function was to legitimize the right to pollute for oil, gas and coal companies, and to argue for ever more tax cuts for the people who created them.
The amount of spent money has been staggering. Between 2005 and 2008, the Kochs alone spent nearly $25m on organizations fighting climate reform. One study by a Drexel University professor found 140 conservative foundations had spent $558m over seven years for the same purpose.[...] The genius of this strategy was to “turn corporate self-interest into a movement among people on the streets”.
“They did everything that becomes known as the signature of the tobacco industry,” said David Rosner, who has helped anti-lead lawsuits and co-wrote the 2013 book “Lead Wars.” “In fact, they were really pioneered by the lead industries. … The (Lead Industries Association) can take credit for creating this giant doubt industry.”
While evidence about the harmful effects of asbestos continued to grow, so did the influence of the asbestos companies. Between 1940 and 1980, the business expanded into a multibillion dollar industry that employed more than 200,000 people. The success of these companies hinged on keeping the health risks of asbestos a secret — but it was asbestos workers and consumers who paid the price. In order to keep the industry alive and prosperous, many companies took steps to ensure miners, factory workers and the public knew nothing about the true dangers of asbestos.
Jeremy Grantham, the longtime investor famous for calling the last two major bubbles in the market, is urging capitalists and "mainstream economists" to recognize the looming threat of climate change.
"Capitalism and mainstream economics simply cannot deal with these problems. Mainstream economics largely ignore [them]," Grantham, who co-founded GMO in 1977, said Tuesday in an impassioned speech at the Morningstar Investment Conference in Chicago. "We deforest the land, we degrade our soils, we pollute and overuse our water and we treat air like an open sewer, and we do it all off the balance sheet."
This negligence is due in large part to how short-sighted corporations can be, Grantham said. "Anything that happens to a corporation over 25 years out doesn't exist for them, therefore, as I like to say, grandchildren have no value" to them, he said.
- Fred Imbert, CNBC, June 13, 2018
Targeted industry funding has created a cottage industry of rogue scientists and fake experts who have manipulated public opinion and confused the issue.
In a review of the book The Pseudoscience Wars: Immanuel Velikovsky and the Birth of the Modern Fringe by Michael D. Gordin, David Morrison wrote:
In his final chapter, Gordin turns to the new phase of pseudoscience, practiced by a few rogue scientists themselves. Climate change denialism is the prime example, where a handful of scientists, allied with an effective PR machine, are publicly challenging the scientific consensus that global warming is real and is due primarily to human consumption of fossil fuels. Scientists have watched in disbelief that as the evidence for global warming has become ever more solid, the deniers have been increasingly successful in the public and political arena. … Today pseudoscience is still with us, and is as dangerous a challenge to science as it ever was in the past.
The polluters industry - a timeline:
1900-2000: LEAD
Lead is good for us and not dangerous to children and if you dont bend over and enjoy it youre attacking our industry and our desire to make shitloads of money by ruining public health and your campaign to demonize LEAD is based on junk science and you are probably a leftist government communist out to tax and regulate us out of business
OIL COMPANY DUPONT AND GENERAL MOTORS KNEW LEAD GAS WAS A KNOWN POISON WHEN THEY PUT IT IN GASOLINE AS AN ANTI-KNOCK AGENT.
(Ethanol couldn’t be patented and offered no viable profit for GM, so they were on the lookout for new additives to use. Marketing tetraethyl lead or TEL under the name “Ethyl” (because lead was already known to be poisonous), GM expected to rake in massive amounts of money.)
For decades auto and oil companies denied that lead posed any health risks.
1930s-1990s ASBESTOS
Asbestos is good for us and if you dont bend over and enjoy it youre attacking our industry and our desire to make shitloads of money by ruining public health and your campaign to demonize asbestos is based on junk science and you are probably a leftist government communist out to tax and regulate us out of business.
"As is often the case with environmental scares, the asbestos “cure” was pushed well ahead of a complete diagnosis. Research has confirmed that asbestos workers who do not use protective breathing apparatus suffer increased health risks. For the remaining 99+ percent of the U.S. population, however, asbestos health risks are virtually nil."
DDT is good for us and if you dont bend over and enjoy it youre attacking our industry and our desire to make shitloads of money by ruining public health and your campaign to demonize DDT is based on junk science and you are probably a leftist government communist out to tax and regulate us out of business.
Nicotine is good for us and is not addictive nor related to lung cancer and if you dont bend over and enjoy it you're attacking our industry and our desire to make shitloads of money by ruining public health and your campaign to demonize smokers and all forms of tobacco is based on junk science and you are probably a leftist government communist out to tax and regulate us out of business
Tobacco industry intentionally manipulates cigarettes to make them more addictive.
"A federal court has ordered Altria, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco, Lorillard and Philip Morris USA to make this statement about the health effects of smoking."
Then the bad news begins to flow.
"Smoking causes heart disease, emphysema, acute myeloid leukemia and cancer of the mouth, esophagus, larynx, lung, stomach, kidney, bladder and pancreas."
"The public health community's campaign to demonize smokers and all forms of tobacco is based on junk science".
1990s-2018: C02
C02 is good for us and not related to pollution and climate change and if you dont bend over and enjoy it you're attacking our industry and our desire to make shitloads of money by ruining public health and your campaign to demonize fossil fuels is based on junk science and you are probably a leftist government communist out to tax and regulate us out of business.
Deniers favorite fossil fuel think tank front group, the Heartland Institutes view on tobacco and tobacco smoking. Sound familiar?
Heartland Institute 2018:
"The public health community's campaign to demonize smokers and all forms of tobacco is based on junk science".
Heartland Institute 2018:
"The anti-smoking movement is hardly a grassroots phenomenon: It is largely funded by taxpayers and a few major foundations with left-liberal agendas."
Heartland Institute 2018:
“The association between (second hand) tobacco smoke and coronary heart disease and lung cancer may be considerably weaker than generally believed.
Heartland Institute 2018:
"There are many reasons to be skeptical about what professional anti-smoking advocates say. They personally profit by exaggerating the health threats of smoking and winning passage of higher taxes and bans on smoking in public places."
More:
Anti-smoking activists give smokers a stark choice: Stop smoking or die! In fact, there is a third path: reduce the harm by shifting to less-hazardous products that provide similar enjoyment
Litigation against the tobacco industry is an example of lawsuit abuse, and has “loaded the gun” for lawsuits against other industries.
Smoking bans hurt small businesses and violate private property rights.
Appeals to “protect the children” don’t justify the war being waged against adult smokers.
The hysterical, polemic, paranoid conspiratorial and desperate feigned "us against them" conservative alt-right wingnut ideological free marked fundamentalist libertarian Ayn Rand anti-government anti-regulation tax alarmism demagogy junk with its mandatory and predictable attacks on unwanted (climate) science and smear against scientists and competing green energy, filtered through think tanks and astroturf orgs by their wolf pack attackers, Opinion Piece writers, fake experts and their media-accomplices, all recycled by echo chamber denier blogs and You-Tube-videos by amateur deniers and boys room conspiracy drivlers and web-trolls,
-are really only a
sewer stream of cynical polluters industry self interests,
camouflaged as a political right / left struggle -drag queened in a convulsively socialist witch hunt, posing like its about the "people on the street", the workers (their gullible sheeple) and "the poor people of the world",
but the real agenda is
to legitimize the right to pollute for oil, gas and coal companies, and to argue for ever more tax cuts for the free marked fundamentalists who created them so they can continue to make shitloads of money by ruining public health and add to the damages of CC. Private corporations take the profit while the environment and public health takes the bill.
The rise of idiot America today represents - for profit mainly, but also and more cynically, for political advantage in the pursuit of power - the breakdown of a consensus that the pursuit of knowledge is a good. It also represents the ascendancy of the notion that the people whom we should trust the least are the people who best know what they are talking about. In the new media age, everybody is an expert."
Richard Hofstadter, who won a Pulitzer Prize in 1964 for his book, Anti-Intellectualism In American Life, describes
how the vast underlying foundations of anti-elite, anti-reason and anti-science have been infused into America's political and social fabric.
“The culture and our educational system have created a generation that has little experience being told they are objectively wrong. Everyone feels they are entitled to be right. Combine this with the illusion of knowledge provided by Google, and everyone thinks they are their own expert in anything.”
Its become tribal. Often its enough for the polluters to label environmental laws for “tax scams”, and their tribe will have another reason to hate the government.
Everything about the claim, “global warming (climate change) is a scam”, can be directly linked to fossil fuel front groups, think tanks and their echo chamber denier blogs.
Every singe time you follow the trail back, this is where you gonna end up. EVERY SINGLE TIME.
To some nonsense about how C02, their monetary crane and Holy Grail, is “good for us”. Everything the professional climate deniers have ever written about this matter, has this one purpose; to protect C02. To portrait C02 as “ a gift from God”.
They duped us with lead
They duped us with asbestos
They duped us with DDT
They duped us with nicotine
Are we gonna let the mighty polluters run us all over..AGAIN?
Carbon taxes are extremely effective. Why should pollution be free?
Put a price on pollution and the market will figure out ways to avoid the cost. A price is levied on each tonne of emissions from fossil fuel sources, be it from coal, natural gas, gasoline, etc. The tax has to be high enough to dissuade people from making choices that cause emissions in the first place.
Typically a carbon tax includes the following thing:
1. Taxes are collected from CO2 generators, ideally from every sector.
2. Typically 50% or more of the income is refunded back to tax payers (usually this is marketed as "a Carbon Dividend." The carbon dividend is sent to the bottom ~2/3's of the population by income. This arrives in the form of a monthly check. This helps make carbon taxes less regressive.
3. Remaining funds are spent on helping impacted groups adapt, and environmental programs. Note that a *$30*/ton carbon tax translates into an additional $0.25 cents per gallon. That's a big jump up in gas cost, so getting a $50 check every month to offset is helpful. What will happen, of course, is that people will look at that $50 check and want to keep as much of it to themselves, and will start looking for ways to cut back on gas, maybe buy an EV or an electric scooter, if their commute isn't too far.
Eleven teams participated in a detailed study called the Stanford Energy Modeling Forum (EMF) project, which examined the economic and environmental impact of an economy-wide carbon tax in the United States.
Every single team found the same result: not only does a carbon tax lead to substantially fewer emissions, it also could have long-term positive economic growth.
“At a broad level, the results are very unsurprising to me,” said Dale Beugin, executive director of Canada’s Ecofiscal Commission. “The consensus is that carbon tax is going to have a small economic impact, whether positive or negative.”
Claims that carbon pricing will lead to skyrocketing price increases throughout the economy are misplaced at best—and misleading at worst.
Alberta’s new carbon tax is US $15/tonne which adds about 25 cents to a gallon of gasoline. Overall it costs an average Albertan household US $110 to $150 annually and indirect costs will add an additional $60 to $75.
(Note article figures are in Canadian Dollars, I’ve converted them to USD)
But that's only half the story, 60% of Alberta's households would get monthly carbon dividend checks to cover the extra cost."
"Rebates that would begin flowing to lower- and middle-income Albertans in January, 2017, are meant to take the edge off the sting of the new carbon taxes. For example, a couple earning up to CAN$95,000 a year would receive CAN $300 annually, plus an additional CAN$30 a child.
The province expects that the 60 per cent of Alberta households that would receive the full, non-taxable rebate would have the “direct” costs of the carbon levy more than covered by the rebate system."
So what happens when you tax carbon and then give people a check to cover the difference? Well they still want to save money so they look for ways to reduce their gas use.
Innovation is the result.
Hint: EVs already cost *1/4* the cost per mile that gasoline and diesel do.
UK: "A carbon tax killed coal in the UK. Natural gas is next."
Many conservative groups back carbon taxes because they are a market-based approach to regulating pollutants:
A group of veteran conservative political leaders are launching a political-action committee to push for a U.S. carbon tax, a move potentially funded by several large corporations that could test Republican appetite to act on climate legislation.
More and more oil companies agree on anthropogenic global warming, carbon taxes and works to reduce emissions.
GCI is a voluntary, CEO-led initiative which aims to lead the industry response to climate change. Launched in 2014, OGCI is currently made up of ten oil and gas companies that pool expert knowledge and collaborate on action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Companies like Exxon, who knew about the dangers of global warming as early as the 1970s, have backed carbon taxes - it makes a lot of sense in some ways: it provides a predictable business environment and addresses global warming without regulatory overhead.
In the case of Exxon, they've invested heavily in natural gas which benefits in the short run as it pushes out coal and oil demand isn't much effected by carbon taxes today (but will be as EVs get cheaper).
Exxon, long accused of downplaying the threat of climate change, announced plans on Tuesday to donate $1 million over two years to a group urging Washington to enact a tax on carbon.
The donation to Americans for Carbon Dividends makes Exxon (XOM) the first American oil and gas supermajor to financially support the movement.
The decision reflects Exxon's desire to be viewed as part of a climate change solution, not the problem. Exxon realizes its early support could allow the company to shape legislation -- and prevent a more burdensome outcome from Washington.
“We are working with governments, businesses and organisations to set an effective price for carbon around the world.”
“An effective price for carbon emissions would incentivize the supply and use of lower carbon options, enabling the world to move faster to sustainable energy while meeting growing demand along the way. In Norway, Equinor already operates successfully with the highest carbon tax in the world—around USD 65 per tonne of CO2 Equinor has shown that it’s possible for oil and gas production to prosper in a world of high carbon price.”
Our oil and gas production on the Norwegian Continental Shelf is among the most carbon efficient in our industry.
The driver for this environmental performance is simple—the Norwegian government has set high standards and a high cost for emissions.
Karbondioksid reflekterer varmestråling, og mer av lavfrekvent stråling fra jorda enn høyfrekvent stråling fra sola. Mao "isolerer" CO2-laget bedre den ene veien enn den andre. Mer CO2 -> mer effektiv "isolasjon" -> Høyere temperatur
1. CO2 absorberer noen bølgelengder ekstremt effektivt. Fotoner med disse bølgelegdene absorberes av CO2-molekylet og nye fotoner med lignende bølgelengde sendes ut igjen i tilfeldig retning.
2. Fotonene med disse bølgelengdene beveger seg bare noen få meter mellom hver absorpsjon (fri veilengde) i nedre del av atmosfæren.
3. Tettheten (i molekyler/volum) av CO2 avtar oppver i atmosfæren siden trykket avtar. Når tettheten minker øker fri veilengde.
4. Når tettheten av CO2 blir lav nok blir fri veilengde lang nok til at fotoner sendt ut oppover unslipper til verdensrommet. Dette er eneste måten jorda kan avgi energi
5. Når konsentrasjonen av CO2-moelkyler i atmosfæren øker, går høyden strålingen unslipper til verdensrommet fra oppover.
6. Alle deler av jorda (bakken, hvert område i atmosfæren) stråler ut energi etter en lov som heter Stefan-Boltzmans lov som sier at utstrålt energi er proporsjonal med temperaturen opphøyd i fjerde (S=konstant*T^4). Varme ting stråler veldig mye mer effektivt enn kalde ting.
7. Temperaturprofilen i nedre del av atmosfæren (troposfæren) er (i hovedsak) bestemt av andre energitransportmetoder enn stråling (fordampning og kondensasjon av vanndamp spesielt)
8. Når CO2-konsentrasjonen øker jf. pkt. 5 blir energiutslippet fra jorda redusert siden det nye «unnslipningslaget» er kaldere enn det gamle og dermed stråler mindre effektivt.
9. Jorda mottar nå mer energi enn den stråler ut til verdensrommet. Dette går ikke over tid
10. Jordas overflate varmes opp og temperaturprofilen i atmosfæren endres slik at temperaturen ved unnslipningslaget øker nok til at energi ut igjen er lik energi inn.
11. Jorda er nå i energibalanse igjen med en høyere temperatur ved bakken.
Hvert CO2-molekyl har en levetid i atmosfæren på ca 5 år, men en CO2-perturbasjon har en mye lenger levetid, siden det tar svært lang tid for atmosfæren å oppnå ny likevekt med havet som er der det aller meste av perturbasjonen er nød
Energien til stråling er gitt ved E = hf, hvor er E er energi, h er en konstant (Plancks) og f er frekvensen. Siden h er en konstant, så er det frekvensen som avgjør hvor mye energi hvert foton av lyset har. Og siden frekvensen avgjør om det er synlig lys, infrarødt ("varme"), ultrafiolett, osv. betyr dette at fotoene har forskjell energi i de forskjellige typene stråling. Og "infrarød stråling" er som kjent ikke én bestemt frekvens, men et område med forskjellige frekvenser. Altså har man forskjellige energinivåer innenfor infrarød stråling også.
Elektronene i et molekyl har forskjellige, faste energinivåer de kan bevege av mellom. Jo større molekyl, jo flere nivåer, men poenget at dette er faste nivåer med én bestemt energiforskjell mellom.
Dersom det foton med en bestemt frekvens treffer et elektron, og dette fortonet har en energi som tilsvarer nøyaktig forskjellen mellom det energinivået elektronet befinner seg i og et høyere energinivå, så vil strålingen bli absorbert av elektronet. Energien i strålingen er nå "overført" til elektronet i molekylet, dette er nå "eksistert". (dette er også prinsippet for f.eks. UV-absorpsjonsmålinger, hvor molekyl absorberer stråling med én bestemt frekvens). CO2 har energinivåer som er tilpasset infrarød stråling. CO2 absorberer altså infrarød ("varme") fra jorden, men ikke synlig, UV, etc som kommer inn på jorden fra solen.
Molekylet med det eksisterte elektronet er nå litt mer ustabilt. Og det er forskjellige måter atomet kan håndtere denne ekstra energien (for CO2 er det vibrasjonsenergi, men det er ikke viktig). Poenget er at elektronet vil søke til et lavere, mer stabilt energinivå.
Når elektronet faller til et lavere nivå, og få elektronet vil få en lavere energi. Energi kvitter CO2 seg med i form av infrarød stråling.
Så kort sagt: Pga strukturen til CO2, så kan den absorbere og sende ut stråling i det infrarøde spekteret. Den "reflekterer" ikke strålingen som et speil.
CO2 danner ikke kjeder. Stråling er ikke påvirket av "plass"; den går i den retningen som den kommer ut fra strålingskilden.
Jordens overflate er varm. Den slipper ut infrarød stråling. Denne stråling blir absorbert av CO2. Deretter slippes CO2 ut igjen energien som stråling. Noe av dette går tilbake til jorden, og fortsetter å varme opp kloden
CO2 i atmosfæren ikke er ett enkelt lag, det er en gass som består av milliarder på milliarder av molekyler i atmosfæren, som dermed har en viss sjanse til å bli truffet av varmestrålingsfotoner fra jorden. Sjansen for at hvert enkelt moleky treffes er liten, men siden det er så mange blir sjansen betydelig.
Varme er energi. CO2 absorberer varme ved å dytte elektronene opp til et høyere energinivå. Deretter slippes energien ut igjen når elektronene faller ned til et lavere energinivå.
Det er kun molekyl som er dipol eller kan bli det gjennom eksitasjon av elektroner (absorpsjon av varme) som har denne effekten med å reflektere varmen. Dipoler kommer av at atomene i et molekyl drar på elektronene med forskjellig styrke, slik du det oppstår to ender av molekylet med litt forskjellig ladning (uten at det blir ion).
Hvis du googler et vannmolekyl, så ser du at det er en "V" form, med oksygen nede i bunnen og hydrogen i "føttene". Siden oksygen trekker mer på negative elektroner enn hydrogen, så vil det oppstå en liten negativ ladning på oksygen en en liten positiv ladning på hydrogen. Altså er molekylet enn dipol, og kan reflektere varme. Og derfor vanndamp er en drivhusgass.
Om du ser på et CO2 molekyl, så er det lineært O=C=O. Så selv om oksygen og karbon trekker ned ulik styrke på elektronene, vil det ikke oppstå noen dipol. Men, når et varme absorberes og et elektron i bindingene blir eksistert, forandres bindingen og symetrien i molekyl. Molekylet går i en V-form, kan lage en dipol. CO2 er derfor en drivhusgass.
Det blir feil å tenke at CO2 som er så lite av i atmosfæren ikke kan forårsake drivhusgassen. Det blir som å si at blåsyre ikke kan forgifte oss, siden det utgjør en veldig liten del av maten. Samme med gassene i atmosfæren. Både nitrogen og oksygen som utgjør mesteparten av atmosfæren, er begge diatomiske gasset, N=N og O=O. De kan ikke bli dipoler, og bidrar derfor ikke som klimagasser.
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CO2 does not form chains. Radiation is not affected by "space"; it goes in the direction it emanates from the radiation source.
The surface of the earth is warm. It emits infrared radiation. This radiation is absorbed by CO2. Then, CO2 is released back into the energy as radiation. Some of this goes back to earth and continues to warm the globe
CO2 in the atmosphere is not a single layer, it is a gas that consists of billions of billions of molecules in the atmosphere, thus having some chance of being hit by heat radiation photons from the earth. The chance of each molecule being hit is small, but since there are so many, the chance becomes significant.
The electrons in a molecule have different, fixed energy levels they can move between. The larger the molecule, the more levels, but the point that these are fixed levels with one particular energy difference between.
If the photon with a particular frequency strikes an electron, and this has an energy that exactly matches the difference between the energy level of the electron and a higher energy level, then the radiation will be absorbed by the electron. The energy of the radiation is now "transmitted" to the electron in the molecule, this is now "in existence". (This is also the principle of, for example, UV absorption measurements, where the molecule absorbs radiation of one particular frequency). CO2 has energy levels that are adapted to infrared radiation. Thus, CO2 absorbs infrared ("heat") from the earth, but not visible, UV, etc, which enter the earth from the sun.
The molecule with the existing electron is now slightly more unstable. And there are different ways the atom can handle this extra energy (for CO2 it is vibrational energy, but that's not important). The point is that the electron will search for a lower, more stable energy level.
When the electron falls to a lower level and get the electron will get a lower energy. Energy emits CO2 in the form of infrared radiation.
So in short: Due to the structure of CO2, it can absorb and emit radiation in the infrared spectrum. It does not "reflect" the radiation as a mirror.
Carbon dioxide reflects heat radiation, and more of low-frequency radiation from the earth than high-frequency radiation from the sun. Mao "isolates" the CO2 layer better one way than the other. More CO2 -> more efficient "insulation" -> Higher temperature
1. CO2 absorbs some wavelengths extremely efficiently. Photons with these waveguides are absorbed by the CO2 molecule and new photons of similar wavelength are emitted back in random order.
2. The photon with these wavelengths moves only a few meters between each absorption (free path length) in the lower part of the atmosphere.
3. The density (in molecules / volume) of CO2 decreases in the atmosphere since the pressure decreases. When density decreases, free path increases.
4. When the density of CO2 becomes low enough, free path length is long enough so that photons emitted upwards escape into space. This is the only way the earth can emit energy.
5. As the concentration of CO2 milk in the atmosphere increases, the height radiation escapes to space from upward.
6. All parts of the earth (ground, each area of the atmosphere) radiate energy according to a law called Stefan-Boltzman's law that radiated energy is proportional to the temperature elevated in the fourth (S = constant * T ^ 4). Warm things radiate much more effectively than cold things.
7. The temperature profile in the lower part of the atmosphere (troposphere) is (mainly) determined by other energy transport methods than radiation (evaporation and condensation of water vapor in particular)
8. When the CO2 concentration increases, cf. section 5, the energy emission from the soil is reduced since the new "abrasive layer" is colder than the old one and thus radiates less efficiently.
9. The Earth now receives more energy than it radiates to space.
10. The surface of the soil is heated and the temperature profile in the atmosphere changes so that the temperature at the abrasive layer increases enough so that energy out again is equal to energy in.
11. The soil is now in energy balance again with a higher temperature at the ground
“When we look at all the natural causes today - changes in energy from the sun, orbital cycles, natural cycles like El Nino, volcanic and other geologic activity - each and every one of those natural causes has an alibi”.
“According to natural factors, we should be cooling right now, not warming. So they can’t be responsible for our current warming trend.” (Climate scientist Katharine Hayhoe.)
The climate changes we have now are 20 times faster than the climate changes we had when leaving the last ice age. No natural changes can do this.
The changes are in the OPPOSITE direction to the slow cooling trend we were on. The planet should still be cooling. But we are rapidly warming.
Its not hard to spot the change of pattern; The moment when natural climate change became AGW! The huge blue spike to the right. It’s that obvious. WE have changed the natural slow cooling trend. If it was “climate has always changed and natural cycles, BOTH C02 LEVELS AND TEMPERARURE SHOULD GO DOWN NOW!!
Nature does what it does. Extra carbon dioxide, extra greenhouse effect. Extra greenhouse effect, higher mean global temperature. Its basic physics which follows the same principles as other laws of nature. The 10 Hottest Global Years on Record For 400 Months in a Row, the Earth Has Been Warmer Than 20th Century Average Last four years are 'world's hottest'
Some aspects of the science of AGW are known with near 100% certainty. The greenhouse effect itself is as established a phenomenon as any: it was discovered in the 1820s and the basic physics was essentially understood by the 1950s. CONTENT
The simple basic physics behind AGW
What the peer reviewed science says
Whats different with the climate change we have now?
The Sun and internal variablity
All temperature data shows the same warming trend
The Hockey stick
Consensus update
The Greenhouse effect and a history lesson
The who lags who “mystery” explained.
Links
Lets explain AGW in a few simple steps using only school science:
CO2 happens to have a special feature naturally. It absorbs heat radiation very effectively. It has to do with the vibratory and rotational properties of the molecule itself. The structure of their molecules makes them especially effective at absorbing heat radiation while the major atmospheric gases, nitrogen and oxygen, are essentially transparent to it. We can easily measure their properties in laboratories, and derive them from quantum physics.
That’s just how it is. Nature made that happen. That’s what basic physics tells us. This have been known since 1859.
It’s so trivial 5th graders can demonstrate GHE at home:
John Tyndall's experiments also showed that molecules of water vapor, carbon dioxide, and ozone are the best absorbers of heat radiation, and that even in small quantities, these gases absorb much more strongly than the atmosphere itself.
Iain Stewart demonstrates a simple experiment that shows that carbon dioxide absorbs infrared radiation. Scene from BBC's 'Earth: The Climate Wars' documentary:
2. Anyone can take out their spectroscopes and see with their own eyes that C02 traps heat that would otherwise escape into space.
Spectroscopy is a method of detecting elements by looking at how electromagnetic radiation passes through them. Different elements have electrons in orbits at varying energy levels, and this affects the way they resonate. It's the reason why neon lights produce different colors depending on what gases we fill them with. It's also the way we're able to tell what proportions of hydrogen, helium, and other elements are in distant stars: the spectrum of light coming from them has peaks and valleys that are chemical fingerprints of exactly what gases are in them.
“The Earth's surface is warmed by the sun, and as a warm globe in space, the Earth itself emits that same heat right back out, as infrared radiation. If we go outside and point a spectrometer at the sky, we can see there are peaks and valleys in the infrared spectrum. Some wavelengths of heat fly right out into space unhindered, while other wavelengths are absorbed by the atmosphere, and that heat stays there, where we're able to detect its wavelength with our spectrometer. And exactly the same way as we're able to identify the elements in a distant star, we're able to identify exactly which greenhouse gases are trapping the Earth's radiative heat. This is how we were able to identify those five main gases. And this isn't new; we've understood this for 200 years. It's a direct measurement that anyone with a spectrometer can reproduce. Not a model, not a prediction, not a guess.”
“Water vapor, which is the most prominent, defines the basic shape of the greenhouse spectrum. Most of the infrared radiation that escapes the Earth goes through a window left open by water vapor, which we call the infrared window. This window in the spectrum, which is pretty wide, is centered around a wavelength of about 10 µm (micrometers). At higher and lower wavelengths, water vapor absorbs much of the Earth's radiated heat, so the Earth has always relied on this open window in the spectrum to allow the excess heat to escape. One end of the infrared window is overlapped by CO2's absorption range, which is centered around 15 µm. The amount of CO2 in the atmosphere acts like a sliding door which widens or narrows the infrared window. As CO2 increases, the infrared window is narrowed, less radiation escapes into space, and more heat is absorbed by the atmosphere. At the other end of the infrared window, around 7.5 µm, methane has a similar effect, contributing about 1/4 as much warming as CO2.”
“Spectroscopy is hard science. We don't have to model or predict. Simply by pointing our instruments at the sky, we can, right now, directly observe and identify the greenhouse gases, and measure exactly how much radiative energy the atmosphere is absorbing and keeping here on Earth. This direct, non-ambiguous spectroscopic reading is the "smoking gun" that proves the excess heat energy being trapped in our atmosphere is due to CO2.” […] “Within that infrared window defined by water vapor, there is one big spike. It is the 15 µm range of CO2. This is explicit, unambiguous proof that the increased heat in our atmosphere is due to CO2. It has nothing to do with models or predictions; it is a direct observation, it is hard chemistry and basic physics, not guesswork or extrapolation.”
“As we burn fossil fuels, the CO2 in the atmosphere increases, the infrared window narrows, less heat radiates away from the Earth, and more heat goes into the Earth's system. These are simple, solid facts.Energy being trapped in the atmosphere corresponds exactly to the wavelengths of energy captured by CO2.”
3. HOW DO WE KNOW ITS OUR CO2 CAUSING THE WARMING?
The carbon in the atmospheric CO2 contains information about its source, so that scientists can tell that fossil fuel emissions comprise the largest source of the increase since the pre-industrial era.
The carbon from burning fossil fuels have a different isotope signal (radioactivity) than C02 coming from natural sources. Its like a fingerprint. Its the carbons "DNA". Its unique.
Here’s how scientists know.
“We can carbon date the CO2 in the atmosphere, and tell exactly how much of it comes from humans burning fossil fuels. It's a direct measurement. It leaves no room for interpretation”.
“The same elements (i.e. same number of protons in the nucleus) with different mass numbers (arising from the different numbers of neutrons in the nucleus) are called isotopes. Each carbon molecule has six protons in the nucleus, but there are many different isotopes with varying numbers of neutrons in the nucleus. Carbon isotopes from different sources are “lighter” (high negative value) or heavier (lower negative value). For example, carbon from ocean is the standard with a value of “0” while carbon from fossil fuels ranges from -20 to -32. While atmospheric carbon has an average value of -5 to -9, it is becoming “lighter” over time as carbon from fossil fuels become more abundant in the atmosphere.”
The Suess Effect is a term which has come to signify the decrease in 14C in atmospheric CO2 owing to admixture of CO2 produced by the combustion of fossil fuels. This term is here extended, as a concept, to the shifts in isotopic ratio of both 13C and 14C in any reservoir of the carbon cycle owing to anthropogenic activities.
Changes in the 13C/12C ratio of atmospheric CO2 are also caused by other sources and sinks, but the changing isotopic signal due to CO2 from fossil fuel combustion can be resolved from the other components (Francey et al., 1995).
http://bluemoon.ucsd.edu/publications/ralph/25_Partition.pdf
Additional confirmation that rising CO2 levels are due to human activity comes from examining the ratio of carbon isotopes found in the atmosphere. Carbon 12 has 6 neutrons, carbon 13 has 7 neutrons. Plants have a lower C13/C12 ratio than in the atmosphere. If rising atmospheric CO2 comes from fossil fuels, the C13/C12 should be falling. Indeed this is what is occurring (Ghosh 2003). The C13/C12 ratio correlates with the trend in global emissions.
Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2): NASA's New Carbon Counter
2. WHAT THE BEST PEER REVIEWED SCIENCE SAYS:
From about 1880 our C02 emissions started to dominate CC , and after 1950, according to scientists, humans ARE the dominant cause of CC.
Fourth National Climate Assessment (NCA4), Volume I peer reviewed by the National Academy of Sciences, the world’s most prestigious academy, founded by Abraham Lincoln, with over 200 Nobel Price winners among their members.
This report is an authoritative assessment of the science of climate change, with a focus on the United States. It represents the first of two volumes of the Fourth National Climate Assessment, mandated by the Global Change Research Act of 1990.
The 600 page report was created from input by scientists working at 13 different federal government agencies.
“Based on extensive evidence … it is extremely likely that human activities, especially emissions of greenhouse gases, are the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century,”
For the warming over the last century,
“there is no convincing alternative explanation supported by the extent of the observational evidence.”
“Anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions have increased since the pre-industrial era, driven largely by economic and population growth, and are now higher than ever. This has led to atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide that are unprecedented in at least the last 800,000 years. Their effects, together with those of other anthropogenic drivers, have been detected throughout the climate system and are extremely likely to have been the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century. {1.2, 1.3.1}”.
NASA: The evidence for rapid climate change is compelling:
The planet's average surface temperature has risen about 1.62 degrees Fahrenheit (0.9 degrees Celsius) since the late 19th century, a change driven largely by increased carbon dioxide and other human-made emissions into the atmosphere.
Most of the warming occurred in the past 35 years, with the five warmest years on record taking place since 2010. Not only was 2016 the warmest year on record, but eight of the 12 months that make up the year — from January through September, with the exception of June — were the warmest on record for those respective months.
OBSERVATIONS: First Direct Observation of Carbon Dioxide’s Increasing Greenhouse Effect at the Earth’s Surface
"the critical link between c02 concentrations and the addition of energy to the system, or the greenhouse effect [...] and further confirmation that the calculations used in today’s climate models are on track when it comes to representing the impact of CO2.”
3. Whats different with the climate change we have now?
1 degree C warming, in only a hundred years, is twenty times faster than the climate changes the Earth experienced when it thawed after the last ice age, and in the OPPOSITE direction to the natural slow cooling trend we were supposed to be on, and in the OPPOSITE direction to the natural slow cooling trend we were supposed to be on. The increase of atmosphere C02 from 280 ppm in 1880 to 407 ppm we have today, would normally take thousands of years. Its the highest C02 ppm for millions of years.
407 - 280 = 127 ( 127 / 280 ) * 100 = 45.36 %
45% of the C02 up there is ours now..
We see very rapid warming, in the OPPOSITE direction of the natural slow cooling trend. The increase is happening at a time when, naturally, carbon dioxide levels and temperature should be decreasing. THE RAPID INCREASE IN C02 SINCE THE POST INDUSTRIAL ERA WOULD NATURALLY TAKE THOUSANDS OF YEARS
For the 800,000 years we have records of, average global CO2 levels fluctuated between about 170 ppm and 280 ppm. Once humans started to burn fossil fuels in the industrial era, things changed rapidly.
Only in the industrial era has the number risen above 300 ppm. The concentration first crept above 400 ppm in 2013, and continues to climb.
Look at the spike and dramatic change of pattern to the right. Thats because of us.
Scientists debate the last time CO2 levels were this high. It might have happened during the Pliocene era, between 2 and 4.6 million years ago, when sea levels were at least 60 to 80 feet higher than today. It may have been in the Miocene, 10 to 14 million years ago, when seas were more than 100 feet higher than now.
In our 800,000-year record, it took about 1,000 years for CO2 levels to increase by 35 ppm. We're currently averaging an increase of more than 2 ppm per year, meaning that we could hit an average of 500 ppm within the next 45 years, if not sooner.
This is the smoking gun:
THE HUMAN INFLUENCE ON CLIMATE CHANGE IS SO STRONG WE ARE MAKING THE PLANET RAPIDLY WARM IN A TIME WHEN IT SHOULD BE SLOWLY COOLING!!
This study Climate variations analyzed five million years back in time
shows that the interglacial periods, like the one we are in now, are ALWAYS stable. So the rapid warming we see now in the OPPOSITE direction to the natural slow cooling trend, is very very unnatural. It got human fingerprints all over it.
4. THE SUN - AND INTERNAL VARIABILITY 3rd ROCK FROM THE SUN In the 1820s Joseph Fourier calculated that an object the size of the Earth, and at its distance from the Sun, should be considerably colder than the planet actually is if warmed by only the effects of incoming solar radiation.
If the sun is such a key driver of the Earth’s climate, then why has the entire planet (air, oceans, land, and ice) warmed rapidly over the past 60 years while solar activity has declined?
If the warming were caused by a more active sun, then scientists would expect to see warmer temperatures in all layers of the atmosphere. Instead, they have observed a cooling in the upper atmosphere, and a warming at the surface and in the lower parts of the atmosphere.
That's because greenhouse gases are trapping heat in the lower atmosphere. A very clear human fingerprint.
This phenomenon can only be attributed to the insulating effect of increasing greenhouse gases. Annual global temperature change (thin light red) with 11 year moving average of temperature (thick dark red). Temperature from NASA GISS. Annual Total Solar Irradiance (thin light blue) with 11 year moving average of TSI (thick dark blue). TSI from 1880 to 1978 from Krivova et al 2007 (data). TSI from 1979 to 2009 from PMOD.
"According to PMOD at the World Radiation Center there has been no increase in solar irradiance since at least 1978, when satellite observations began. This means that for the last thirty years, while the temperature has been rising fastest, the sun has not changed.” "Don't blame the sun for recent global warming. A new analysis, based on historical data rather than computer simulations, shows that our star's role in climate change has been vastly overtaken by other factors, particularly the human-induced buildup of greenhouse gases."
Global warming isn’t natural, and here’s how we know Both the timing and magnitude of today’s warming are well-explained by greenhouse gases.
This is why scientists conclude that humans are likely responsible for most of the warming of the last few decades. Greenhouse gases provide a reasonable explanation for the warming, while no other factor can explain the entire warming. The signals are coming from the planet itself: There are OBSERVED data from pollen, tree rings, ice cores, corals, glaciers withdrawal, polar ice melting, sea level rise, ocean temperature, ecological changes, Co2 levels in the atmosphere, the undeniable temperature increase globally. Do you think there is a another explanation for global warming which just happen to have exactly the same characteristics as an increase of C02 and the other greenhouse gases?
The other factors can’t make all the check marks:
Internal variability is the hardest to evaluate. We know that ENSO significantly changes the Earth’s temperature, and so long-term ENSO-like variation is something we have to consider. However, nobody has yet put forth a viable mechanism or shown data that such a long-term cycle exists. In the absence of any evidence supporting it, we conclude that it’s likely internal variability is playing a minor role in today’s warming. Clearly, future research might cause us to re-examine this conclusion.
"it's just a natural cycle" isn't just a cop-out argument - it's something that scientists have considered, studied, and ruled out long before you and I even knew what global warming was.
Natural cycles can only move heat around, as heat exchange within the oceans or from the oceans to the atmosphere. But now we see adding of heat both in oceans and the atmosphere. So the adding of heat to the energy budget we see now must come from somewhere else than natural cycles.
No credible study has suggested that ocean oscillations can account for the long-term trends. The key observation here is the increase in ocean heat content over the last half century (the figure below shows three estimates of the changes since 1955). This absolutely means that more energy has been coming into the system than leaving.
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2017/04/judy-currys-attribution-non-argument/#comment-677575
Now this presents a real problem for claims that ocean variability is the main driver. To see why, note that ocean dynamics changes only move energy around – to warm somewhere, they have to cool somewhere else. So posit an initial dynamic change of ocean circulation that warms the surface (and cools below or in other regions). To bring more energy into the system, that surface warming would have to cause the top-of-the-atmosphere radiation balance to change positively, but that would add to warming, amplifying the initial perturbation and leading to a runaway instability. There are really good reasons to think this is unphysical.
Remember too that ocean heat content increases were a predicted consequence of GHG-driven warming well before the ocean data was clear enough to demonstrate it.
Arctic sea-ice decline weakens the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation
We know that even when combined, natural causes cannot explain the current warming
We know that CO2 traps heat
We know that increasing CO2 causes more heat to be trapped
We know that CO2 was largely responsible for past climate changes
We know that we have roughly doubled the CO2 in the atmosphere
We know that the earth is trapping more heat now than it used to
We know that including anthropogenic greenhouse gasses in the models is the only way to explain the current warming trend
5 ALL TEMPERATURE DATA SHOWS THE SAME WARMING TREND All temperature data available, including ocean data and satellite data, shows the same warming of 1.1 C (2.0 F) since about 1880.
From the Berkeley Earth page:
Berkeley Earth has examined 16 million monthly average temperature observations from 43,000 weather stations...The weather station data is combined with sea surface temperature data from the UK Met Office’s Hadley Centre (HadSST). This ocean data is based on 355 million measurements collected by ships and buoys, including 12 million observations obtained in 2017.
Two long-term ocean-only temp series (with 95% conf. intervals) shows the same trend as weather stations and satellite data: http://www.realclimate.org/index... Isolated satellite data shows same trend as weather stations and ocean data:
For a long time the UAH satellite data showed less warming than all the other data, but this was due to a bug in the system. When this calibration error was fixed, the data showed the same warming as the other data.
Their trend is 0.13 C per decade. Very much in tune with all the other data.
In the same period, NOAA data shows a trend of 0.10 C per decade! Climate at a Glance
SATELLITE DATA ARE NOT MORE ACCURATE.
Satellites don't measure temperatures, they measure brightness.
Brightness is converted to temperatures via computer models.
The satellite record has 5 times the inaccuracy of the surface temperature record.
Satellites measure the brightness of the troposphere, thousands of feet in the air (where planes fly).
The surface temperature record measures the temperature at the surface, where people live.
EXPLAINED BY SENIOR SCIENTIST FOR RSS SATELLITE DATA, CARL MEARS.
Pick any nation of the world and check to see if their mets have a similar temperature trend to the global GISS temperature trend from NASA. BONUS. THE “PAUSE” THAT NEVER WAS
The 1998 year was an super strong El Nino year and temperatures would always flat out a bit after that. One explanation for the recent "slowdown" in global warming is that a prolonged La Niña-like cooling of eastern Pacific surface waters has helped to offset the global rise in temperatures from greenhouse gases.
They are one of the most respectable scientific academies and hold a very strong position world wide and in the US, all the way back since it was co-founded by Abraham Lincoln. As of 2016, the
National Academy of Sciences includes about 2,350 members and 450 foreign associates.
Since then the “Hockey Stick” is confirmed and improved by the 4 most comprehensive studies done on the matter:
2. 78 researchers from 24 countries, together with many other colleagues, worked for seven years in the PAGES 2k project on the new climate reconstruction. “2k” stands for the last 2000 years, while PAGES stands for the Past Global Changes program launched in 1991. Recently, their new study was published in Nature Geoscience.
It is based on 511 climate archives from around the world, from sediments, ice cores, tree rings, corals, stalagmites, pollen or historical documents and measurements. All data are freely available.
Most Comprehensive Paleoclimate Reconstruction Confirms Hockey Stick (Most Comprehensive
Paleoclimate Reconstruction Confirms Hockey Stick)
3. Planet Earth is warmer than it has been for at least 2,000 years, according to a study that took its temperature from 692 different “natural thermometers” on every continent and ocean on the planet.
The database gathers 692 records from 648 locations, including all continental regions and major ocean basins.
The records are from trees, ice, sediment, corals, speleothems, documentary evidence, and other archives. They range in length from 50 to 2000 years, with a median of 547 years, while temporal resolution ranges from biweekly to centennial.
4. Researchers reconstructed temperatures from fossil pollen collected from 642 lake or pond sites across North America -- including water bodies in Wyoming -- and Europe.[...]
The reconstructions indicate that evidence of periods that were significantly warmer than the last decade were limited to a few areas of the North Atlantic that were probably unusual globally. Shuman says results determined that the last decade was roughly 6.5 degrees Fahrenheit warmer today than it was 11,000 years ago. Additionally, the decade was at least one-half degree Fahrenheit warmer today than the warmest periods of that 11,000-year time frame, even counting for uncertainties, Shuman says.
“If any of the contrarians were a modern-day Galileo, he would present a theory that’s supported by the scientific evidence and that’s not based on methodological errors.
MORE AND MORE OIL COMPANIES AGREES ON AGW AND WORKS TO REDUCE GAS EMISSIONS. Its over.
Climate change skeptics have outlived their usefulness to the fossil fuel industry.
Climate deniers are like those japanese soldiers who was unaware that the war had ended 60 years ago.
GCI is a voluntary, CEO-led initiative which aims to lead the industry response to climate change. Launched in 2014, OGCI is currently made up of ten oil and gas companies that pool expert knowledge and collaborate on action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Every scientific body, org and institution of the world, every National Academy of Sciences of the world, over 99% of the peer reviewed papers + most oil companies ALL agree that AGW theory is a fact. And everything is supported by the principles of basic physics! List of Worldwide Scientific Organizations
ON THE CONSENSUS:
The consensus did not arise from a vote or a gathering. It speaks to the evidence. Scientists come to a consensus after a convergence of evidence leaves no significant doubt about a result. It happens a lot in science. There is a consensus that the speed of light is the universe's speed limit. Scientists didn't vote on that or gather to agree and find evidence to support that agreement. They came to a consensus after the research from multiple independent lines of evidence converged. The same process has taken place in climate science. Scientists didn't vote on the validity of AGW or come together and agree before the evidence came in. They came to a consensus based upon multiple independent lines of evidence converged to support AGW. The consensus among scientists is real, it is not based on popularity or voting, it is based on a convergence of multiple independent lines of scientific evidence.
“Science is never 100% settled - science is about narrowing uncertainty. Different areas of science are understood with varying degrees of certainty. For example, we have a lower understanding of the effect of aerosols while we have a high understanding of the warming effect of carbon dioxide. Poorly understood aspects of climate change do not change the fact that a great deal of climate science is well understood.”
Scientists are working on the details and are improving the knowledge database every day. New finding and corrections are happening on a daily basis. This is science at work, it doesn’t mean the main theory is wrong.
The scientific method does not produce, nor is meant to produce, absolute truths and knowledge, but increased knowledge. Such is the case - and so it must be - in climate research as for all other research. Major theories are generally always based on a large amount of smaller scientific findings. Because these little discoveries are made through the implementation of the scientific method, they makes the major scientific theories so robust and credible. In other words, there are infinite many filters, tests, corrections and objections until one gets a conclusion.
That humans contribute most to climate change with our C02 emissions is such a conclusion.
The opinion of any single individual scientist is irrelevant. Consensus matters in science. You will find individual scientist who dispute Einsteins Theory of General Relativity and that’s fine. That’s how science works, but the consensus holds until the evidence convinces otherwise.
“Skeptics often claim that the science of anthropogenic global warming (AGW) is not “settled”. But to the extent that this statement is true it is trivial, and to the extent that it is important it is false. No science is ever “settled”; science deals in probabilities, not certainties. When the probability of something approaches 100%, then we can regard the science, colloquially, as “settled”.
The theory of gravity is not “settled” either, but it will be regarded as settled until we see apples falling upwards.
The skeptics say that results must be double-checked and uncertainties must be narrowed before any action should be taken. This sounds reasonable enough – but by the time scientific results are offered up to policymakers, they have already been checked and double-checked and quintuple-checked. There is no cohesive, consistent alternative theory to human-caused global warming, Some blame global warming on the sun, others on orbital cycles of other planets, others on ocean cycles, and so on. There is a 97% expert consensus on a cohesive theory that's overwhelmingly supported by the scientific evidence, but the 2–3% of papers that reject that consensus are all over the map, even contradicting each other. The one thing they seem to have in common is methodological flaws like cherry picking, curve fitting, ignoring inconvenient data, and disregarding known physics.” “For AGW skeptics to overturn the consensus, they would need to find flaws with all the lines of supportive evidence and show a consistent convergence of evidence toward a different theory that explains the data. (Creationists have the same problem overturning evolutionary theory.) This they have not done.”
Professor Kerry Emanuel has been known for his "Show me the data!" approach to climate science. In this talk, he will present a long term, evidence-driven view of Earth's climate change, culminating in a discussion of current risks and implications.
Professor Emanuel is an award-winning meteorologist and climate scientist and the Cecil and Ida Green Professor of Atmospheric Science at MIT. His research focuses on tropical meteorology and climate, with a specialty in hurricane physics. Emanuel has a PhD from MIT, has been a faculty member since 1981 and has served as the Director of the Center for Meteorology and Physical Oceanography and the Program in Atmospheres, Oceans, and Climate. He is co-founder of the MIT Lorenz Center, which fosters creative approaches to fundamental science devoted to understanding how climate works. He was named one of Time Magazine's 100 Influential People who Shape Our World in 2006. In 2007, he was elected as a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences. He is an author of over 100 peer-reviewed scientific papers and two books, including What We Know about Climate Change, recently hailed by the NY Times as "... the single best thing written about climate change for a general audience."
8. A HISTORY LESSON - HOW LONG HAVE THERE BEEN CLIMATE SCIENCE?
Climate scientist Katharine Heyhoe:
THE GREENHOUSE EFFECT
In the 1820s Joseph Fourier calculated that an object the size of the Earth, and at its distance from the Sun, should be considerably colder than the planet actually is if warmed by only the effects of incoming solar radiation.
1859: John Tyndall discovers that some gases block infrared radiation. He suggests that changes in the concentration of the gases could bring climate change.
Tyndall's experiments also showed that molecules of water vapor, carbon dioxide, and ozone are the best absorbers of heat radiation, and that even in small quantities, these gases absorb much more strongly than the atmosphere itself.
"calculate estimates of the extent to which increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide increase Earth's surface temperature through the Arrhenius effect, leading David Keeling to conclude that human-caused carbon dioxide emissions are large enough to cause global warming"
Using 'Stefan's law' (better known as the Stefan-Boltzmann law), he formulated what he referred to as a 'rule'.
While other planets in Earth's solar system are either scorching hot or bitterly cold, Earth's surface has relatively mild, stable temperatures. Earth enjoys these temperatures because of its atmosphere, which is the thin layer of gases that cloak and protect the planet.
Step 1: Solar radiation reaches the Earth's atmosphere - some of this is reflected back into space.
Step 2: The rest of the sun's energy is absorbed by the land and the oceans, heating the Earth.
Step 3: Heat radiates from Earth towards space.
Step 4: Some of this heat is trapped by greenhouse gases in the
atmosphere, keeping the Earth warm enough to sustain life.
Step 5: Human activities such as burning fossil fuels, agriculture and land clearing are increasing the amount of greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere.
Step 6: This is trapping extra heat, and causing the Earth's temperature to rise.
"the critical link between c02 concentrations and the addition of energy to the system, or the greenhouse effect [...] and further confirmation that the calculations used in today’s climate models are on track when it comes to representing the impact of CO2.
There are non condensable gases and there are water vapour which rains out.
Water vapor doesn't accumulate, it rains out. What's accumulating, is CO2 and Methane. Water vapor *amplifies* the CO2 effect. But it doesn't accumulate like CO2 and Methane do. so it's not itself a driver of the changes we see. The amount of water vapor in the air is a function of temperature and pressure. As temperatures go up, the air will hold slightly more vapor, and that in turn traps more heat. The amount of vapor can be calculated using the Clausius-Clapeyron equations that are taught in 1st year physics.
“Without CO2 and the other non-condensing greenhouse gases ability to absorb infrared radiation, the terrestrial greenhouse would collapse and throw the global climate into an ice-bound state. Without the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, the mean temperature of the Earth would be down to -15 degrees Celsius (4 F) instead of + 15 degrees Celsius (59F).”
We humans release 37 billion tonnes of CO2 every year. How can such a “small” amount be important? The point is this: How much % CO2 is of the already very tiny atmosphere is a comparison that does not mean that much. Only the greenhouse gases can capture heat radiation. The rest of the atmosphere contributes to just taking over heat from CO2, water vapor and co.
CO2 is "least" effective as greenhouse gas per kg, yet the gas's contribution to global warming is greatest because the amount released by humans is many times greater than the amount of other greenhouse gases. CO2 accounts for about 60% of the man-made consolidation of greenhouse effect today.
The non-condensing greenhouse gases CO2, ozone, N2O (nitrous oxide), CH4 (methane) and chlorofluorocarbons account for 25% of the total terrestrial greenhouse effect, thus serving the stable temperature structure that maintains today's levels of atmospheric water vapor and clouds via feedbacks that account for the remaining 75% of the greenhouse effect.
Fun facts. 750 billion tons of C02 moves through the carbon cycle each year, but C02, the gas which is the main driver for the temperature that made and makes Earth habitable, is only 0.04% of the atmosphere.
And the total mass of ozone in the atmosphere is about 3 billion metric tons. That may seem like a lot, but it is only 0.00006 percent of the atmosphere. Still, ozone protects life on Earth from the Sun’s ultraviolet (UV) radiation.
“If there had been no increase in the amounts of non-condensable greenhouse gases, the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere would not have changed with all other variables remaining the same. The addition of the non-condensable gases causes the temperature to increase and this leads to an increase in water vapor that further increases the temperature. This is an example of a positive feedback effect. The warming due to increasing non-condensable gases causes more water vapor to enter the atmosphere, which adds to the effect of the non-condensables.”
If that claim is true, then we should see that the amount of IR leaving the planet has decreased over time, and that decrease should match the increase in CO2. That is, of course, exactly what satellite data show (Harries et al. 2001; Griggs and Harries 2007). The IR leaving the earth since the 70s has decreased, and that decrease matches the increase in CO2. This is a direct test of anthropogenic climate change and cannot be explained by anything other than our CO2 trapping heat.
“The earth’s climate is constrained by well-known and elementary physical principles, such as energy balance, flow, and conservation. Greenhouse gases affect the atmospheric optical depth for infrared radiation, and increased opacity implies higher altitude from which earth’s equivalent bulk heat loss takes place. Such an increase is seen in the reanalyses, and the outgoing long-wave radiation has become more diffuse over time, consistent with an increased influence of greenhouse gases on the vertical energy flow from the surface to the top of the atmosphere.”
“We have shown that longwave downward radiation flux increases at Earth's surface can be accurately measured, subdivided and explicitly explained and backed with model calculations as cloud-, temperature-, water vapour- and enhanced greenhouse gas radiative forcing effect. Radiative forcing - measured at Earth's surface - corroborate the increasing greenhouse effect.”
“The changes of the outgoing longwave radiation (OLR) in clear-sky conditions have been calculated using High Resolution Infrared Radiation Sounder (HIRS) observations from 1979 to 2004.[...] The observed increase in GHE is shown to be inconsistent with the control ensemble, indicating that anthropogenic forcings are required to reproduce the observed changes in GHE. Satellite-Based Reconstruction of the Tropical Oceanic Clear-Sky Outgoing Longwave Radiation and Comparison with Climate Models.”
When the Earth comes out of an ice age, the warming is not initiated by CO2 but by changes in the Earth's orbit. The warming causes the oceans to release CO2. The CO2 amplifies the warming and mixes through the atmosphere, spreading warming throughout the planet. So CO2 causes warming AND rising temperature causes CO2 rise. Overall, about 90% of the global warming occurs after the CO2 increase.
The reason has to do with the fact that the warmings take about 5000 years to be complete. The lag is only 800 years. All that the lag shows is that CO2 did not cause the first 800 years of warming, out of the 5000 year trend.
The other 4200 years of warming could in fact have been caused by CO2, as far as we can tell from this ice core data.
At least three careful ice core studies have shown that CO2 starts to rise about 800 years (600-1000 years) after Antarctic temperature during glacial terminations. These terminations are pronounced warming periods that mark the ends of the ice ages that happen every 100,000 years or so. Shakun et al 2012 (above) found clear evidence of temperature lagging CO2 by obtaining data from a higher number and more diverse areas of the globe.
There are numerous feedback mechanisms involved in climate change. In other words, one event can trigger another event, which triggers another event, etc. In this case, what happened in the past was that a small amount of warming (usually regional) from factors other than CO2 (such as Milankovitch cycles) caused the oceans to warm up and release the CO2 stored in them (Martin et al. 2005; Toggweiler et al. 2006; Schmittner and Galbraith 2008; Skinner et al. 2010). Then, that increase in CO2 caused the majority of the warming (Shakun et al. 2012). So CO2 was actually the major driver of past climate changes (Lorius et al. 1990; Tripati et al. 2009; Shakun et al. 2012).
