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Shareholders File First-Ever 'Carbon Bubble' Resolutions | InsideClimate NewsThe carbon bubble concept is relatively new, born out of a recent scientific paper that has united climate change activists and some in the financial community in a common pursuit: to rethink the value of investments in coal, oil and gas.
The paper, published in 2009 in Nature, said that at current rates of fossil fuel burning, the world could face catastrophic warming in as soon as a dozen years.
Dearth of Skilled Workers Imperils $100 Billion Projects - BloombergAfter spending years searching for enough crude to pump, the U.S. oil and natural gas industry now is struggling to find and pay for enough skilled workers to tap the abundant supply in shale rock, putting $100 billion in planned petrochemical projects at risk.
Engineers and similar professionals earned an average $183,000 to $285,000 in 2012 depending on their position and background, a 20 percent to 50 percent jump since 2009, NES Global Talent data show. Wages in energy and mining have grown at nine times the rate of all industries since 2008, and starting salaries for petroleum engineering graduates are about $98,000, up 9.7 percent since 2008, according to PayScale Inc.
East Anglia: Businesses urged to embrace the need for a low-carbon economy - Business - East Anglian Daily TimesLord Deben was delivering the keynote speech at the New Anglia Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) Green Economy Conference, taking place at Wherstead Park, near Ipswich.
He told the audience of more than 200 delegates that the science behind climate change was “as sure as any science can be” and that those who styled themselves as climate change sceptics – who he preferred to call “climate change deniers” – were only sceptical about those facts which were inconvenient.
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Climate change deniers argued that the changes required in switching to a low carbon economy were too expensive when, in fact, they represented the most cost effective way of meeting the economic challenges of our time, said Lord Deben.
Claimate change was “the biggest threat but also the biggest opportunity that any generation has ever had”, he concluded.
Lizards facing mass extinction from climate changeBy analysing this evolutionary transition in the lizards' reproductive modes and projecting the future impact of climate change, the scientists discovered that increasing temperatures in the species' historically cold habitats would result in their areas of distribution being significantly reduced. As a consequence, if global warming continues at the same rate, viviparous lizards are facing extinction in the next few decades.
Why windfarms get paid to switch off | Carbon BriefBetween 2011 and 2012, National Grid says constraint payments to windfarms were just over ten per cent of the total amount paid to all generators - about £34 million.
Windfarms produce less than five per cent of our electricity so the payments they are getting are out of proportion to the amount of electricity they generate.
Twitter / clim8resistance.@ret_ward's extreme view #3: Grantham is the only oil multi-millionaire allowed to use his oil money to influence debate @mehdirhasan
Twitter / clim8resistance.@ret_ward's extreme view #4: Anyone who disagrees with Bob Ward has already been debunked, a priori. @mehdirhasan
Twitter / clim8resistance.@ret_ward's extreme view #2: people should be allowed to say things in media only if it agrees with official climate policy. @mehdirhasan
Time to forget global tipping points - 06 March 2013 - New ScientistOthers, like me, are convinced that no theoretical or empirical evidence exists for such a claim, and that a widespread belief in the existence of such a point of no return threatens to push ecological science and its application in the wrong direction.
Most Insurers Lack a Plan to Address Climate Change, Ceres Says - BloombergAlmost 90 percent of insurance companies lack a comprehensive plan to address climate change and fewer than half of them view it as a likely source of financial losses, according to a report released today.
Only 23 of 184 insurers surveyed demonstrated a “comprehensive climate change strategy” and 88 said they consider climate change a future loss driver, Boston-based Ceres said today in a report.
The Real Winners Of The Global Economy: The Material Boys | Joel KotkinSomething strange happened on the road to our much-celebrated post-industrial utopia. The real winners of the global economy have turned out to be not the creative types or the data junkies, but the material boys: countries, states and companies that have perfected the art of physical production in agriculture, energy and, remarkably, manufacturing.
The strongest economies of the high-income world (Norway, Canada, Australia, some Persian Gulf countries) produce oil and gas, coal, industrial minerals or food for the expanding global marketplace. The greatest success story, China, has based its rise largely on manufacturing. Brazil has been powered by a trifecta of higher energy production, a strong industrial sector and the highest volume of agricultural exports after the United States.
Things are really looking up for the material boys here in North America.
'Climate alarmists latch on to every passing hurricane, tornado, rainstorm, drought, heat wave, snowstorm, drizzle and passing cloud as evidence of the need for legislation to bring weather under control'Kerry’s global warming crusade
Hayhoe : All Phenomena Are Now Man-Made | Real Science
University Of Colorado Academics Making Up Crap As They Go Along | Real ScienceOh, please …. there is no trend in Colorado snowfall. These idiots have absolutely no idea what they are talking about.
- Bishop Hill blog - The ethics of global warming policyReader Gareth sends this report of last night's debate on the ethics of global warming policy.
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I'd expected this to be a bit of a greenfest with Lindzen as the token denier but it wasn't at all. The panel was quite balanced in representation of "warmist" and "denier" viewpoint as was the audience, and it was quite a civilized affair
California to quantify UHI statewide | Watts Up With That?We intend to produce a tool that can be mapped at the census tract level or smaller, and that enables state and local agencies to identify the areas that are most affected and quantify the benefits of heat island reduction measures.
Roy Martin: How do the planets affect the Sun? | Tallbloke's TalkshopTo summarize: the synodic periods between the planets are shared between their gravitational and tidal influneces on the Sun, but whereas the Jupiter-Saturn relationship dominates SIM, Venus-Earth-Jupiter relationships dominate the tidal effects. [I wonder if those Fortran climate models correctly represent every one of these influences, along with correctly modeling all of their interactions with every other factor?]
ICECAPRutger’s monthly snow data is in. November was 5th snowiest, December was the snowiest ever, January the 6th snowist and February 16th snowiest.
Twitter / ret_ward: .@mehdirhasan But why have ... Bob Ward @ret_ward .@mehdirhasan Yet another example of the media hosting a falsely balanced debate about climate science instead of covering the real issues.
Mehdi Hasan Mehdi Hasan @mehdirhasan @ret_ward 1) Not true at all. Its not a 'balanced debate'. Its a fair but tough interrogation of his views. I'm not neutral on this.
Bob Ward Bob Ward @ret_ward .@mehdirhasan But why have you made Lindzen the focus of the debate? He no longer contributes to the science and is irrelevant to policy.
Mehdi Hasan Mehdi Hasan @mehdirhasan @ret_ward But he's not irrelevant to the world, is he? You (and me) not liking his views doesn't make him disappear, does it? Or his claims?
Mehdi Hasan Mehdi Hasan @mehdirhasan @ret_ward Which 'sceptic' would you like me to interview? He's more credible than the rest. Or is your position, no intvs with them, ever?
Ben Pile Ben Pile @clim8resistance Oh, look, Bob Ward @ret_ward trying to close down debate and discussion again. The self-appointed censor has no shame. @mehdirhasan
Richard Lindzen - Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaRichard Siegmund Lindzen (born February 8, 1940) is an American atmospheric physicist and Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Lindzen is known for his work in the dynamics of the middle atmosphere, atmospheric tides and ozone photochemistry. He has published more than 200 scientific papers and books.[1] He was a lead author of Chapter 7, 'Physical Climate Processes and Feedbacks,' of the IPCC Third Assessment Report on climate change.
A $5 million lawsuit claims Gore was "adamant" about not selling his network to oil-rich Qataris but had a "change of heart," then stiffed the man who came up with the idea for the deal.
Lake Effect: Sustainability Superstar James Hansen Slated for Milwaukee Talk on Climate Change"I won't say it's like going to hear Einstein," says Stone, an MATC instructor of natural science, "but you know, it's not far behind. When you have such a prominent person, such a renowned and respected and celebrated scientist coming here to Milwaukee, see him. I mean, it's the chance of a lifetime."
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"When the coral reefs start dying off... that's a very serious warning," he says. "This is more than a single canary dying in the coal mine. The coral reefs around the world are leaching and dying, this is really serious."
Europe to cut power of vacuum cleaners to save energy - TelegraphThe cleanliness of Britain's homes is being threatened by European bureaucrats who want to reduce the power of vacuum cleaners in a bid to cut energy use.
As the climate warms, skiers can kiss their Aspen goodbye | Grist“It’s a tough reality to swallow,” Elizabeth Burakowski, a PhD candidate in snow science at the University of New Hampshire, told me. “It’s bad for business.”
Least Effective Global Warming Propaganda Ever? - YouTube
Arrhenius Revisited | Digging in the ClayIf there was any validity to Fig. 3 the CO2 concentration would have been 8 halvings lower than today or 1 part per million. The Vostok ice cores show that the CO2 concentration never fell below 190 ppm. This failure is beyond spectacular.
THE HOCKEY SCHTICK: Settled science: New paper challenges climate science consensus on winds & rainfallA new paper published in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics finds that "condensation and evaporation merit attention as major, if previously overlooked, factors in driving atmospheric dynamics," including winds and rainfall. “This paper is really trying to bring the physics to formal attention of the climate scientists,” according to co-author Douglas Sheil. “We are asking them to disprove this theory and so far no one has been able to do that.”
The paper finds that forests themselves are a significant factor in causing rainfall which "opens up a lot of potential to improve rainfall in dry areas through reforestation." If true, the atmospheric model the scientists have developed “could revolutionize the way we understand local climates, and their vulnerability, with many major implications,” according to the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), which participated in the new study.
Blue Jays: Cold snap puts chill on spring training in Florida | Toronto StarSunday’s 6C low was the second-coldest temperature in the area since 1999; Wednesday’s low was 7C. The normal low for this time of year is around 15C.
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Weather experts say it’s just a little cold snap, not a record-low by any means.
“I don’t know, man,” said Ricky Romero, who was wearing multiple layers as he returned to the warm clubhouse after Wednesday morning’s workout. “It’s never felt this cold here.”
Global Warming Report: By End of Century, Sea Will Rise 0.66 Feet--Or 6.6 Feet | CNS News(CNSNews.com) – An Obama administration-commissioned report predicts that because of climate change the global sea level will rise somewhere between 0.66 feet and 6.6 feet by the year 2100, citing a "lack of knowledge" as the reason for such a wide range of levels.
Bora 1, Climate Denialist Kooks 0 » PharyngulaThis is really a thing of beauty: climate pseudoscientist Willis Eschenbach whines at the inadvertent comedy blog Watt’s Up With That that Bora Zivkovic has been moderating comments on his SciAm blog.
Eschenbach, who’s also a Mass Extinction denialist, objects to Bora’s having instituted some basic anti-troll measures at A Blog Around The Clock that relegate comments with certain field marks of the climate denialist loon to the spam bin. Says Bora, in a passage that apparently made Eschenbach’s cranial temperature spike like a Warmist hockey-stick graph...
Michael Mann Says Climate Change is About Our Children's Future Planet | DeSmog Canada"We are obviously going to need to incentivise that shift away from fossil fuels, both in American and in Canada," Mann says, mentioning carbon tax and cap and trade legislation as popular considerations on this front.
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He adds, "I stop short of trying to proscribe policy..."
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"To me more than anything else it's a debate about what kind of world we leave for our children."
How climate change worsened violence in Syria | Grist International security experts are now looking at the connection between recent droughts in the Middle East and the protests, revolutions, and deaths that followed, and building a body of evidence to suggest that climate change played a key role in Syria’s violence and the Arab Spring generally.
Obama’s Choice: Ethical Energy Or 'The Devil’s Excrement' | ThinkProgress (In an earthier metaphor, Juan Pablo Perez Alfonzo, the Venezuelan diplomat who helped create OPEC, called oil “the devil’s excrement.”)
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The same spirit that drove oil exploration in the United States needs to drive our transition to renewable energy. We don’t need Keystone. We need to wildcat the sun.
-– William Becker is executive director of the Presidential Climate Action Project.
On the Art of Climate Change [Hoax] Communication | Orion Magazine[M. Sanjayan, a Nature Conservancy lead scientist and CBS News contributor] I’m writing this from Santiago, Chile—a vibrant, modern city of about six million people nestled into a verdant valley in the Southern Andes. I’m here to film part of an upcoming Showtime series on climate change called Years of Living Dangerously, and I just came back from an expedition to the receding Tupungatio glacier—the source for the main river that feeds and waters Santiago—accompanying Dr. Paul Mayewski of the University of Maine, one of the foremost experts on glacial ice cores and abrupt climate change.
In a perverse way, my timing couldn’t be better, because just a couple of weeks ago something drastic happened in Santiago: The city lost its water supply for two days. Several million people woke up, turned on their taps, and watched incredulously as they dribbled dry. And climate change was almost certainly a factor.
...The Showtime project I am working on aims directly at emotional content, the prime motivator for action.
Giant ancient camel remains discovered in Canadian Arctic | National PostSlight changes in the Earth’s orbit are believed to have triggered a global temperature rise of two to three degrees about 3.5 million years ago. Due to poorly understood feedback mechanisms in the climate system, the warming was greatly amplified in the Arctic with temperatures on Ellesmere rising 14 to 22 C, allowing the forests — and camels — to move north.
[Related comment by Hilary Ostrov] | Climate Etc.Can you imagine how distraught Hansen, Holdren, Ehrlich and their ilk – not to mention the alarmist denizens in our midst – would have been had they lived 3.5 million years ago – when there were camels in the Canadian Arctic?
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But no doubt, if the Earth’s orbit is still changing en route, and if Mother Nature continues on her merry way, doing her own thing in her own good time, human-generated CO2 will trump any possible impact either of these could have, right?!
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