Anyone that references the Heritage Foundation as a source automatically forfeits all credibility.

TFA: Is a war on carbon dioxide the answer?

But of course. We can pattern it after the wildly successful war on drugs...Soon to enter it's 4th decade.

Can we manage to discuss what (if anything) the Bill will actually do to reduce emissions? Rather than arguing over who's got the bigger graph?

No. Oh, well.

I guess it'll do as much as the good ol' European cap-and-trade scheme.

This guy has a Bachelor of Science Degree in Meteorology from Northern Illinois University. Clearly he is the one to listen to national climate change policy.

The whole issue is something we can ignore, it's not like we'll see change in the environment anywhere near as fast as we'd be impacted financially.

And yes, I am serious.

Ofcourse Solar Cycles have nothing to do with it.

Ofcourse the fact that, geologically, we are at the tail end of the last ice age has nothing to do with it.

Ofcourse the fact that the eruption of Mt Saint Helen's released more CO2 than every human in history has no bearing on this.

It is all the Evil SUV's Fault.... We should all go back to living in mud huts and having no power, heat or AC.

Its for the Children.....

I trust the future of my planet to someone named The_Ancient... a name like that makes one think of the stability of a rock.

opiumpoopy: Can we manage to discuss what (if anything) the Bill will actually do to reduce emissions? Rather than arguing over who's got the bigger graph?

No. Oh, well.

I guess it'll do as much as the good ol' European cap-and-trade scheme.

The cap-and-trade system for reducing emissions that cause acid rain that was set up by George H.W. Bush was very successful.

Europe's system didn't work well in Phase I because it was too lenient -- there's always a balancing act in terms of any emission trading system, because it you issue too few credits, it's impossible to make the cap, and if you issue too many, there's no scarcity so there's no economic pressure. Europe issued too many credits in Phase I, mainly because each country issued its own, and some countries over-issued to help their industry. Plus, at the beginning, they erred on the side of caution, as there's more immediate danger from capping too low versus capping too high.

In Phase II, they'll allocate credits centrally, give fewer credits for free, and reduce how many credits they issue.

Cap and trade is overall a very efficient way to reduce any undesirable emission. It uses market forces to optimize the reduction -- if you set a cap that is X% lower than current levels, market forces will tend to find the cheapest place to cut X% of emissions and cut there.

Myths... regurgitated

1. We can't trust computer models of climate

2. Ice cores show CO₂ increases lag behind temperature rises, disproving the link to global warming

3. The lower atmosphere is cooling, not warming

and

It's all a conspiracy

4. Global warming stopped in 1998

The_Ancient: Ofcourse Solar Cycles have nothing to do with it.

Myth:It's all down to cosmic rays

Ofcourse the fact that, geologically, we are at the tail end of the last ice age has nothing to do with it.

Ofcourse the fact that the eruption of Mt Saint Helen's released more CO2 than every human in history has no bearing on this.

Myth: Human CO₂ emissions are too tiny to matter

It is all the Evil SUV's Fault.... We should all go back to living in mud huts and having no power, heat or AC.

Its for the Children.....

Myth: We can't do anything about climate change

I can do this all day people...

It's the end of June and we haven't had one really hot day yet here in the NY area, how do you hot shot scienticians explain that ? Global WARMING ?

There's nothing even happening. And if there was it'd be a volcano's fault, not ours. Let the volcano pay more taxes.

Arguing science is pointless - what is beyond question is that the President's energy plan is a bad plan because it doesn't even attempt to strike a balance between environmental protection and the needs of the business community. Obama is going to artificially raise the costs of energy production and use in a weak economy. This *will* hamper any economic recovery efforts. It is beyond question or argument. THAT is the only thing we should be discussing....just how much economic hardship are we willing to endure in order to keep the planet green? How many people do we want to keep unemployed? how many homeless people will we shelve in public assistance over this energy policy?

And in the end, this policy won't actually help the environment. In order for this to work, you need to have EVERYONE sign on board to these restrictions. And there is nothing to force China and India into compliance. In fact, if I were China and India, I'd be slipping funding to the eco-nuts to lobby US legislators to vote in favor of this energy policy legislation - helping the US to destroy it's industrial base in the middle of our worst recession since the Carter years can ONLY help their economy and financial positions.

Then there's the fact that the only real effect to all of this will be to drive any remaining corporations out of this country (along with all their jobs). So we won't even slow down the rate of pollution, we'll just accelerate our fiscal hardship(s). Jobs will bleed out of this country, corporations will STILL pump out massive levels of pollution because they're basing manufacturing facilities in countries that aren't going to EVER pass environmental protection laws like this one. And once those corporations leave, there goes our last way to influence their behavior at all.

Dancin_In_Anson: TFA: Is a war on carbon dioxide the answer?

But of course. We can pattern it after the wildly successful war on drugs...Soon to enter it's 4th decade.

Soon it will enter it is 4th decade? Excuse me while I don't listen to you.

I produce a lot of methane. Can I apply for some cap and trade credits?

The_Ancient: Ofcourse Solar Cycles have nothing to do with it.

They play some role -- solar emissions account for about 30% of the recent warming. It's not nearly enough to account for all of it.

Ofcourse the fact that, geologically, we are at the tail end of the last ice age has nothing to do with it.

No, we're not. The last glacial (technically, there are many glacials and interglacials in an ice age -- we're still in an ice age) ended around 11,500 years ago. The prior interglacial was around 17,000 years long, and the interglacials have been getting consecutively shorter, so we're probably due for another glaciation in under 5,000 years or so. In any event, we're past the interglacial optimum (the temperature peak of an interglacial) which was between about 8,000 and 3,000 years ago. Temperatures should be slowly cooling on the way to the next period of glaciation.

Ofcourse the fact that the eruption of Mt Saint Helen's released more CO2 than every human in history has no bearing on this.

No, it didn't. Volcanoes actually release much less CO2 than humans. They release primarily SO2 which is a cooling gas.

Let's say that ALL of the material that was expelled from Mt. St. Helens was pure coal. It would be about 3.8 billion metric tons of carbon, or about 14 billion metric tons once it combined with oxygen to make CO2. That's about the same as what humans release every seven months.

Plus, there's a simple way that you can see that volcanoes aren't releasing any appreciable amount of CO2:


Notice what you don't see on that graph. You don't see Mt. St. Helens in 1980. You don't see El Chichón in 1982. You don't see Mt. Pinatubo in 1991 -- and that was the largest eruption in eight decades.

It is all the Evil SUV's Fault.... We should all go back to living in mud huts and having no power, heat or AC.

Nobody's saying we should be Luddites. The technology is out there, or can be reasonably developed, to drastically reduce our carbon footprint. Carbon capture technologies that can be added to existing power plants are -- at least in the best case -- up to 90% effective at removing CO2. And the sooner we make the transition away from fossil fuels, the better off we'll be in the long run, because the day WILL come when they run out, and the better prepared we are, the easier that day will be.

We're all familiar with the relationship between pirates and global warming. But did you know...

Nevermind whether or not climate change is man-made or not, a 300-page amendment was made to the bill in the dead of night..errr...morning and none of the congrescritters has even read it.

Weaver95: the President's energy plan is a bad plan because it doesn't even attempt to strike a balance between environmental protection and the needs of the business community.

There is no such thing as 'the business community'. Some businesses are going to do better under Obama's plan, some neutral, some worse. That's what happens when we have industries relying on outdated and unsustainable technology.

Weaver, when you paint in those broad strokes you invalidate your opinion.

dj_bigbird: Nevermind whether or not climate change is man-made or not, a 300-page amendment was made to the bill in the dead of night..errr...morning and none of the congrescritters has even read it.

kinda makes you wonder what's in those pages...

Sum Dum Gai: Cap and trade is overall a very efficient way to reduce any undesirable emission. It uses market forces to optimize the reduction -- if you set a cap that is X% lower than current levels, market forces will tend to find the cheapest place to cut X% of emissions and cut there.


This is what I always thought. Global warming aside (since I don't think we know accurately enough how much effect CO2 is having, combined with a low ability to control other countries outputs, means that to me I don't want to go nuts spending based on global warming as the ultimate cause), it always seemed to me that cap and trade is a very effective way to reduce total pollutants.

I understand that the republican agenda is to pretend global warming doesn't exist, and that the liberal agenda to many is to make global warming out to be the single most imminent threat to mankind, but reducing pollution is still a good thing. It is sillier to assume that massively increasing the CO2 levels will have no effect than it is to assume they will have a significant one. Any true person who calls themselves conservative should have at least some concern for the environment and should appreciate the economic policy of cap and trade because instead of laying down massive government restrictions without regard for the market, it instead uses the invisible hand to guide people. Instead of directly fighting every business out there, it just changes the course of the business racetrack a bit so they want to zig instead of zag.

/assuming its set at an appropriate level.

/hasn't read the current bill in question, too lazy.

Weaver95: kinda makes you wonder what's in those pages...

I'll bet they stuck funding for the government internment camps in there. Sneaky bastards.

Gregory D I'm with you, buddy. The world's coral reefs are dying due to increased acidity from carbon dioxide.

Most of these yahoos have probably never seen real evidence with their own eyes. It's nothing short of terrifying.

For the people, by the people and of the people.


We won.

I love it when people think they are smart enough to manage the entire world's ecosystem. Yes, sir, your bachelor's degree from State-U certainly makes you more qualified than Mother Nature herself. There is no chance what-so-ever that your efforts will simply compound problems by throwing more and more systems out of the wonderful balance they have existed in for billions of years, without your help.

/Smarmy Liberal Hubris

GregoryD: The_Ancient: Ofcourse Solar Cycles have nothing to do with it.

Myth:It's all down to cosmic rays

Ofcourse the fact that, geologically, we are at the tail end of the last ice age has nothing to do with it.

Ofcourse the fact that the eruption of Mt Saint Helen's released more CO2 than every human in history has no bearing on this.

Myth: Human CO2 emissions are too tiny to matter

It is all the Evil SUV's Fault.... We should all go back to living in mud huts and having no power, heat or AC.

Its for the Children.....

Myth: We can't do anything about climate change

I can do this all day people...

How about something that has been in a respectable peer reviewed journal instead of something that put "Darwin was wrong" on their cover.

shastacola: Weaver95: kinda makes you wonder what's in those pages...

I'll bet they stuck funding for the government internment camps in there. Sneaky bastards.

right now 15 states can't make their unemployment benefit payments without loans from the Federal government. By 2010 that number is expected to double. And in the middle of all this, we're going to artificially jack up the price of energy use and production.

It's a stupid plan, and we all know it.

Dancin_In_Anson: TFA: Is a war on carbon dioxide the answer?

But of course. We can pattern it after the wildly successful war on drugs...Soon to enter it's 4th decade.

I'd argue that the war on drugs has been very successful. Having an end game was never part of the plan.

Notabunny: We're all familiar with the relationship between pirates and global warming. But did you know...

I like that :)

Weaver95: It's a stupid plan, and we all know it.

When this plan sails through and the sky doesn't fall in 2010, will you admit that you were really hyperbolic today?

This is the most important policy change yet. And one I welcome wholeheartedly. It has brought the reactionaries out in force, but simply put there is no better way to both reduce oil use and develop alternatives -- and the opposition, who has so far claimed gloom and doom ad-nauseum, has no alternative.

subby, the entirety of the scientific community seems to disagree with you. (oil company whores need not apply)

Sum Dum Gai: Notice what you don't see on that graph. You don't see Mt. St. Helens in 1980. You don't see El Chichón in 1982. You don't see Mt. Pinatubo in 1991 -- and that was the largest eruption in eight decades

I would like to see that graph with a line for "power produced by nearby power plants" but I can't find the data. The line is very close to the local population growth. The Mauna Loa high altitude CO2 readings don't agree with the ones the Aussies and Kiwis do in the Pacific.

Weaver95: dj_bigbird: Nevermind whether or not climate change is man-made or not, a 300-page amendment was made to the bill in the dead of night..errr...morning and none of the congrescritters has even read it.

kinda makes you wonder what's in those pages...

I agree with you on this much. This is certainly not a bill that needs rushing. Changing one country's emissions a month sooner should have very little overall effect on things.

Weaver95: It's a stupid plan, and we all know it.

That's your assertion on faith.

Weaver95: Arguing science is pointless - what is beyond question is that the President's energy plan is a bad plan because it doesn't even attempt to strike a balance between environmental protection and the needs of the business community. Obama is going to artificially raise the costs of energy production and use in a weak economy.

It does strike a balance, especially because 85% of the credits are given out freely, a strong concession to industry and a departure from his original proposal.

Further, while SOME energy production will be raised in cost, other energy production will be artificially lowered in cost. A cap-and-trade system is cost-neutral over the entire nation; one company's expenses must become other companies' profit, because for there to be a buyer there must be a seller too.

Electricity production especially is poised to make a killing on the carbon trading system. It emits a large amount of CO2 and there are ways to reduce those emissions substantially.

This *will* hamper any economic recovery efforts. It is beyond question or argument. THAT is the only thing we should be discussing....just how much economic hardship are we willing to endure in order to keep the planet green?

That's the other benefit of cap-and-trade -- it minimizes the overall economic cost compared to any straight regulation scheme. It utilizes market forces to optimize the reduction strategy to become lowest cost.

And in the end, this policy won't actually help the environment. In order for this to work, you need to have EVERYONE sign on board to these restrictions.

We're one of the top producers of CO2 overall, and we're THE top producer per capita. We could make a large difference even if we did so unilaterally.

DarnoKonrad: Weaver95: It's a stupid plan, and we all know it.

That's your assertion on faith.

He had some valid points there. He exaggerated the hell out of them, but the argument that the US alone can't fix everything, and that a downturn in the economy may not be the best time to make this change are both points worth bringing up and looking at.

GregoryD: This guy has a Bachelor of Science Degree in Meteorology from Northern Illinois University. Clearly he is the one to listen to national climate change policy.

I'm on my way to a B.S. in Meteorology (but not from NIU), and I will be the FIRST to say that you should not trust a meteorologist when it comes to climate. You need a climatologist.

/Applies to both sides of debate

DarnoKonrad: This is the most important policy change yet. And one I welcome wholeheartedly. It has brought the reactionaries out in force, but simply put there is no better way to both reduce oil use and develop alternatives -- and the opposition, who has so far claimed gloom and doom ad-nauseum, has no alternative.

They want to put up windmills off the Jersey shore, they have even already started leasing the land to companies to build them.....but the environmental lobby is blocking it because birds might hit the windmills and get all chopped up and stuff.

So they want a couple decades to do a study of the environmental impact.

Why do environmentalists love oil and coal powered electrical generating stations.


Why can't they refer to other studies that were done in places that have been using windmills for 20+ or so years now.

Seabon: subby, the entirety of the scientific community seems to disagree with you. (oil company whores need not apply)

That's cleverly set up. Anyone who disagrees is trying to get Big Oil money (because there's certainly no way to profit from going green...oh wait) and is therefore automatically discredited.

So even when you don't have a consensus, you rig it so you do! Brilliant tactic.

Seabon: subby, the entirety of the scientific community seems to disagree with you. (oil company whores need not apply)

The *entirety*? Are you sure about that?

With the release of the revised statement by the American Association of Petroleum Geologists in 2007, no remaining scientific body of national or international standing is known to reject the basic findings of human influence on recent climate change.

Oh. I guess you are sure about that.

Carth: How about something that has been in a respectable peer reviewed journal instead of something that put "Darwin was wrong" on their cover.

Don't be rushing to judgment. Maybe it was an article about how Darwin thought that marmalade was far superior to jam.

Smackledorfer: Any true person who calls themselves conservative should have at least some concern for the environment

Pffft, true conservatives don't have any interests that require a healthy environment. Other than hunting or fishing or just sitting out on the patio grilling and drinking beer what could there possibly be to do outside ?

Weaver95: And in the middle of all this, we're going to artificially jack up the price of energy use and production

No we aren't.We're going to recapture about 10% of the negative externalities caused by burning coal.

The best analogy here is if you were a farmer growing wheat on your field, and your amusement-park-owning neighbor started dumping his sewage on your otherwise productive field, making it stink and rot. If you then charge him a fraction of the cost of cleaning up his sewage and building a new sewer line to the closest sewage treatment facility for him, is that then "artificially jacking up the price of sewage treatment and amusement park tickets?" No. It's making him pay a fraction - just a fraction - of the cost of cleaning up his mess. That's precisely what the cap and trade bill is. For all the giveaways to the coal industry put in that bill, it actually ends some of the public subsidy of inefficient and wasteful economic activity by forcing them to pay back a portion of the costs they impose on others.

Like most things Congress touches good intentions will be transmuted into special interest pork barrels and loopholes.

I would suggest a slowly ramping tax on non-renewable , non-nuclear energy offset by income tax credits which would have a neutral effect on the economy while providing private enterprise the incentive to both conserve energy and develop untaxed alternatives.

A. no government involvement in the solution e.g. no massive wasted welfare programs for ADM
B. will act as an vaccine to cushion the effects of the next 150+$ oil spike.
C. the plan is simple so lobbyists and politicians have a harder time gaming and looting it.
D. income tax credits would give non-wasteful people a net profit so a large constituency, probably a majority, would be created to support the plan.
E. it might have a hope in hell of working

Carth: How about something that has been in a respectable peer reviewed journal instead of something that put "Darwin was wrong" on their cover.

How about you read the article that "Darwin was wrong" about? You know the one that was written in celebration of the 200 year anniversary of Darwins birth.

Of you can take the headline completely out of context of the article.

Your choice.

Smackledorfer: DarnoKonrad: Weaver95: It's a stupid plan, and we all know it.

That's your assertion on faith.

He had some valid points there. He exaggerated the hell out of them, but the argument that the US alone can't fix everything, and that a downturn in the economy may not be the best time to make this change are both points worth bringing up and looking at.

He's not advocating anything.

We're not going to expand our economy on cheap energy anymore -- building more shopping malls is just not going to cut it.

Part the bill's purpose is drive local industry around improving energy efficiency. As the president says "jobs that can't be outsourced"

It's a very important bill. Without it, I'm not sure I'd even care about anything anymore -- because the status quo is not sustainable.

Giltric: DarnoKonrad: This is the most important policy change yet. And one I welcome wholeheartedly. It has brought the reactionaries out in force, but simply put there is no better way to both reduce oil use and develop alternatives -- and the opposition, who has so far claimed gloom and doom ad-nauseum, has no alternative.

They want to put up windmills off the Jersey shore, they have even already started leasing the land to companies to build them.....but the environmental lobby is blocking it because birds might hit the windmills and get all chopped up and stuff.

So they want a couple decades to do a study of the environmental impact.

Why do environmentalists love oil and coal powered electrical generating stations.


Why can't they refer to other studies that were done in places that have been using windmills for 20+ or so years now.

I highly suspect the people actively trying to block wind power because of how much they love birds makes up a small portion of the pro-environment people, and consists of a combination of people who are dishonest in their reason for fighting windmills and ignorant people buying into the propaganda.

I see you use the term "environmental lobby". I'll admit ignorance on this, but given that there isn't one single environmental lobby group, do you know that the people fighting wind power out of bird love is made up by the bulk of people who have lobbied for the environment on other issues throughout the last couple of decades?

listerine: That's cleverly set up. Anyone who disagrees is trying to get Big Oil money (because there's certainly no way to profit from going green...oh wait) and is therefore automatically discredited.
=======================================

They are. Because going green is going to cost them money, so obviously they're going to fight it.

Sum Dum Gai

We're one of the top producers of CO2 overall, and we're THE top producer per capita. We could make a large difference even if we did so unilaterally.

I think its because we live in homes with air conditioners and heating....and not in mud and grass huts like some other countries.

We live pretty good, our energy consumption fits our lifestyles.

Who wants to sweat in 80 degree weather....really.

Sweating is for third world countries and immigrant landscapers.