Friday, September 29, 2006

When the history of climate change is written ...

I'm quite convinced that the citizens of the Earth will at some point band together and attempt to stabilize atmospheric CO2 abundances . If I were a betting man (and I am), I would bet that an international agreement will be reached during he first term of the next U.S. President (2009-2013). Let's hope it's sensible and successful.

When the history of AGW is written, I believe that three occurrences will have been crucial in setting the stage for CO2 emissions reductions:
  • Hurrican Katrina - we can argue about the effect of AGW on hurricanes, but there's no question in my mind that Katrina had an affect on how many view AGW
  • Drowning polar bears - images play a key role in policy debates, and images of so-called charismatic megafauna can quickly become iconic. These images appeal to the obligation many feel for stewardship of the planet.
  • Al Gore - Love him or hate him, his movie has had a huge effect on the debate --- not on the hard-core Gore haters, nor on the AGW believers, but on the undecided middle of the debate. And not necessarily because they went to see his movie, but because his movie has kept AGW in the news and on the public's radar.
Together, these three events have been crucial in generating the growing wave of awareness on the issue. In fact, I think we've recently passed a tipping point, where the question has changed from whether to take action to what form that action will take.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Excuse my parochial American instincts but I see the three events you offered as merely signposts on the road to some remedy of the AGW. They point us in the direction to act but, at the end of the day, it will be the U.S. Congressional Senate that can muster 60 votes (filibuster-proof) to send a final House of Representative/Senate act to a president willing to sign into law a legally binding requirement that the U.S. decarbonize sufficient to compel China, India and the rest of the world to get with the program.

Nothing, in this life, will supercede the U.S. government’s agreement to reconfigure its economy and prepare its citizenry to adapt to the changes, we Americans have already committed to the earth’s climate. Then, we (Americans, et.al.) will be writing a proud history and not our epitaph.

John L. McCormick

Anonymous said...

If your history is about the global warming debate Gore's movie and books would be included. If your history is about global warming science and sound nalysis, these would not make the cut. They would be swept off the cutting room floor and dumped in the trash bin labelled propaganda. I would have thought someone from TAMU would have a pretty strong and sound set of criteria for what is science and what is not.

Anonymous said...

Dano, you are such a partisan it is little trouble proving you wrong, perhaps you missed this review of Algore's "propaganmercial"

http://www.slate.com/id/2142319/

Oh, but wait, this is another of the right wing conspirators out there coming to get the poor AGW believers, right? Anyone who disagrees with you on Algore's movie must be in that camp I suppose.

Anonymous said...

How is this for scientific consensus on global warming?

In preparation for the 2007 G8 summit, the national science academies of the G8+5 nations issued a declaration referencing the position of the 2005 joint science academies' statement, and acknowledging the confirmation of their previous conclusion by recent research. Following the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report, the declaration states:

It is unequivocal that the climate is changing, and it is very likely that this is predominantly caused by the increasing human interference with the atmosphere. These changes will transform the environmental conditions on Earth unless counter-measures are taken.

National and international science academies and professional societies have assessed the current scientific opinion on climate change, in particular recent global warming. These assessments have largely followed or endorsed the IPCC position that "An increasing body of observations gives a collective picture of a warming world and other changes in the climate system... There is new and stronger evidence that most of the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities".

* 1 Statements by concurring organizations
o 1.1 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 2007
o 1.2 Joint science academies’ statement 2007
o 1.3 Joint science academies’ statement 2005
o 1.4 Joint science academies’ statement 2001
o 1.5 U.S. National Research Council, 2001
o 1.6 American Meteorological Society
o 1.7 American Geophysical Union
o 1.8 American Institute of Physics
o 1.9 American Astronomical Society
o 1.10 Federal Climate Change Science Program, 2006
o 1.11 American Association for the Advancement of Science
o 1.12 Stratigraphy Commission of the Geological Society of London
o 1.13 Geological Society of America
o 1.14 American Chemical Society
o 1.15 Engineers Australia (The Institution of Engineers Australia)

It is not surprising that the only dissenting voice was by the
American Association of Petroleum Geologists (AAPG).