Webdiary - Founded and Inspired by Margo Kingston

A Labor-dominated parliamentary committee is calling on the Federal Government to significantly toughen up its greenhouse gas emission cuts targets.

The Federal Government's existing target is to make cuts of 60 per cent by 2050, but Labor and Greens members on the joint standing committee on treaties have released a report saying nothing less than 80 per cent will be sufficient.

The government has a lot of work to do. A reduction of nothing less than 80 per cent by 2050 will demand much more than a pathetic carbon reduction scheme. It is about time we listened to what the science is telling us and take the appropriate actions. The end of all coal mining would be a good start.

XSTRATA Coal has revealed it could sack hundreds of Queenslander workers and bin a $5 billion project because of an emissions trading scheme.

A written briefing to Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull has revealed the world's largest exporter of thermal coal could retrench 1000 employees across Australia - with predictions half could be in Queensland - and sacrifice 4000 future national jobs.

Has any thought been given to the number of jobs that will be lost if we continue to mine coal? If the barrier reef is destroyed thousands of jobs in tourism will go. If ocean acidity continues thousands of fisherman will sacrifice their jobs. It is about time we realised how many jobs will be lost if we continue to mine coal.

Perhaps we should also ask how many will die if we destroy our food chains and cause sea level rises of over 1 metre?

Could the Big Apple soon be bobbing in sea water? A new study shows that sea level rise due to climate change in the next 100 years will be disproportionately high around New York and other cities of northeast US.

This looks like natural justice to me. I wonder who the US will bomb as it begins to sink. It might be a commie plot or an Islamic  attack. Or maybe the Muslims have god on their side after all.

Forget 9/11. This will be a much bigger threat and one that homeland security should really be concerned with. Better bring the troops home to start building the levees.

Anthony Nolan, I had a good laugh at your comment. There is no one in my area who thinks like I do, or knows how I think. They are all just the same as city folk, but more friendly and are expressing the reality of what they are experiencing in their daily lives.

“So Alga, Queenstown? Zeehan? Somewhere in the hills south of St Mary's? “

Maybe you should learn to read a map, but I understand the rage you feel towards difference and reality. Its a common trait and lacking in the ideologically enslaved, you're welcome to it.

Keeping on topic. For the first time, they are unable to harvest the fruit here as we have had little rain. The springs have dried up so the fruit is too small and useless, meaning 20 or so jobs have disappeared this year from the town. In a small place like this, that's a dramatic event and one which will see living standards here decline even more. Over the last 10 years, our rain fall has dropped continuously, in the last 3 about 200mm a year. Now our dams are dry for the first time in memory and things are pretty grim for this once area of high rain fall, as it is in many other places.

I think your are flogging a dead horse, nothing will change as we are seeing. I also watched Wong give her empty answers, it seems she has no idea about anything. If I wasn't so prepared for this, then it would be frightening knowing the future is in the hands of people like Rudd, Wong, Turnbull and Co. As for the science, I think its 50 years behind and what they are expecting in the next 50 years will be upon us within the next 5. However I am now beginning to believe there is very little I can do to prepare for the reality, how do you prepare for ecological collapse and the consequences of lost biodiversity and many breaks in the food chain.

As we know, emissions trading is all about keeping power in the hands of the polluters, nothing at all is being done to change to or encourage alternatives. All the money for economic stimulus which will again just put more money in the pockets of the rich, should have been used to create new sustainable industry which reduce costs and slow climate change.

John Pratt, you are not alone, I've been telling the story for more than 30 years to no avail. Even with the growing evidence, people just continue along in hope and denial. If you've studied history you'll find this is the normal approach by the majority of humans and they make no effort to change until disaster actually hits them. As the current human approach hasn't changed and the evidence is showing we are about to repeat human stupidity but this time on a massive scale, all you can do is prepare yourself and forget the rest.

Locals in my area are talking about the changes which are affecting their livelihood. The cray fishermen are complaining about soft shells and diminishing stock, yet the science is stating warming sea temperatures and increasing CO2 levels in the oceans will cause this. Yet they just say it's just a cycle and things will come good again soon. So you see even with the evidence before them, the average person will do nothing, just like the political system will do nothing to upset their corporate masters.

Ideological humans never learn from their mistakes, just look at near space, we have already turned that into a garbage dump in a few short years because of the short sightedness of the ideological human. If this wake up call doesn't rid the world of the ideological human and its primitive approach, then it may be the end of humanity and life on earth. But, as long as they have their primitive mythology to cling to and delusional suppressive control over life around them, they couldn't care less.

How to mourn the loss of all those lovely other species? The beauty for and of its own sake? The multiplicity, the teeming, seething, robustly regenerative richness and diversity of being and life.

People are indeed in denial.

I grew up and have lived a life in a world in which the possibility existed that one day I might see a polar bear in its natural envionment. I never made doing so a priority and that is OK with me because I've seen other natural wonders, most often on foot and far from any road or trail, often alone and sometimes in good and loving company.

My children, however, will most likely live out the majority of their lives without even the possibility of seeing such a magnificent beast in its own domain and on its own terms because ... there will be no wild polar bears.

And many other species, large and small.

Ross Garnaut has put the consequences of failure in terms of a loss and regret that will be experienced by succeeding generations "until the end of time".

Ah. Well. Not for want of effort. I'm well over the denial and well into the healing. Struggle is life and struggle for life is the best of all.

Since the Industrial Revolution, CO2 emissions have already turned the sea about 30% more acidic, say researchers.

It is more acidic now than it has been for at least 500,000 years, they add.

The problem is set to worsen as emissions of the greenhouse gas increase through the 21st Century.

"I am very worried for ocean ecosystems which are currently productive and diverse," Carol Turely told BBC News.

"I believe we may be heading for a mass extinction, as the rate of change in the oceans hasn't been seen since the dinosaurs.

"It may have a major impact on food security. It really is imperative that we cut emissions of CO2."

More evidence pointing to the damage our C02 emissions are causing.

The global economic crisis will feel like a walk in the park compared to the problems we are about to face due to the damage caused by our C02 emissions.

We must use the money stimulating our economy to move us to a low emission economy.

"As a result of the acceleration of outlet glaciers over large regions, the ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica are already contributing more and faster to sea level rise than anticipated," says Eric Rignot of the University of California in Irvine and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "If this trend continues, we are likely to witness sea level rise 1 metre or more by year 2100", he says.

Church says even 50 cm would have a huge effect on flooding events. "Our study on Australia showed that coastal flooding events that today we expect only once every 100 years will happen several times a year by 2100," he says.

If this science is correct many Australian coastal cities would become swamps. People would not be able to live in cities that are flooded several times a year. The cost of rebuilding would be enormous. In the third world millions will die and the pressure on the remaining land would be enormous.

"In principle [carbon trading] is not a bad idea but in operation it's been disastrous. Business has frankly made billions out of artificial reductions of what is called hot air with absolutely no environmental benefit at all," said Meacher, singling out the ETS for being distorted by commerce. "Governments under pressure from industry – the worst example is Germany – gave away far more allowances than industry actually needed."

As Penny Wong introduces Australia's carbon trading system into our Parliament why will it do any better than what we have witnessed in Europe?

The winners seem to be big business and big polluters. Is it just a distraction to slow us from making the changes that would make real reductions in our GHG emissions? A carbon tax would be a much simpler method of putting a price on carbon pollution.

The global sea level looks set to rise far higher than forecast because of changes in the polar ice-sheets, a team of researchers has suggested.

Scientists at a climate change summit in Copenhagen said earlier UN estimates were too low and that sea levels could rise by a metre or more by 2100.

As usual the scientists have been too conservative. It looks as though the sea level rise our children will experience will be a least one metre. Most of our coast will flood. Floods like those we have seen recently in North Queensland will happen much more often, and canal front homes will be under water. We should be putting more pressure on our politicians to act on reducing global carbon emissions. Two actions that should take place today are the introduction of biochar into our agriculture and a ban on all coal mining.

Failure to act now will cost our kids more than the sacrifice we should make today.

We believe 2009 can be a transformative year, that the economic crisis presents an opportunity to reject old assumptions just as the ecological crisis focuses minds on the last chance UN climate summit in Denmark in December. The Copenhagen meeting has the potential - more than any gathering of human beings before it - to affect how our civilisation develops. This is Westphalia, Versailles and Bretton Woods rolled into one, and it's happening this year.

Some of you who have read this far will by now be sniggering with cynicism, and when this article is published online many of the comments will exhibit a similar scorn. But with respect to the keyboard commandos, we'll take our cue instead from Professor James Hansen, director of Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies who said: "In the nuclear standoff between the Soviet Union and United States, a crisis could be precipitated only by the action of one of the parties. In contrast, the present threat to the planet and civilisation requires only inaction in the face of clear scientific evidence of the danger."

Copenhagen 2009 must be a turning point. The future of the planet depends on it. It will be the most important meeting of humans since Jesus held his last supper. The decisions made will determine the future of the human race. Will we be willing to change or will it be more of the same? 

Mr Alcorn, could you possibly persuade your alter ego to head down to south-eastern Australia for a few weeks? Please ....

On March 2 the first civil disobedience action against the use of coal took place in Washington.

Listen to Dr James Hansen's call to action.

It is about time we called a halt to Australia's coal exports.

So are we doomed?

There is one way we could save ourselves and that is through the massive burial of charcoal. It would mean farmers turning all their agricultural waste - which contains carbon that the plants have spent the summer sequestering - into non-biodegradable charcoal, and burying it in the soil. Then you can start shifting really hefty quantities of carbon out of the system and pull the CO₂ down quite fast.

Would it make enough of a difference?

Yes. The biosphere pumps out 550 gigatonnes of carbon yearly; we put in only 30 gigatonnes. Ninety-nine per cent of the carbon that is fixed by plants is released back into the atmosphere within a year or so by consumers like bacteria, nematodes and worms. What we can do is cheat those consumers by getting farmers to burn their crop waste at very low oxygen levels to turn it into charcoal, which the farmer then ploughs into the field. A little CO₂is released but the bulk of it gets converted to carbon. You get a few per cent of biofuel as a by-product of the combustion process, which the farmer can sell. This scheme would need no subsidy: the farmer would make a profit. This is the one thing we can do that will make a difference, but I bet they won't do it.

An interview with James Lovelock in the New Scientist. Is it possible that a change in farming practice is all it will take to save the planet from global warming? No need for a carbon reduction scheme.

More importantly, we need a powerful and active movement not to force the administration and the Democrats in Congress to do something they don’t want to, but to give them the political space they need to act on their convictions. Barack Obama was a community organizer — he understands that major change only comes when it’s demanded, when there’s some force noisy enough to drown out the eternal hum of business as usual, of vested interest, of inertia.

On March 2, environmentalist Bill McKibben will join demonstrators who plan to march on a coal-fired power plant in Washington D.C. In this article for Yale Environment 360, he explains why he’s ready to go to jail to protest the continued burning of coal.

The time has come for action. We should be ready to act in unison with Bill McKibben and his fellow activists in Washington DC. Australia is a leading exporter of coal. Our economy is run on black death. It is time to shut down the coal mines.

Richard:   The Halliburton activist who was deported from Australia, Scott Parkin, has had a strong hand in this one as well.  It's shaping up to be a major event.

Biochar technologies are potentially world-wide in their applicability. Grain production and many other forms of agriculture, livestock production, forestry and even the disposal of human waste will, I’m convinced, be profoundly transformed by biochar, and the impact will be both swift and radical. The driver, at least initially, is likely to be the climate crisis. Approximately eight per cent of all atmospheric CO₂is absorbed by plants each year. If just a small proportion of the carbon captured by plants can be pyrolysed and transformed into charcoal, humanity’s prospects will be much brighter, for this will buy us time as we struggle to make the transition to a low emissions economy.

Biochar represents a cornerstone of our future global sustainability. With the appropriate political and technical recognition, promotion and adoption, it will change our world forever, and very much for the better.

Most of us are now aware of the dangers of global warming. We need to look for solutions that are quick and economically feasible. Better farming practice is one way we can remove C02 from the atmosphere and grow better crops at the same time. It is about time Biochar was recognised as a potential solution for our climate problems. How many of our political leaders are aware of its potential?  You can make a difference if you make sure your local pollies are aware. 

Paul Walter...I agree with your analysis above.  For years the "greenspin" from the coprorates and the state has been to individualise the responsibility for market choices of consumers as if there is no responsibility on manufacturers as to what they put on the market by way of goods and services or how they produce what they market. 

This has effectively limited the range of responses to, for want of a better phrase, consumer responsibility or responsible consumption. Into the bargain the corporates let themselves off the hook.  And now, when we all have our backs to the ecological wall they threaten a flight of capital to China or thereabouts?  Time to call their bluff.  They understand only too well the tradeoff - economic and political stability (Australia) or corruption and chaos (SE Asia).

Go ahead guys, make my day.

The real danger for the future is the corporatist response where the state, labour and capital align themselves to hyper-exploit remaining resources in the class interests of those three groups.  Marginalising dissent (greens are ratbags, the earth is warming, climate change scepticism, clean coal etc etc)is a first and necessary step in forming that particular alignment of forces.

The step after that is fascist governance as  dwindling resources are depleted further. Watch out for the working class as that happens.  The working class, contra-Marx and as Germany shows, is perfectly capable of a vicuous swerve to the right in the name of its own factional interests and it is and can be as much of a creature of capital as the bosses themselves.  In other words watch out for further alliances, like in Tasmania, between working class forces and those whose profits depend on non-sustainable ecological exploitation of resources.

Actually, second trip here tonight with tales of other media.

In this case because Andrew Glikson's last two paragraphs talked of "Climate Skeptics" long term undermining of emissions mitigation, based on a convenient lapse on the part of these, to the effect that Antarctica can still be regarded as  "part of another planet".

I'd mention specifically Crikey, the Clive Hamilton article there and responses to that, that recognise the shafting of all citizenry,  most of all those responsible for taking personal responsibility earlier or currently for their emissions via methods like solar panelling, which simply then leaves more of the carbon emissions pool available to big business, rather than offering big polluters any incentive to pull back on their pollution, as others try to do. Why bother, what's more, putting in mitigation systems when it stays cheaper to use fossil fuel generated power. Gets rid of the competion, doesn't it, thru discouragement?

I thought back to the timid Scullin government of the early 'thirties that was saddled with the Great  Depression, and its acceptance of the notorious Niemeyer Plan, which bled Australians  to pay off off-shore financial interests  (responsible for the crisis, in the first place). The equivalence is, that Australians now are being asked to subsidise big interests  polluting activities, even as they are encouraged to be self sacrificing citizens themselves. The carbon credits scheme makes responsible people sponsor the sociopathy of others unwilling to also take similar substantial steps perhaps involving personal sacrifices.

Wong reckons the corporate bastards will take their bats and balls sulk off to China if they are also asked to pull their weight here ( yes, China and co remain a problem).

But others responding take a darker view, cynically mentioning the fossil fuel industry constellation of interests and an emerging  political framework where government also sets the precedent and reinforcement for holding off on decisions as to other sectors of environmental policy,  unless developers can "persuade" them otherwise as to these, also. Eg. government as brokerage house, auctioning off what's ours- the NSW/Tas/Vic state model, imho. The opposition, who did much the same thing in government and the maligned Greens are sidelined, whilst the sheep in the mortgage belt, spooked by business fear campaigns, are  won over with the prospect that their jobs won't be lost, altho that was unlikely in the first place.

Howard Lite usurped, you could say, but sad to see the sloth continuing even into in new times, that call for definite responses to long postponed real problems.

It is comforting to know that concern about matters environmental are not confined exclusively to these threads.

Lateline did a fairly long segment this evening on precisely the issues the thread is concerned with. Included some concern expressed in passing by scientists on the problems with West Antarctica, one of several apparent symptoms of a situation coming to a head re global warming carbon emissions and a semingly intransigent lack of adequate government response. Most of the extensive lead in followed in line, tone and conclusions proffered, similar to Glikson's in essence.

At this stage I anticipated an interview with a government minister, but apparently Penny Wong had already been interviewed, with apparently sad results, on 730 Report, the minister still apparently not  across her portfolio as it relates to this problem. 

Instead we got, descending rapidly into burlesque, a surpassing poor performance from opportunist Andrew Robb, transparently trying to pour oil on troubled waters as to a united front in getting a more decisive response from the government as to its current watered-down proposals for carbon trading/emmissions.

I suspect Jones was not amused by Robb .

We were belatedly given a consolation interview involving finally a politician who did appear comfortable and familiar with his subject matter, like the scientists spoken with earlier, Greens Sen. Bob Brown.

This a very brief sketch of the segment.  I hope those who missed the show get the online download tomorrow and make their own minds up.

I append below a recent (16.2.2009) statement, titled "The sword of Damocles" by Prof James Hansen, chief climate scientist, Goddard Institute, NASA, consistent with evidence by the world's climate research institutions (Hadley-Met, Potsdam, CSIRO, as summarized by the AR4 IPCC-2007 report):

http://climaticidechronicles.org/2009/02/16/james-hansen-the-sword-of-damocles/

Richard:  Andrew, without knowing what to edit into a length within copyright parameters, I thought it best just to leave the link.

You know, it would be almost amusing if it were not so criminal, the conversation with Sales, Brandis and Emerson on lateline tonight. The chat  ended up focussing on the alleging rolling of  developers friend Mar'n Ferguson and treasurer Duck by the progessives, over carbon trading/carbon taxes.

Not one of those people could draw away from mollycoddling the business community;  the stubborn denialists largely most responsible for so much environmental damage leading up to the current situation, to point out that carbon trading/taxes is a response to a situation created largely (like the related economic crisis) by big business.

The poor things want "certainty", probably like after Wik and Mabo, when Howard was put in to undermine aboriginals participation in their own lives, when that stood in the way of a developer buck,as well. They'll take their bats and balls home if they don't get what they want, after rolling and kicking on the floor, holding their breaths and going blue in the face of the prospect of actually reining in their greed for once, for the sake of the wider world.

Angela Ryan:  "UK has had the coldest winter in 25yrs".

Well, as you know, it is impossible to make with any assurance inferences about long term climatic trends based on isolated weather events.....

"But just because some of us are suffering through a particularly cold and snowy winter doesn't refute the fact that the globe is warming as we continue to pump carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere."

-  E/The Environmental Magazine 

...unless of course, it suits your argument to do so...

"With Victoria’s bushfire holocaust now confirmed as Australia’s worst-ever natural disaster, people are reasonably asking: are these events linked to climate change?  The short answer is yes."

 - Green Left Weekly

To what level do temperatures, droughts, cyclons, ice melt, sea level and methane emission need to rise before people will realize that climate science is correct?

John Pratt:  "Even if you thought the science had a fifty fifty chance of being correct wouldn't it be prudent to reduce our GHG emissions until we can prove that GHG are not causing the observable changes to our planet?

It probably wouldn't be wise. Considering a major economic downturn (it hasn't even hit yet) will take care of all that at any rate.

In Britain for example they'll probably experience depression conditions. And all their money has already gone into that bottomless pit of the "best of British Banks". Though, it depends on who you listen too: Gordon Brown, affectionately known as sumphead, or those that profit so handsomely from this lunks every move.

Climate change is the least of their concerns. Merely bread and circuses.

Angela Ryan:  "UK has had the coldest winter in 25yrs".

One of the British papers on the very same page of reporting six or so deaths from freezing were breazely quoting "climate changers" that were expecting the hottest summer ever! Perhaps the "frozen few" will thaw out? Do energy generating windmills work in blizzard conditions by any chance?

There are some other issues being debated about the changes in Antarctica. the increasing size of the rest of the ice cover is interesting. Everywhere except the busy little west area (symbolic) or is it the changes in tides affecting the shallower masses, the active volcanoes beneath the ice with hot currents moving along, and now this week we have a cold snap. Does that mean an Ice age is coming? Is climate change a bandwagon of fear? Are we forgetting in the demonisation of carbon the dreadful pollution and deforestation and overfishing occurring, the cementing of our arable land for cheap profits for developers etc?

Are we losing a scientific grasp of how to observe the climate phenomenon as a fanatical bandwagon leaps into gear with populace chanting and burning of heretical sceptics?

Are we forgetting the influence of the large hotplate beneath the western ice sheets? Note the eastern sheets are increasing in size apparently :

Most of Antarctica is seismically stable. But its western part lies on a rift in Earth's crust that gives rise to occasional volcanism and geothermal heat, occurring on the Antarctic coastal margins.

This is the first evidence for an eruption under the ice sheet itself – a slab of frozen water, hundreds of metres thick in places, that holds most of the world's stock of fresh water.

Reporting in the journal Nature Geoscience this week, the investigators from the British Antarctic Survey (BAS), In Cambridge, England, describe the finding as "unique."

It extends the range of known volcanism in Antarctica by some 500 km and raises the question whether this or other sub-glacial volcanoes may have melted so much ice that global sea levels were affected, they said.

And this bit:

"The Wilkins disintegration won't raise sea level because it already floats in the ocean, and few glaciers flow into it," Scambos said. But "the collapse underscores that the Wilkins region has experienced an intense melt season. Regional sea ice has all but vanished, leaving the ice shelf exposed to the action of waves."

And this comment (which is true it seems):

... he himself conveniently ignores the fact that only 2% of the surface area in Antarctica is losing ice - while the ice on the other 98% of the continent is actually increasing.

From an article discussing the Wilkins shelf break up:

"Temperature records from the nearest weather station (San Martin - 400kms away) show no evidence of unusual temperatures since a warm summer in 2003 - both land and sea temperatures have been around average since then. What we are seeing here is a normal phenomenon involving a relatively small amount of ice - if global warming was causing this there would be many more ice shelves collapsing in Antarctica than the isolated incident we are seeing..."

"I find the press commentary on the calving of a slice of the Wilkins Ice Shelf a trifle exaggerated.

Currently, the sea ice off Antarctica totals about 4 million square kms, as against about 2.5 million sq kms this time last year. Last year ended up having the largest sea ice cover since satellite measurements began in 1979.

I don’t think 400 odd sq kms really counts when there is about 1.5 million sq kms of extra ice around.

Doug Lavers, Melbourne, Australia"

"NEW evidence has cast doubt on claims that the world’s ice-caps are melting, it emerged last night. Satellite data shows that concerns over the levels of sea ice may have been premature. It was feared that the polar caps were vanishing because of the effects of global warming. But figures from the respected US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration show that almost all the “lostâ€� ice has come back. Ice levels which had shrunk from 13million sq km in January 2007 to just four million in October, are almost back to their original levels. Figures show that there is nearly a third more ice in Antarctica than is usual for the time of year. The data flies in the face of many current thinkers and will be seized on by climate change sceptics who deny that the world is undergoing global warming. […] Central and southern China, the USA and Canada were hit hard by snowstorms. "

And this little gem:

"To quote ICECAP:

"The full Wilkins 6,000 square mile ice shelf is just 0.39% of the current ice sheet (just 0.1% of the extent last September). Only a small portion of it between 1/10th-1/20th of Wilkins has separated so far, like an icicle falling off a snow and ice covered house. And this winter is coming on quickly. In fact the ice is returning so fast, it is running an amazing 60% ahead (4.0 vs 2.5 million square km extent) of last year when it set a new record. The ice extent is already approaching the second highest level for extent since the measurements began by satellite in 1979 and just a few days into the Southern Hemisphere winter and 6 months ahead of the peak. Wilkins like all the others that temporarily broke up will refreeze soon. We are very likely going to exceed last year’s record. Yet the world is left with the false impression Antarctica’s ice sheet is also starting to disappear."..."

and after some pretty hot weather we now have cold weather for the year-perhaps that must mean there is an Ice Age coming now. UK has had the coldest winter in 25yrs.

And a bit more about volcanoes beneath - despite the article dismissing an active volcano as a possible cause of Ice melting and warmer sea just there - wow how amazing and I thought magma was kind of hot stuff:

Although ice buried the unnamed volcano, molten rock is still churning below. David Vaughan, a glaciologist with the BAS and a co-author of the new study, said the discovery might explain the speeding up of historically slow-moving glaciers in the region.

“This eruption occurred close to Pine Island Glacier on the West Antarctic Ice volcano has caused some of that acceleration." Sheet," Vaughan said. "The flow of this glacier towards the coast has speeded up in recent decades, and it may be possible that heat from the

The effect is similar to a person gliding down a Slip 'n Slide: Volcanically melted water beneath the colossal ice sheet lubricates its movement, assisting its gravity-powered journey toward the Antarctic Ocean...."

"The discovery of a ‘subglacial’ volcanic eruption from beneath the Antarctic ice sheet is unique in itself," Corr said. "But our techniques also allow us to put a date on the eruption, determine how powerful it was and map out the area where ash fell."

Scientists like Corr have used radar and other technologies to find other features, such as lakes, tucked beneath the Antarctic ice. Researchers also think that magma-heated rock beneath Greenland's massive ice sheet is accelerating its melting, but whether a volcano or just a pool of magma is responsible is still a matter of debate."

So.... got that? volcanoes under the area melting, like Greenland, and the opposite are of Antarctica increasing ice cover and the coldest winters in decades in the northern hemisphere...

If we miss the real cause of a phenomenon due to a religious obsession with a popularist hypothesis then we may miss the real reasons for events and the dangers such encompass.

Science is not religion. It is not something to be believed or not. hypothesises are to be examined and all observations explained by that hypothesis or such must be re-examined.

Imagine if current changes from volcanic activity was the threat to the ice sheets not a tiny change in temperature-not recorded in other areas and rapidly countered by the colder snowier winter... we would be missing this by failure to observe and question.

Climate change is not a religion but a hypothesis to be observed and tested. So far there is much that is controversial there.

Cheers

The economic downturn supplies the perfect back out clause for both sides of the argument. The climate change people can now claim that the downturn has "delayed the inevitable", and industry can conduct its "less" business, until a "return to better days". This is the perfect win-win situation. A noble and face saving truce for both parties.

The economic downturn will eventually affect funding for numerous subjects at any rate. This will naturally include climate change funding. Everyone is now fighting for much smaller slice of the pie, and it's only getting smaller. As the situation deteriorates people such as James Hansen (obvious to me he is suffering a Messiah complex) will be crowded off the pages for other stories.

The irony here is the climate change industry directly relies on economic success as much as any industry. The exact thing they seemingly want to destroy, and even more ironically the job seemingly has been done for them. Finishing them in the process.

The climate is nearing tipping points. Changes are beginning to appear and there is a potential for explosive changes, effects that would be irreversible, if we do not rapidly slow fossil-fuel emissions over the next few decades. As Arctic sea ice melts, the darker ocean absorbs more sunlight and speeds melting. As the tundra melts, methane, a strong greenhouse gas, is released, causing more warming. As species are exterminated by shifting climate zones, ecosystems can collapse, destroying more species...........

The greatest danger hanging over our children and grandchildren is initiation of changes that will be irreversible on any time scale that humans can imagine. If coastal ice shelves buttressing the west Antarctic ice sheet continue to disintegrate, the sheet could disgorge into the ocean, raising sea levels by several metres in a century. Such rates of sea level change have occurred many times in Earth's history in response to global warming rates no higher than those of the past 30 years. Almost half of the world's great cities are located on coastlines......

Clearly, if we burn all fossil fuels, we will destroy the planet we know. Carbon dioxide would increase to 500 ppm or more. We would set the planet on a course to the ice-free state, with sea level 75 metres higher. Climatic disasters would occur continually. The tragedy of the situation, if we do not wake up in time, is that the changes that must be made to stabilise the atmosphere and climate make sense for other reasons. They would produce a healthier atmosphere, improved agricultural productivity, clean water and an ocean providing fish that are safe to eat.

James Hansen in the Guardian.

How can we ignore this science? 

Does anyone think we can continue with a business as usual policy?

One other threads I have argued for Triple Bottom Line accounting to make corporations more responsible for the environment. I have argued for the withdrawal of Australian troops in Afghanistan. These are linked: we cannot carry on as we have in the past.  As our cities disappear under the ocean or burn to ash from bushfires we will need all our troops to protect us from the effects of climate change. Who will give a toss which government rules in Afghanistan?