Stop picking on Fletcher, he’s right as far as he goes—carbon in coal or petroleum was in the atmosphere maybe 300mya, at which time it was absorbed into plants and subsequently buried, irrelevant to the atmosphere until oxidized by us.
HOWEVER, that re-release of carbon as CO2, among other things, hardly justifies the idea that there is a scientifically proven chain of causation leading to catastrophe at some distant future date, nor that even if such were proven, any of the proposals now on the table would affect that outcome.
All we can say for sure is that atmospheric CO2 has been rising and that humans are burning a lot of carbon-based material that adds to atmospheric CO2 in the short term. And that CO2 is a weak GHG.
We are almost certain that the Earth’s surface temperature has been rising intermittently for a century or so. “Almost” because there is no good definition of what we are measuring and there are all sorts of questions about the data. Still, on the whole we have probably seen some warming over the last century or so, tho with ups (1930s, 1990s) and downs (1950s-70s).
We also know that climate varies naturally, probably driven by a number of factors including oscillations in ocean currents and systems, solar activity, the Earth’s axis inclination, the rock weathering cycle, possibly other things. We know there has always been natural variation, we have some vague sense of its limits, and only the vaguest ideas of what drives it.
Beyond that, we actually know very little. We don’t have a good sense of how current temps and trends compare to the more distant past (which is what Mann’s discredited hockey stick tried to do), how the human addition of CO2 and other GHG’s compares to natural processes, how other human activities may act to cool (i.e., aerosols).
We certainly cannot predict; the current models can’t even replicate the 20th century (see the HARRY_READ_ME file), why on earth should we think they can accurately forecast centuries or even decades into the future?
Even if we could predict global averages, estimating the effects would require very fine geographic detail regarding temps, precipitation, clouds, wind and such. this is so far beyond us as to be laughable.
The climate system is itself hugely complicated; its effect on us is complication squared, and our understanding let alone power to predict is extremely primitive.
Yet some people want to throw trillions of dollars around and create vast economic waste on the basis of something that doesn’t even compare favorably to alchemy.
Yesterday’s kerfuffle about the “Danish Text” gives us a peek behind the mask. It’s all about money. The supposedly “most-vulnerable” equatorial third world will walk out if they don’t get the dollars they demand on the terms they demand. I guess they really don’t see the alternative as catastrophe, huh?
The developed countries won’t confront the reality of a carbon tax, which would be the only sane way to address this problem (ask James Hansen, a real true believer) because (a) too politically obvious to the people who will be paying, (b) we have no sound basis to set the level of the tax, and (c) not enough scope for graft, corruption and rent-seeking—carbon trading works much better for everything EXCEPT restraining emissions.
So, it’s clear that even the people who are pushing this don’t really believe there is a crisis, it’s just an opportunity to help themselves to someone else’s money.
