For those of you that don't believe in global warming

[AGD]

The way I see it is that even if you don't believe in climate change you should be in favour of the climate change policies.

Look at the situation now:

high dependence on other countries which have oil and gas and bad governments - very bad for our energy security and foreign policy.
No long term provision for energy production when coal/oil/gas is running out and the prices for them skyrocket.
Bad air quality in cities from cars.
Very inefficient use of electricity in the uk generally leading to lots of wasted energy.

The solution to all of these big problems is more nuclear, more renewables, much less oil and gas. We can become self-sufficient, have cleaner air, and in the medium term save a lot of money. Also by investing in these emerging technologies we can bring jobs and investment to the uk.

It's a win win situation imo. Even if climate change is false we are still better off.

 

[Freefaller]

I agree about nuclear power - really don't understand why the UK and the US don't use it :/

 

[lookitsjonno]

The way I see it is that even if you don't believe in climate change you should be in favour of the climate change policies.

Look at the situation now:

high dependence on other countries which have oil and gas and bad governments - very bad for our energy security and foreign policy.
No long term provision for energy production when coal/oil/gas is running out and the prices for them skyrocket.
Bad air quality in cities from cars.
Very inefficient use of electricity in the uk generally leading to lots of wasted energy.

The solution to all of these big problems is more nuclear, more renewables, much less oil and gas. We can become self-sufficient, have cleaner air, and in the medium term save a lot of money. Also by investing in these emerging technologies we can bring jobs and investment to the uk.

It's a win win situation imo. Even if climate change is false we are still better off.

this

 

[meghatronic]

I agree about nuclear power - really don't understand why the UK and the US don't use it :/

That's why. 1970s protests in particular. Killed the industry.

 

[[TW]Fox]

I dont think its that people dont beleive in global warming, more they dont beleive its all purely down to mans activities over the last 100 years, as if the world used to have a completely stable temperature for the thousands of years before that.

 

[UncleBensSauce]

I want to see a larger volume of open science.

To many datasets are closed etc.



Though good piece of news today:

The world may not be doomed after all, according to top American dirt scientists. Soil-dwelling microbes, expected in climate models to go into CO2-spewing "overdrive" as the world warms, refused to do so in experiments.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/04/27/soil_microbe_peril_no/

 

[LordSplodge]

I believe that there's more than enough plant life to process all the CO2 we could ever throw at the planet and more.

There is this wonderful thing called the Carbon Cycle that has been operating for many many millennia, hell even aeons and has managed to process lots more CO2 in the past than there is now.

I think Johnny Ball summed it up.

Ball, 71, claimed that spiders’ flatulence was more damaging to the environment than fossil fuels, and criticised the “bad science” of global warming during a performance at a Christmas show in celebration of atheism and science.

 

[Glaucus]

A model of the global climate that works. That is all. Until then it's best guess and I just don't think the current single minded approach to whatever challenges the future may pose is justified.

Presenting theories as fact based on an obviously incomplete understanding of the climate model is as short sighted as trying to work out where a car will go next without understanding it has steering and brakes. You just keep finding oddities you can't explain and re-calculating the model to fit.

The human race is quite ingenious and given the opportunity we could engineer our way round the worst effects of climate change. Our current approach though appears to be to knock our society back to the stone age and hope the gods are pleased.

This. accurate models would be a great starting point.

But as i have said before we have already gone past the point where we can stay below the moderate danger level according to IPCC. So it really is futile. However we should be going green, not to cut co2, but for energy security, economy and the like.

When GW happens which it will regardless of co2. Then we will have to work around it.

 

[Shadez]

I'd want statistics in a graph form covering at least a few million years of history, at least a couple of ice ages. If the graph showed an unnatural increase in temperature correlating with the rise in Industry then I would believe it was man made.

you meen this http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/last_400k_yrs.html

looks quite conclusive to me global warming is a con!

infact we are due a massive global cooling.

 

[Rroff]

I don't believe in global warming, I do believe there is climate change and I do believe that mans contribution to it is minor and mostly over-ridden by other natural factors well beyond our control. I do believe we should be more considerate of our environment and that climate change should be studied carefully, however so far all I've seen is skewed evidence, usege of climate change to political ends and hysteria.

At this point the only conclusive proof I would accept is noticing year on year warming - even that would be no indication of a long term trend tho (and probably too late at that extreme if it was).

The planet itself is due for a period of mass cooling I believe as mentioned above, but it would appear that the solar system as an entity is warming up slightly year on year at the moment.

 

[Dave M]

This. accurate models would be a great starting point.

I'm afraid I was being quite flippant, we have as much change of modelling the global climate as we have of living on the moon. The moon colony may be easier actually.

My point is given the lack of certainty efforts should not be so focused on one point (reducing carbom emissions).

And the Prius, oh my lol. Thanks for saving the world, seriously

Bandwagon products like that and tax hikes that are *not* ring fenced for environmental or energy projects just make me cynical, very cynical.

 

[shredgod]

Well, there's already sufficient evidence that human activity has had a global impact on the environment, take the Hole in the Ozone layer and CFCs for example.

So I don't think it's too much of a long shot to assume that human activity has had a part to play in global warming as well

 

[Dave M]

So I don't think it's too much of a long shot to assume that human activity has had a part to play in global warming as well

Is that what we're calling 'good science' now?

 

[shredgod]

Well, I was in no way implying that it's good science. Just stating that there is already solid evidence to show that Human activity has affected the world as a whole.

I do however agree that more research needs to be conducted with a non biased view.

 

[MikeTimbers]

If the world was at threat from warming up due to our carbon emissions then the worlds leaders would be stopping emissions as priority number 1 and not looking to make some money from it by half heartily taxing it.

Not even sure how to start responding to this other than to say given the age of most politicians and the total absence of any sense of honesty or humanity in any of them, the idea that politicians from any country would o anything about something which won't affect them personally is frankly ludicrous.

As for my own view, whether AGW exists or not, we should all do what we can to avoid waste of any resource simply out of respect for our descendants.

 

[Redman]

I'd accept evidence more readily if it was presented by people without a vested interest in profiteering from it.

 

[Kill_Phil]

its interesting how micheal fish and his pals cant predict what weather im going to get tomorrow accurately, yet can predict various weather changes years down the line... the evidence against climate change is just as strong as for climate change. accept the spin docors choose to ignore these facts to be able to make taxes of all sorts. the whole concept of 'global warming' is tainted and not very well defined...yes the planet is heating up,which ok might be minutely down to us humans, but a lot of it happens to be because of the cycle of the earth and others factors such as the behaviour of the sun.

so why the hell is it ok for the goverment to churn out adverts saying we are going to kill the planet and basically everything alive when it cant back up its argument 100%. show me a definative answer with 1000,s of years information of the earths climate behaviour that is near enough 100% accurate and then i will be taken into this whole concept of climate change!

but on the whole the world does need to cut down on pollution and burning fossil fuels, which means nuclear power my friends which will surely anger the tree hugers out there

 

[Frapple]

So, essentially, you'll never believe in it, as you already know such proof isn't and won't be available in your lifetime.

Surely it's up to the person claiming to provide the proof? (i.e. It's bible time)

 

[drunkenmaster]

I agree about nuclear power - really don't understand why the UK and the US don't use it :/

Don't the USA have some 40-50 Nuclear power stations, none have been commisioned in a long time, since they had a minor meltdown at a US plant IIRC, and obvioudly Chernobyl had a rather bad effect on the building of new nuclear plants.

Obama has started plans to build several more, but theres a lot of nuclear waste to deal with and a lot of enriched nuclear material to make, the more you have, the more fairly big terrorist targets you create aswell and the more targets the harder it becomes to protect them. Blowing up a bog standard power station has little lasting effect, the same can't be said for a nuclear one. We have a few and I think we have plans to build more. But they cost a lot and generally tend to get built fairly close to towns/citys the power is to be used for, its not like you can build a bunch out at sea and any problematic effects from a meltdown will be largely contained simply by lack of proximity.


Most people are rather hoping for a cheaper/safer alternative to nuclear power before normal power stations run out of fuel. China's supposed to have like 100 more coal power stations in the planning/building stages over the next decade because of increased power usage.

Thats the other problem, we shift production and industry out of the states and the UK and the factories need to be powered in China instead. I don't know about you but I don't feel comftable with China building a shedload of nuclear power stations as quickly as possible, with fairly lax regulations.

Its better to build nuclear power stations in countries with stricter control and better safety records to reduce the number of accidents, but that would also mean shifting more production back to countries we can more safely run them, here, the states, richer countries basically.

AS for global warming, didn't the polar ice caps officially GROW this year.

 

[Berserker]

Climate change is a natural phenomenon. The question is not whether or not it is caused by man - the question is how much?

I don't believe we will ever have irrefutable proof of man-made climate change. Or at least not until it's long past time to do anything about it.

The problem is that large-scale climate cycles may happen over tens of thousands of years - whereas man's influence is at best since the industrial revolution, so a few hundred years. As a result, people will always be able to argue that any measured temperature change is due to natural variance.

Climate models aren't really a viable option either. While the current models are reasonably good at predicting what we do know, there's always going to be unknowns. For example, if a Katla-sized event happens, the models will be out for a few years. If Pinatubo-sized, a decade or two. If Yellowstone pops, all bets are off.

IMO, the debate needs to move on from climate change. We need to be looking at ensuring we have a sustainable energy supply for the long term - be that by saving energy, renewables, or whatever else. If we get it right, the climate issue will resolve itself.