Climate change is a fact.
The shift to a cleaner energy economy won’t happen overnight, and it will require tough choices along the way. But the debate is settled. Climate change is a fact. And when our children’s children look us in the eye and ask if we did all we could to leave them a safer, more stable world, with new sources of energy, I want us to be able to say yes, we did. (Obama, 2013)
Originally shared by Jason Davison
President Obama, in the State of the Union, just declared:
Climate Change is a Fact.
Climate scientists and Barack Obama are standing up together!
Science on Google+ 
John Poteet The problem today in this area is that people are unwilling to accept any challenge to the prevailing views. People’s minds have been closed to objective facts. Simulations aren’t accurate enough to predict the future because many, many factors have been left out, and the phenomena such as the butterfly-effect can’t be modeled. I’m not putting any of my personal physics (whatever that is) into the picture, just asking people to be open to the fact that the science isn’t perfect today. That is what the giants I mentioned earlier are trying to get people to realize. Basing our entire economy on projections that can’t be proven is dangerous and foolish. Dealing with pollutants that are known to cause immediate harm is more important than labeling a natural component of the atmosphere as a pollutant.
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David Forslund, the nice part of cutting back on CO2 emissions is that a lot of other pollutants decrease. The IPCC report on radiative forcing shows the current concerns:
http://www.climatechange2013.org/images/figures/WGI_AR5_Fig8-20.jpg
David, cutting back on burning fossil fuels is good policy for everyone.
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Jason Davison Cutting back may be a good idea, and doing things such as switching to natural gas can accomplish this. Also reducing pollution by approving the Keystone XL pipeline which reduces the likelihood and frequencies of spills and moves the oil further from the Chinese which cuts down the emissions from its use are all good ideas in this direction, but seem to be rejected by those who seem to have a political agenda rather than an anti-pollution agenda.
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David Forslund, I agree with Natural Gas. However, I’m against the Keystone pipeline.
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Jason Davison Why oppose the Keystone Pipleline? The oil will come out of the ground regardless of whether it comes through the U.S., and it is likely to come through the U.S. by train or truck which is much more likely to have a spill than the pipeline will. The environmental issues were resolved a long time ago by the states involved. The U.S. does a much better job with emissions from oil than almost any other country, so from a global perspective, this reduces potential pollution. I see no rational reason to oppose it.
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I’m not a fan of using tar sands. They have a high CO2/J ratio when compared to other traditional sources of oil. I would prefer if we would use more carbon friendly sources of oil than the tar sands.
Natural Gas is so much more clean and I would prefer to use this source for the time being until we can replace them with renewables and nuclear.
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Right, they’re going to destroy the planet’s ecosystem anyway so why not let them maximize their profits while they do so.
Nope. That’s just idiocy right there.
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What we still have here are old conservatives telling lies they can’t back up with solid science.
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It is tar sands and the only way they get anything resembling oil out of it is by creating massive pollution. The bottom line is the the easy oil is gone and the average barrel of “oil” tomorrow will always cost more than the oil you purchased yesterday.
Meanwhile Tesla is making electric cars that can be powered by solar panels or wind turbines and BMW is making electric bicycles and scooters.
http://cleantechnica.com/2013/10/24/bmw-electric-bike-bmw-cruise-e-bike-2014/
http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13746_7-57482874-48/bmw-shows-75-mph-electric-scooter/
Even Forbes is acknowledging that e-bikes are eating into car sales in Europe. They’re more economical and less hassle.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/pikeresearch/2013/05/08/are-e-bicycle-sales-reducing-car-sales-in-europe/
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John Poteet Nothing we do will stop Canada from getting that oil out of the ground. The only question is what happens to it after it is out of the ground. We can have some influence on that, but if we think we can stop Canada from getting the oil from the ground by not building the pipeline, we are fools.
Electric cars powered by solar panels or wind farms? What about the distribution and the sporadic nature of the source?
e-bikes might work in Europe for some transportation, but not very well in the wide open spaces in the western U.S. or even commuting in the East. We need at least an order of magnitude improvement in battery capacity and power.
These ideas aren’t realistic proposals for replacing gasoline powered vehicles. If we would embrace natural gas powered vehicles, which we could quite easily, we could actually do a lot to reduce pollution and carbon emissions. So I’m skeptical that the real motive is reducing carbon emissions, but trying to make a buck, which is what the carbon credits are all about, not about cutting pollution.
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You’re going with the “since we’re raping the environment anyways you might as well enjoy it” defense David Forslund? Seriously? Along with the wholly fictional “sporadic nature of renewable power” nonsense.
We have a few nuclear power plants in California that are sporadic as hell; they’re producing nothing, no power whatsoever. Meanwhile the sun rises every day and we get several gigawatts of midday solar power: every, single, day.
Even today when it’s a little cloudy in SoCal the wind is up so it all balances out.
http://www.caiso.com/Pages/TodaysOutlook.aspx#SupplyandDemand
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John Poteet You know I’m not saying that. We can’t control what other countries are doing. Doing the Keystone Pipeline or not doesn’t change the reality of the oil coming out of the ground.
How do you use those solar gigawatts at night when you need the power. Standby power generation will always be needed and how much of the countries power can be obtained from solar or wind? By the way I have had solar panels on my house for over 30 years, so I’m not against solar at all. I just don’t think it is realistic to think we can get rid of fossil fuels.
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You’re being a deliberate idiot David Forslund. All of those problems. All of them. Have been solved. The wind blows more at night so wind turbines take up the slack of solar. Electric vehicles can replace cars. Ground source heat pumps need a fraction of the energy to heat your house a gas furnace uses. The solutions are available.
All the way down the line.
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John Poteet Show me the solutions for the erratic wind and solar power. Batteries aren’t nearly big enough. If there are solutions, show me where they are implemented and by whom.
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It’s right here:
Western Wind and Solar Integration Study
Key Findings
The integration of 35% wind and solar energy into the electric power system will not require extensive infrastructure if changes are made to operational practices.
Wind and solar energy displace fossil fuels. A 35% penetration of solar and wind power would reduce fuel costs by 40% and carbon emissions by 25%–45%—the rough equivalent of taking 22–36 million cars off the road—compared to today’s system.
Increasing the size of the geographic area over which the wind and solar resources are drawn substantially reduces variability.
Scheduling generation and interchanges subhourly reduces the need for fast reserves.
Using wind and solar forecasts in utility operations reduces operating costs by up to 14%.
Existing transmission capacity can be better used. This will reduce new transmission needs.
Demand response programs can provide flexibility that enables the electric power system to more easily integrate wind and solar—and may be cheaper than alternatives.”
http://www.nrel.gov/electricity/transmission/western_wind.html
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You’ll never admit you’re wrong David Forslund because you’re basically a liar. You claim to be a physicist but refuse to acknowledge the validity of peer-reviewed journals, the radiation absorption and emissions spectrum of CO2, the very simple mathematics of basic climate change theory or the fact that these theories are backed up by observed climate change.
One way or the other you’re lying. You either have the credentials you claim and therefore the understanding that _blog posts do not trump peer reviewed science_ or you don’t have the credentials and you’re a fraud.
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John Poteet You have no grounds for calling me a liar. That is only an ad hominem attack on me. I have many published papers in peer reviewed journals and understand the issues that underly this. I understand the physics of CO2 absorption. None of that is at question. The question is what is happening to the climate and why. There are much more reputable physicists than myself who question the conclusions and the connections to measurements. Dissent is healthy in the scientific world, and what I see is the deliberate effort to suppress dissent from those that disagree with the conclusions of the community. You know very well I’m not lying. Why has there been essentially no global warming over the past decade, if it is inexorably tied to one measurement, the CO2 concentration? Why are otherwise reputable scientist fudging the data?
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What’s your explanation David Forslund? You’re a physicist that can’t understand physics perhaps? In 1896 Svante Arrhenius hypothesized that if we burned enough coal and oil the globe would warm. We ran the experiment and, sure enough, the globe, has, in fact, warmed.
There has also been warming over the past decade you nitwit. Trenberth found the heat in the oceans. The arctic sea ice melted and most importantly, the evidence is in the atmospheric record.
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2014/01/30/global-temperature-the-post-1998-surprise/
The only way you can claim there has been no warming in the last decade is if you cherry pick your data field to exclude the atmospheric record prior to 1997. That’s garbage and you know it.
You’re a liar David Forslund or you’re a senile old man that needs to retire from the field.
If you are who you say you are write your own paper and submit it for review. If you’re not STFU about your credentials because they don’t matter if you don’t use them properly. There’s no conspiracy to conceal anything. There’s just the physics of CO2 saying you’re wrong.
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Why the insulting language? Pointless name calling only weakens your case. 14 years without global warming is significant. People were predicting global cooling several decades ago.
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Why the Gish Gallop David Forslund? You’re not refuting a single argument. You’re not pointing to a single, peer reviewed paper that states clearly that there’s no anthropogenic climate change. You’re not sourcing any of your arguments.
Now you’re pulling out the pathetic “global cooling” argument?
These are old, tired, bogus, arguments.
There was no scientific weight behind a global cooling prediction in the 1970’s. The scholar who did write the article cited by Time magazine is alive and clearly says it doesn’t refute current AGW theory at all.
http://skepticalscience.com/ice-age-predictions-in-1970s.htm
http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn11643-climate-myths-they-predicted-global-cooling-in-the-1970s.html
The answer to every other argument of yours is probably also here: http://skepticalscience.com/argument.php
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I’m simply not going to respect somebody who makes claims that he doesn’t source. Doesn’t address a sourced refutation of his claims. Refuses to acknowledge basic science and then repeats often debunked, political, talking points over and over.
That isn’t science: that’s spam. Since we’re not having a scientific discussion but refuting a troll I see no reason to use gentle language.
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Yep, Obama said it. That means we REALLY know its true…
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Robert Clark Are you stupid enough to think President Obama is referring to his own research? The President is referring to the findings of his science advisers, the U.S. Navy, the AAAS and NASA.
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