Climate Climate & Energy

The damming question

It's been 50 years since Celilo Falls in Oregon was buried by the Dalles Dam to create 800 megawatts of power, but the memory of the great salmon runs lost live on through the tribes who migrated again this year to the spot to mourn the day. Orion Grassroots Network member group Save Our Wild Salmon opined eloquently in the Oregonian this week about the choices our society made for green power.

What should be the cost of skepticism?

Every few months, it seems, someone comes out with the great idea about how people who are wrong in the climate-change debate should have something really bad done to them. Who can forget our very own David's, ahem, indiscretion? Or Heidi Cullen and her suggestion to strip skeptical meteorologists of their AMS credentials?

Over on Roger Pielke Sr.'s Climate Science blog, guest blogger Hendrik Tennekes suggests some tit-for-tat:

More than once I have dreamed of regulations that would cut the retirement pay of climate modelers in half if their forecasts proved off the mark at their retirement. Such an arrangement would also help them keep their feet on the ground concerning the prediction horizon of climate scenarios.

What's interesting is Tennekes doesn't mention what should happen to scientists who claim that climate change is not happening, yet turn out to be wrong. Perhaps they should have their retirement taken away, too?

But What About Liechtenstein?

Survey unearths international climate-change attitudes A majority of South Koreans believe global warming is a critical threat. Same with Iranians. And Mexicans. And Israelis. But Americans — not so much, says a recent survey of more than 20,000 people in more than 15 countries. Granted, the U.S. could have been more ignorant: a solid 46 […]

Bush to cut funding for geothermal

The Bush administration wants to eliminate federal support for geothermal power just as many U.S. states are looking to cut greenhouse gas emissions and raise renewable power output. A comprehensive new MIT-led study of the potential for geothermal energy within the United States has found that mining the huge amounts of heat that reside as […]

Join me for some navel gazing!

There is sometimes a fine line between opposing something and not supporting it; between believing that something should be advocated against and believing it should not be advocated for; between believing that something is bad and believing that there are several better options. Two examples come to mind. One is adaptation, as opposed to mitigation, […]

Is it a communications failure?

Recent news articles have pointed out that we in the U.S. do not consider global warming a critical threat. Some bloggers have argued that this is the result of a communications failure (e.g., here or here or here).

The decision whether to worry about a looming issue is a value judgment, not a scientific one. You and I could agree entirely on the science of climate change, but disagree about whether it's something for our society to address.

For example, one argument against us worrying about climate change is that our descendants will be much richer than we are, so they will be better able to address whatever climate change occurs -- thus, we should leave the problem for them. At its heart, this is a moral choice.

On a Bing and an Err

Stanford and U.C. Berkeley criticized for partnerships with Big Oil Movie producer Steve Bing has yanked a promised $2.5 million donation to Stanford University in response to several TV and print ads wherein ExxonMobil touts its partnership with the school. Exxon is funding up to $100 million of Stanford’s climate and energy research; Bing, whose […]

Why Broad’s NYT piece isn’t all that important

[ed. note from David Roberts: It appears everyone in the climate world was writing about this piece at once! My response is here; RealClimate's is here; Tim Lambert's is here. Now take it away, Andrew.]

William J. Broad writes today on the complicated relationship between Al Gore and the scientific community in the New York Times.

Here's the thesis of the article:

But part of his scientific audience is uneasy. In talks, articles and blog entries that have appeared since his film and accompanying book came out last year, these scientists argue that some of Mr. Gore's central points are exaggerated and erroneous. They are alarmed, some say, at what they call his alarmism.

The gray lady gets it woefully, laughably wrong

Yesterday, Drudge breathlessly reported a coming “hit on Gore” from The New York Times. Today that hit has come, in the form of a state-of-the-art piece of slime from Bill Broad. This may be the worst, sloppiest, most dishonest piece of reporting I’ve ever seen in the NYT. It’s got all the hallmarks of a […]

He Believes in Miracles

Former Jamaican bobsled team founder seeks energy independence as mayor It’s a career crisis we’ve all faced at some point: what comes after you’ve created the Jamaican Olympic bobsled team? For George Fitch, now the mayor of Warrenton, Va., the answer stinks. Fitch wants to make the 8,000-person town energy independent by 2010 by building […]