Climate Climate & Energy

Is It Hot in Here, Or Is It Just Me?

2005 to be one of the hottest years recorded This year will go down as one of the hottest on record. NASA’s Goddard Institute says 2005 will beat 1998, the current record-holder, while the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the U.K. Meteorological Office — using the same land and ocean data as NASA, but […]

The Talk of the Drown

Polar bears drowning as Alaska sea ice disappears OK, we’re trying to keep a positive outlook here, but … drowning polar bears? Seriously? And just when therapy was starting to work. In September 2004 (the year the polar ice cap receded a record 160 miles from Alaska’s north coast), federal researchers doing routine aerial surveys […]

Polar bears drowning

I thought this new Greenpeace commercial was kind of a cutesy joke. But no: Turns out polar bears really are drowning.

(Yeah, it's subscription only, so there's an excerpt below the fold.)

Gas prices

It's an open question how much gasoline prices affect gasoline consumption. But apparently gas prices are pretty tightly correlated with something else. Click to find out what.

(Via Tapped)

Off Season

Climate change is messing with the seasons in a Rocky Mountain forest Since 1968, researchers have gathered air samples from near the summit of Colorado’s Niwot Ridge in the Rocky Mountains, and tracked carbon dioxide levels in the conifer forest below. They’ve amassed the world’s third-longest record of atmospheric carbon dioxide, and that record provides […]

All This Aggravation Ain’t Satisfactionin’ Us

Montreal summit wraps up with agreement to … have more summits The U.N. climate talks in Montreal ended this weekend with plenty of drama but little progress. The big news, such as it is, is an agreement by a coalition of some 150 nations to convene new talks to generate a set of binding greenhouse-gas […]

Let’s Take This Slow on the Road

Campaign by right-wing U.S. group aims to derail E.U. climate policy American lobbyist Chris Horner is trying to convince major European companies to join a campaign against the Kyoto Protocol and any future such strategies to curb emissions of heat-trapping gases — but he’s not making much headway. Horner is a senior fellow at the […]

The Summit of Our Discontent

U.S. continues to stomp mightily on Montreal climate summit Poor Canada got it from both sides this week at the Montreal climate summit. On Tuesday, it suggested that the 189 nations party to the original 1992 U.N. climate convention meet formally over the next two years to discuss post-Kyoto strategies for greenhouse-gas reduction. The Bush […]

More!

About a week ago I did a short post on Prius/oil-related matters that seemed to irritate a few folks. I hadn't noticed until today that our occasional contributor (and pundit nonpareil) Clark Williams-Derry posted a response. He seemed to be approaching the question the same way some other people did, so I thought I'd offer a reply.

To recap:

A Wall Street Journal editorial (sub.) said this:

Petroleum not consumed by Prius owners is not "saved." It does not stay in the ground. It is consumed by someone else. Greenhouse gases are still released.

Treehugger's Lloyd Alter said (I paraphrase): What a jerk.

I said (again paraphrasing): Yes, he's a jerk, but on this narrow point, he's right.

Several commenters thought I was making a point about the futility of energy conservation generally. But I wasn't -- the point is about oil in particular.

Bart, and at greater length Clark, mentioned the "rebound effect," whereby reduced demand lowers price, which subsequently raises demand. Both of them make the point that although the rebound effect is real, demand only bounces back about 30-50%. So, while using less oil may not make the total efficiency gains you'd want, it does make some efficiency gains. It does save some oil.

To which I say: For "energy" generically, yes. For electricity, yes. For something like coal, where supply is plentiful, yes. But oil?

Ah-Ha California

California pushing ahead with ambitious plan to fight global warming Earlier this year, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger (R) broke with the Bush administration’s do-nothing stance on global warming when he pledged that by 2050, his state would shrink its greenhouse-gas emissions to 80 percent of 1990 levels. On Thursday, the state’s Climate Action Team will […]