What we’ve learned from the biofuels series

Future or folly? Photo: iStockphoto After spending much of the last several months thinking about the biofuels boom and its...

Stories of how Measure 37 has affected Oregon landowners

For two days now, I've been blathering on about the unholy "property rights" ballot measures in 2006 -- see here and here. But if you really want to understand the potential impacts of these takings initiatives, there's one real-world example: Oregon.

For two years, Oregon has been the only state in the nation with a pay-or-waive law on the books: Measure 37. The results clearly illustrate the dangers facing other Western states. So as a way to warn other places of what can happen, Sightline Institute (where I work) recently compiled a batch of real-life stories from neighbors and communities in Oregon.

You can read the full stories, along with some additional context, in our report, Property Wrongs (PDF). If you don't have time for that, here's the bite-sized version:

A single-issue movement won’t cut it

David Roberts has been writing about environmental talking points. But I think that skips a step. We need to examine what kind of politics the talking points are intended to contribute to.

I don't think I have to persuade anyone reading this blog to forget about informed, competent insiders trying persuasion from the inside. Romm tried that with both government and business since the early '90s. Al Gore spent decades as a Senator and Vice President of the U.S. playing insider baseball on the issue. Amory Lovins has been pursuing the "appeal to rational business self-interest" strategy since 1976!

The only thing will make change is a bunch of ordinary people getting together and exercising their democratic rights as citizens. And it is not just us dirty hippies saying that. Non-hippie former VP Al Gore says:

‘Antarctic ice is growing’–Well, probably not, but even if it were, we are not off the hook

(Part of the How to Talk to a Global Warming Skeptic guide)

Objection: The Antarctic ice sheets are actually growing, which wouldn't be happening if global warming were real.

Answer: There are two distinct problems with this argument.

First, any argument that tries to use a regional phenomenon to disprove a global trend is dead in the water. Anthropogenic global warming theory does not predict uniform warming throughout the globe. We need to assess the balance of the evidence.

Enviros turn eco ear to House races

There are few key House races we here at Gristmill will be keeping an eye on tonight, races where the environment has been a big issue in the run up to today's elections. We're looking for feedback from you on others where environmental issues will be a factor in tonight's results.

A review of Joe Romm’s new book

Joseph Romm's Hell and High Water may be the most depressing book on global warming I've ever read.

He writes of a "Planetary Purgatory" [UPDATE - by the 22nd Century], where sea level rises 20 feet, many coastal cities are subject to such frequent hurricanes they are abandoned, and most of the Greenland ice mass melts. What are today considered heat waves become normal summers, with more and more forest and agricultural land lost to fire and drought.

Here's the really bad news: this is not what Romm is trying to avoid, but what he hopes to settle for.

People Still Read Those Things?

Newspaper and magazine companies seek to lessen environmental impact A handful of large publishers are beginning to think about the...

A review of Happy Feet, the wildly successful musical-penguin eco-flick

Dear Children of America, I used to be one of you. I used to beg and wheedle and whine and...

‘The hockey stick is broken’–Well, no … but who’s playing hockey anyway?

(Part of the How to Talk to a Global Warming Skeptic guide)

Objection: The Hockey Stick graph -- the foundation of global warming theory -- has been shown to be scientifically invalid, perhaps even a fraud.

Answer: The first order of business here is to correct the mischaracterization of this single paleoclimate study as the "foundation" of global warming theory.

What's going on today is understood via study of today's data and today's best scientific theories. Reconstructions of past temperatures are about, well, the past. Study of the past can be informative for scientists, but it is not explanatory of the present nor is it predictive of the future. The scientific foundation of global warming theory contains much more than a few tree-rings and the temperature during the Medieval Warm Period.

RealClimate has an interesting article about what it would mean for today's climate theories if the MWP had indeed been warmer than today.

Now, about that pesky bit of sporting equipment ...