Many Nations Pin Climate Hopes On China, India As Hopes For Trump Fade (reuters.com) 335
Twelve readers share a Reuters report: Many countries are pinning their hopes on China and India to lead efforts to slow climate change amid a growing sense of resignation that U.S. President Donald Trump will either withdraw from a global pact or stay and play a minimal role. Delegates at the May 8-18 negotiations in Bonn on a detailed "rule book" for the 2015 Paris Agreement, the first U.N. talks since Trump took office, say there is less foreboding than when Washington last broke with global climate efforts in 2001. Trump doubts global warming has a human cause and says he will decide on a campaign threat to "cancel" the Paris Agreement, the first to bind all nations to set goals to curb emissions, after a group of Seven summit in Italy on May 26-27. "The time when one big player could affect the whole game is past," said Ronald Jumeau, climate ambassador for the Seychelles. "There would be a void without the U.S., but China and India seem to be increasing their effort." Big emitters led by China, the European Union and India have reaffirmed their commitment to Paris, which seeks to phase out greenhouse gas emissions this century by shifting to clean energies. By contrast, Trump wants to favor U.S. coal.
Trump version of... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Trump version of... (Score:5, Insightful)
Saying hopes for Trump on climate issues "fade" is implying they were ever there to begin with. Was anyone ever that uninformed to think that Trump was going to be some environmental crusader?
If you want Trump to do anything about climate change, get behind nuclear to replace coal for base load power generation, which I'd imagine he'd support. A large number of environmentalists have, for many decades now, been hurting their own cause by blocking nuclear at every opportunity, allowing perfect to be the enemy of good.
Of course, it won't happen, as some environmentalist would apparently rather see the apocalypse occur than build more nuke plants. Many of those people have even been going after *hydro* in recent years, which is about as clean as large-scale power generation is going to get. It weakens environmental arguments when practical solutions seem to be rejected out of hand.
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He leads from behind so that it's easier for him to grab some ass.
Re:Trump version of... (Score:4, Insightful)
When everyone else is jumping off a cliff, last is the best spot to be in.
I suspect Trump will be jumping off the cliff once he runs out of staff members to throw off the cliff.
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I agree. The world is indeed going off a cliff with climate change. Most people realize that we need to stop burning fossil fuels and that the economy will be stronger based on renewable solar and wind energy. It's a shame that the US is led by an ignorant, racist moron whose only interest is his personal wealth and ego. This means we are first off the cliff. Congratulations to India and China (and many other countries) who are trying to keep from jumping off the cliff.
Re: Trump version of... (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem is that although solar and wind are decent peak generators, people have been eschewing clean base load generation for decades. Natural gas, nuclear and hydro power, even wind power has been under attack from all forms of "nature freaks" the only thing that doesn't piss anyone off today is solar and coal because we already have coal and they don't understand the environmental impact of silicon production.
People that support Greenpeace and similar alt-environment organizations need to understand that people aren't willing or capable to go back to nomadic hunter-gatherer lifestyles.
Re: Trump version of... (Score:4, Insightful)
I suspect that the "nature freaks" see all this not as a goal to be achieved, but a tool to push their agenda.
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Watermelons...green on the outside, red to the core.
You hear them jump right into 'destroy capitalism', whatever they might be bitching about today. Best ignored and marginalized until they grow up.
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Natural gas isn't clean, it's merely cleaner than coal. Nuclear is extraordinarily expensive and leaves behind some pretty nasty waste. Hydro works, but requires ready water supply and the right geography.
In the end, we're just going to have to develop better batteries or other energy storage techniques.
Re: Trump version of... (Score:5, Interesting)
Batteries are far from clean as well, the cheapest ones we have are full of lead and the best ones we have are full of lithium and all have a lifespan of 3-5 years.
Natural gas is great as auxiliary power and burns pretty close to optimal.
Nuclear can be clean if we wouldn't worry so much about the rogue employee running of with a nearly useless yet personally lethal portion of weapons grade uranium. We're throwing away significant amounts of fuel because of some Cold War fears and wasting more on litigation than it would cost in the first place.
Any amount of energy we generate is going to have some impact. Everybody knows coal and oil is not the way to go but the point is that everyone equally opposes any alternative.
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There are other kinds of energy storage systems than batteries, and the point of a large scale electric grid, like the ones in Europe and North America, is that you can have multiple energy production sources feeding into the grid. This isn't an either-or situation. Nuclear is part of the solution, but I do not see it ever being the most significant factor, and natural gas, like other fossil fuels, is a finite resource. In the long term, unless we discover cheap fusion processes, it is renewables.
Re: Trump version of... (Score:2)
Batteries
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Natural gas, nuclear and hydro power, even wind power has been under attack from all forms of "nature freaks"
Bollocks.
Nuclear was going to be big in China, but after Fukushima they cancelled anything not already started as the risk and cost became clearer.
Hydro... Well, as you love to keep pointing out, they had a pretty bad experience with it. You know that, you keep posting about it when trying to make pro-nuclear points, but suddenly now it's a great option because it supports your flawed argument.
China does use some gas, but doesn't have that much of it and doesn't want to be reliant on imports. They have plen
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Nuclear was going to be big in China, but after Fukushima they cancelled anything not already started as the risk and cost became clearer.
Actually what happened was China had a moratorium on new nuclear plant projects for a couple of years after Fukushima to study what had happened, and then they restarted commissioning new reactor projects after that. Since it takes about five or six years for them to complete a 1GW reactor from scratch they're only bringing five reactors online this year, six years after
China and non-fossil nuclear power (Score:3)
The plans are not back on, they are only finishing sites that had progressed before the accident.
Do you really believe that? Weird...
You can find a list of nuclear power reactors which started construction in China after Fukushima here, about halfway down the page.
http://www.world-nuclear.org/i... [world-nuclear.org]
The [Construction Start] listings in bold are real construction projects, concrete and metal and not just press releases and Powerpoint presentations. They have completion dates ranging from this year through
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Come on comrade, where the hell are you getting your info from? Greenpeace hates coal
Greenpeace hates coal, but they also hate nuclear. They also detest the creation of man-made lakes to power hydro. They don't like anything that's reliable, and they love the idea of returning to a more simple, in-tune-with-nature time, IE, not using energy in the first place.
Re: Trump version of... (Score:3)
Several solid studies have shown that the world's energy need can be met by renewables
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Indeed, a DOE analysis found that the midwest US has enough wind to produce 10x the electricity the whole country uses.
For a tech site, Slashdot seems to have a lot of people who think that the way things are today is the way they will always be, when that has never been the case.
Citation? (Score:2)
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Here is a list of articles/studies/etc [procon.org] divided into both yes (pros) and no (cons). However, keep in mind, they both involve other factors (especially economic & politic) into the account of what could and could not...
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Of course they could... but at what price? Are you willing to pay 50 cents per KWh? I'm not...
Re:Trump version of... (Score:4, Insightful)
I suppose if we see them actually do anything meaningful, then we in the US can look in on it again.
In the US, we've already made great strides in cleaner air...time to sit back and let the rest of the world and the worst polluters make some serious changes, and only then we start risking our economy on overregulation of energy industries that power our economy in so many ways.
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The impacts of climate change are going to be very severe on these two countries. Considering how far behind they're coming from, the fact that they aren't just sticking their heads in the sand and declaring "AGW is a lie!" says something, even if they have long ways to go.
The fact of the matter is that oil isn't going to die the death everyone thought it would even ten years ago, when it was assumed peak oil would hit at some point and oil would leap to several hundreds or even thousands of dollars of barr
Re: Trump version of... (Score:4, Insightful)
When it comes to risking our economy with overregulation, then yes, I say we follow and let someone else "lead" for awhile.
I think it IS time to let the other countries of the world show for real that they are willing to take the economic risks to do this and not us.
The US has already cleaned up its act FAR more than the leading polluters in the world have done, so why not hang back and bit and let's see if China really means what it says on this commitment.
If China actually *does* cut their pollution down and take the drastic steps required to do this in any reasonable period of time, then the US should take another look at joining in.
But no reason for us to be almost the only one that self imposes these regulations on ourselves and putting our economy at risk vs the other countries in the world that only pay lip service to these agreements.
Re: Trump version of... (Score:5, Insightful)
Go fuck yourself.
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It seems money is your primary motivating factor
Of course it is. Money is the primary way in which people in civilizations exchange value.
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Do us all a favour and go bathe downstream of one of your Utopian unregulated chemical plants.
Re: Trump version of... (Score:5, Insightful)
It is sad to hear this sort of conversation. Climate change is not about "us vs. them" or whose turn it is, it's about climate change, a global issue and how the impacts are already devastating today in many parts of the world and will be more so for our children.
What if China didn't do anything (they are waking up to it, fortunately)? Should we just let everything go to hell then?
Everybody needs work hard on this issue, right now. We don't have time for petty bickering. Stragglers will have to be influenced to catch up.
And no, US is not "almost the only one" self-imposing regulations. Furthermore, in the long run climate change would be far far more costly than preventative measures.
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Well, it isn't JUST climate change, there are economic factors.
I'm not willing for my life and lifestyle to go to hell tomorrow in order to "maybe" make a change in decades to a century from now. There has to be reasonable compromise, we just can turn the lights off all and once. And the US can't do it while the rest of the world (and our competitors) do not
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If China doesn't do anything then our own actions mean nothing.
United States could reduce pollution to zero and it would not change the outcome if nobody else cuts.
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What would not having those regulations mean for health care costs? I'm sorry, a polluted environment does have a negative effect on ones standard of living.
Back in the 60's there were rivers so polluted that they'd literally catch on fire. People in Beijing walk around wearing air masks. Th
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What you're advocating is a race to the bottom (Score:4, Insightful)
The US needs to lead here because we're why China is polluting. They're doing it to meet our demand for cheap consumer goods that can be sold at a high profit margin. Not that Europe isn't to blame too, but any time we want we could put our foot down, pay a few hundred dollars more for our electronics & consumer goods and stop the pollution. We don't because we don't want to.
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The US has already cleaned up its act FAR more than the leading polluters in the world have done, so why not hang back and bit and let's see if China really means what it says on this commitment.
The US is 2nd overall in CO2 output (7th per capita). If you've done a lot to clean up your act, it's because your act was pretty fucking bad to begin with. Wielding that as an excuse is akin to banks paying a few million in fines after bilking billions out the populace.
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again with the bullshit thesis that we risk the economy.
news flash: we've had environmental regs since 1899.
the economy has done fine in relation to them.
go peddle your bullshit somewhere else shill.
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Cancelling 100/2100 new plants is not a reduction. It's just less growth.
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Worse than that, at least the cancellations will undoubtedly be replacement for old, inefficient highly polluting coal plant by cleaner, more efficient plants.
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Unless your goal is to pretend to do something for the environment while your real goal is income redistribution from the evil industrialized countries to the virtuous developing countries.
Re:Trump version of... (Score:4, Interesting)
Except destroying the habitat we live in and need for survival is jumping off a cliff, and everyone else is smart enough to see it and take appropriate measures.
I don't get who this We everybody keeps talking about is. It certainly can't be the United States, our GHG emissions are trending down, our transportation fleet has had significant emissions controls for the last 50 years and our country has more trees than it did in the 1850's. Our world is getting greener, not just the US and it's due primarily to CO2 fertilization.
Most of the habitat destruction is done by poor brown people trying to law their way out of energy poverty; environmentalism is a middle-class luxury.
One word: sadness (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:One word: sadness (Score:5, Insightful)
You know you have screwed things up when you have to look at China and India, two countries that have long been considered backwards when it comes to using renewable sources of energy, for a brighter tomorrow.
Given that the combined population of China and India is over 35% of the world's population it makes perfect sense to look to them for long term solutions. Making changes in those countries will have the greatest impact overall.
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Don't look at it as population numbers alone, but as energy used and pollution produced per person. The U.S.A. is a problem.
Re:One word: sadness (Score:4, Insightful)
Don't look at it as population numbers alone, but as energy used and pollution produced per person. The U.S.A. is a problem.
But given the fact that China and India are still developing, when taken into account with the population they have China and India are the best places to start. It's much easier to focus on clean energy and pollution reduction while industries and economies are growing. Once the economy is established then there is considerable incentive for key players within the economy to maintain the status quo. For the ROI, both in terms of political capital/effort and straight up monetary terms, you will get more results from reforms in China and India than you will in the US. Especially given the current corporatist influence in American politics.
Re:One word: sadness (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't look at it as population numbers alone, but as energy used and pollution produced per person. The U.S.A. is a problem.
I agree that the US is an energy pig, but there are two counter points:
1. The US is only 5% of the worlds population, so people in China and India only have to use 1/7 per capita energy of the US and already you are equally the total energy usage of the US.
2. At some point the populations of China and India will start demanding a lifestyle equivalent to that enjoyed by people in the US. When that happens you start to get in deep shit.
I have been saying for literally decades that the US has 5% of the worlds population but consumes 20% of the worlds energy and that when the other 95% of the world start demanding their 20% of energy, the the shit will really hit the fan.
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There's a hell of alot more counter points than that. Only 7% of our energy usage is residential: https://upload.wikimedia.org/w... [wikimedia.org]
So per capita isn't even a great measure. We have a huge GDP with alot of industry, which equates to a great deal of energy usage. If you take GDP into account, the US ranks some
Re:One word: sadness (Score:5, Informative)
Making changes in those countries will have the greatest impact overall.
CO2 emissions per capita (2015):
US: 16.1t
China: 7.7t
India: 1.9t
The US has 4% of the population but produces 14% of the CO2. Seems to me that the US could make a pretty big impact if they stopped trying to find excuses not to.
Re:One word: sadness (Score:5, Insightful)
China is doing pretty well compared to how the west did during its industrial revolution. Hindsight helps.
Renewables are big business and the future of energy, and as the US turns away from them China sees an opportunity. Fortunately some parts of Europe are pushing ahead too, and of course Japan.
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Well compared to the west. Europe and the US had terrible air too, and for longer, and produced a lot more pollution and CO2 per person.
U.S. Is already done (Score:2)
Why sadness?
The U.S. long ago already met the coyote protocols. There are very little gains to be had at this point from the U.S. trashing the economy any further; ay real CO2 reduction gains can ONLY be had by looking at China and India.
Thank you Autocorrect - Koyoto not "coyote" (Score:2)
Though frankly "coyote" is a better term for a system designed to scavenge from developed countries.
Or if you like a kinder interpretation would be, that it is a protocol designed for countries to run leaner on...
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Only Liberals would be so willfully blind as to look at a shithole like most of India and China and say "I WISH WE COULD BE MORE LIKE THEM"...simply because of politics.
America First? (Score:2)
It makes a lot of sense for China/India to lead (Score:4, Interesting)
I'm glad to see it. Trump is a regressive relic of an era of disinformation and anti-science, anti-problem-solving "I can do no wrong" ethos. That has to die.
We live in a connected world. Protectionism is no protection in the long or short term. We have to address these issues as a global community, and that means making the economics of any solution apply universally as much as possible. Or it won't work.
The US can pay carbon taxes all day long but unless China and India get a serious investment in non-burning energy sources, it's a wasted effort.
So, India, China, other nations.... LEAD ON. Innovate, invest, and show the world that greedy old-coal financial interests aren't more important than the planet itself.
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Pay what carbon tax...?!?!
We're not paying any type of tax, carbon or otherwise to any regulating body in the world....
What a shit post... (Score:5, Insightful)
The amount of pollution is negligible compared to China. Have you been to China? They are in no way trying to fix this. The air is thick and metallic tasting. The only time they fix it is when they shut the factories down for the celebration of one of their communist holidays.
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Foxes. Henhouses. You know the rest. (Score:5, Insightful)
"China and India to lead efforts to slow climate change "
We've sure seen the results of China's forward looking environmental policies. Especially in scenic untouched places like Baotou, and in the pristine air of Beijing.
So, good luck with that.
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We've sure seen the results of China's forward looking environmental policies. Especially in scenic untouched places like Baotou, and in the pristine air of Beijing.
On the other hand, because they've screwed up so badly, and because poor air quality affects everyone, including the highest members of the government, they're actually doing something about it. China is the biggest investor [forbes.com] in renewable power [wikipedia.org] and has a dozen nuclear power plants under construction [wikipedia.org]. They're not in a good place right now, but at least they're moving in the right direction. The same cannot be said of the US.
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We already did clean up our act on many things. I remember the air in Gary Indiana in the early 70s. It was orange. And there was the lovely LA smog in 1974 or so when I visited there. I also remember the larger amount of litter on our highways in the 60s/early 70s.
The problems were highly visible and you could smell them. We dealt with those to a large extent. Now, it's CO2, methane, etc. Invisible, don't smell, don't undergo photochemical reactions to make a haze. It's a much less visible problem. Are you
Gary, and Newark, and Pittsburgh (Score:2)
And Pittsburgh used to be a grimy stinkpot. I was there last month, though, and I was amazed-- really beautiful city, now that they've stopped the smog and peeled the accumulated grime away.
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"Its hard to see the point you're trying to make"
That applies to your response, too. Are you saying you're more concerned about assigning blame someplace you'd prefer it? Great. Blame me. That evil Hartree is the source of all our problems. Now, we've solved that issue. ;)
Yes, widespread air conditioning would increase energy usage in in India. And? I'm hardly going to worry that some of the Indians might be more comfortable.
Do you propose that we tell them that they somehow don't "deserve" air conditioning
Re:Foxes. Henhouses. You know the rest. (Score:4, Informative)
You know, I remember the 60s and early 70s in the US, before the Clean Air Act was amended to empower the federal government to regulate emissions.
If you are under 50, you would not believe how bad things got. Look at pictures of Los Angeles [wikimedia.org], New York [wikimedia.org], or Chicago [wikimedia.org]. Hell, even Salt Lake City [wikimedia.org] was barely recognizable. It wasn't just big cities, either; small cities like Birmingham looked like this [al.com].
When you look at an old movie or TV show from the late 60s early 70s and everything in the distance looks hazy, that's not the film. That's what cities actually looked like on a good day.
I bring this up because the decision to to do something about air pollution was a sign of how healthy our democracy used to be. There was a problem that was costly and complex to tackle, but we did it. And as today there were people who profited by the status quo, that allowed them to externalize their waste management costs. The difference is that their hold on politicians was a lot less, and there was more independent media. Had we not done something about air pollution in 1970, we'd be where Beijing is now, and we'd be just as powerless to do anything about it today.
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Wait 6 months (Score:2, Interesting)
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Yeah, keep holding your breath, skippy. We've seen this kind of banter about every administration for my lifetime and it never really goes anywhere. The difference is that your soapbox is a little bigger but that doesn't make what you say any truer.
Re: Wait 6 months (Score:3)
Are you still waiting on Obamas birth certificate or his mother to be fired from the White House payrolls or were you not alive for the last presidential inauguration?
This bothers me (Score:5, Interesting)
Who ever said we can only fix environmental problems by electing the 'right' president? We don't need the federal government to make a difference, we can (and I would argue are) collectively working to solve this problem through the free market mechanisms available to us!
Now excuse me while i get in my honda with ridiculously good gas mileage, and drive to the local farmers market to buy organic local produce, while i drink my Soylent meal that took 90% less CO2 to produce than any conventional meal, and then go home to my apartment that is cooled by a sun roof and electricity supplied by wind power
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These assholes absolutely know fossil fuels have a guaranteed end of life where prices are going to inflate massively at some point when they start to become much more scarce. This results in massive profits to these people and their shareholders as they hold the fossil fuel depend
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I live in the US and have a car with ridiculously good gas mileage, where I drive 60 miles every day. When I lived in another country, NOBODY did that (and personally, I walked about 10 minutes to work). In the US, that sort of commute is very common. Having a car that is 25% more efficient in a country with long-ass commutes and an addiction to freeways is a false economy.
Solar power is cool for the future. So far, it isn't a significant factor. Not running your AC is more environmentally friendly tha
No, we didn't (Score:5, Insightful)
And you can't fix the environment with a president who is openly hostile to the EPA. Poor people still can't drink the water in Flint, MI you know? And your Honda's good millage & clean emissions is dwarfed by the number of Trucks calling themselves SUVs on the road.
Trump: (Score:2)
Making America irrelevant again!
"as hopes for Trump fade" (Score:2)
Pin Hopes on Yourselves (Score:3, Insightful)
They can start worrying less (Score:2)
Trump Bashing (Score:3)
Look, I get it; Trump is horrible. He's a horrible person and an even worse president.
However.
Why SHOULD the US shoulder the responsibility, when we aren't even the worst polluter? In our rush to criticize Trump, we're giving the two worst polluters on the planet a free pass. If Trump pulling back on the accord prompts China and India to step up their game...isn't that a net benefit to the climate?
Unhinged criticism is precisely how Trump got elected, and is likely to be why he gets re-elected.
Re:Trump Bashing (Score:5, Insightful)
Why SHOULD the US shoulder the responsibility, when we aren't even the worst polluter?
America burns about 3 tonnes of coal per capita each year (900 million tonnes last year for 320 million people). China burns a little over two tonnes of coal per capita each year (2.9 billion tonnes last year for 1.4 billion people). India burns about the same amount of coal as America does to supply 1.3 billion people, about half a tonne per capita.
America IS the worst polluter of the three, and that doesn't even begin to take the oil and gas the US also burns into consideration. Americans use over twice as much energy per capita as the rest of the world and much of that energy is derived from fossil fuel.
Climate ambassador for the Seychelles? (Score:2)
Seriously? The Seychelles have less than 100,000 people. They should absolutely not have an "ambassador" on the international stage. That would be like some idiot from one of the bum-fuck suburbs around any city in the States randomly showing up and pretending that they mattered. This really irritates me. Not that I disagree with him, of course, but he and his islands are just not important enough to be quotable. Of course everyone deserves a voice, but it must be proportional.
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Re:It's about time (Score:4, Insightful)
You forgot all the rubbish that was manufactured there in the first place, then wasted fuel to be sent to us, used for less than a year and then wasted fuel to send it back over there for "disposal" (i.e. trash heap, no recycling).
Both [Re:It's about time] (Score:4, Insightful)
It's about time we focused on emissions from "developing countries."
The correct answer is "focus on both". You can't solve global problems by saying "let the other guy solve all the problems, we won't do anything." And you also can't solve global problems by saying "we'll work on our problems, but we'll ignore everybody else's contributions."
That's the thing about "global": it's everybody's problem.
The stuff the US emits is harmless plant food compared to the toxic shit these derelicts dump into the air and water on a day to day basis.
Well, per capita, the US emits far far more than the rest of the world. But the U.S. is a small fraction of the world.
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Well, per capita, the US emits far far more than the rest of the world. But the U.S. is a small fraction of the world.
The US also feeds more of the world per capita, Protects more of the World's people from aggression per capita and provides more of the World's people with heavily subsidized medicine per capita, than any other country in the world.
If some other country wants to take a turn being the lightning rod for the World's anger, then have at it.
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Well, per capita, the US emits far far more than the rest of the world. But the U.S. is a small fraction of the world.
The US also feeds more of the world per capita, Protects more of the World's people from aggression per capita and provides more of the World's people with heavily subsidized medicine per capita, than any other country in the world. If some other country wants to take a turn being the lightning rod for the World's anger, then have at it.
I'm not sure why you think that's relevant to the current discussion.
I'm also not sure how it is we decided that we and we alone were supposed to be in charge of running the world. I, for one, would be fine if another nation would take a turn at being the lightning rod for the world's anger.
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Uh?
Idiot tatooed on your forehead?
The little island in front of Florida, called Cuba, provides more medical aid to the world than all G8 nations together.
That is per capita probably a factor of 5000 more than the USA does. To lazy to look up the numbers, could easily be a factor of 10,000.
I guess the world will be peacefull and happy again when Gods own country of idiots is falling back into insignificance.
Regarding 'developing aid' _per capita_ I doubt the USA makes it into the top 20, and if so it is only
Re:The models fail: Holocene Temperature Conundrum (Score:5, Insightful)
There's till flat Earthers too, but thinking creatures dismiss them; just like we dismiss you. Sorry.
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That is not how science works
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THE MODELS DON'T FUCKING WORK.
The models over-estimate warming over an 11,000 year span because they weren't designed to be run over an 11,000 year span. As the paper you linked to says:
Basically, that paper says that the studied models are not accurately reflecting the actual effects of the Milankovitch Cycle, which is a valuable insight, and something that should be improved
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He either got this from a pseudo-skeptic blog or just googled it. The deniers don't actually read the papers, they just look for certain key phrases and then declare "All the scientists are wrong!!!!"
The models don't fail: Holocene Temperature Max (Score:2)
Looking at the graphs, the models seem to reproduce the overall features pretty well. Heres the comparison graph from the paper you cite: http://www.pnas.org/content/11... [pnas.org]
There are still some variances in the details, but overall, it's the way science works-- you start with getting the overall shape right, and then progressively refine details.
I should point out that it's hard to match the details of the Holocene thermal max because the details aren't really known. It's not even really clear if it was a
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C02 ppm is going up, that's a fact. C02 has an atmospheric effect that helps trap in heat, also a fact.
You can argue how much of an total impact increased C02 emissions have on global climate, you can't argue that more C02 in the air is something we should continue doing.
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Oh boy, scientists totally forgot about the sun! You've cracked the case!
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You're the first ever comment I've ever read with factual information that shows an alternative point of view against all this climate change debate.
And when you think about it, if a single solar flare has the potential to be big enough to end all life on the planet, it sure as hell can modify the climate.
So the question is, can we increase the strength of the planet's natural shield?
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
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http://thatsugarfilm.com/ [thatsugarfilm.com]
Makes sense for UNdeveloped contries to lead (Score:2)
...to commit economic suicide.
Actually, not. The interesting thing about both China and India is that in large parts of the country, they don't have an electrical power grid. So they can install solar-based power solutions without jettisoning the sunk-costs of the existing infrastructure. Building a nation-spanning electrical grid is actually expensive. If you don't have one to start with, going with decentralized generation makes a lot of sense. Contrawise, when you already do have one, much of the advantage of decentralized generati
Re: Trumplestiltskin strikes again (Score:2)
If everybody else uses renewables and doesn't want oil, oil will be cheap. These things will trickle over IF they are ever done. People and corporations are already planning solar installations, if they're the panacea to cheap energy everybody will have them regardless of what the state says we should do. The problem, on large scales it doesn't work. Germany produces 100% renewable energy one day, paying customers to use energy and charges $3/kWh another day, all the while importing French nuclear reactors'
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Well I see that the corporate efforts to confuse the issue have certainly been successful on you!