A SNAPSHOT IN TIME

Making Backyard Ice In An Age Of Global Warming

By Todd Wilkinson, 12-24-06

	Caption: Photo by Todd Wilkinson

While you are reading these words, I am putting our Montana backyard on ice.

I've been out past midnight for a couple of weeks now trying to make peace with the natural elements and uneven contours of frozen sod in order to make a skating rink for the kids.

I must say that it is starting to look sweet as it shines in the end-of-day sunlight.

We've got a hockey net at one end with webbing strung across the trees to prevent flying pucks from reaching the neighbor's windows, though I fear this makeshift Maginot Line will ultimately prove futile.

We also have face-off dots layered into the surface for my son's pick-up games with friends over the holidays. And in a corner glistens a perfectly-smooth patch where my daughter carves turns and pirouettes.

Making outdoor ice in an age of global warming is going to get trickier.

What passes today as a modest extravagance in attempting to defy the gusts of warm Chinook winds that blow through in January and inevitably will turn this project into puddles is nothing compared to the epic struggle in the mountains between glaciers and the rising global thermostat.

Like ancient mystics, we native-born northerners speak of "old fashioned" seasons when snow was roof deep, days of bitter cold lasted for interminable stretches, and gardens couldn't be planted til June. We talk amongst ourselves of being able to skate on frozen lakes early around Thanksgiving and on natural ice later into the winter than we do now.

The vertical spine of the Rockies has been a frigid oasis in the West.

The manifestations of winter may appear unchanging, but old timers and peer-reviewed scientists know better. They sense the shift in their salty bones and in the metrics of precise measurements.

Decades from now when the glaciers are memorialized in our oral tradition, the same way that Native Americans speak of free-ranging bison in their origin stories, I wonder what our kids will remember of winter?

Maybe I'm being selfish in recreating an artificial skating pond out back and clicking digital photos of the kids playing shinny during Christmas week as we did in the sixties and seventies, but I want them to have more than a mental recollection of how it is, and was.

On this side of the picture window which overlooks the modest rink, I have two file cabinets full of scientific reports and studies I've accumulated dating back to the early 1990s on climate change.

Last week in Washington, D.C., I had a long conversation with former U.S. Senator Tim Wirth of Colorado, who today is president of the UN Foundation created by Ted Turner with an unprecedented $1 billion donation to help elevate the quality of life for less-fortunate people on the planet but in environmentally sensitive, sustainable ways.

It was Sen. Wirth and others, including Al Gore, who held the first formal public hearings on climate change in the nation's capital years ago.

Most humans understand that growing emissions of greenhouse gases are raising the average temperature, warming it in most places and maybe cooling small pockets of the Earth in the future where ocean currents may get disrupted.

When one hears partisan skeptics baying about uncertainty, touting "experts" like John Stossel or the think tanks fronted by the oil industry, or from a relative handful of credible climatologists who represent a very, very small minority, I think of the farce presented in the film "Thank You For Smoking." The movie is a brilliant entertaining satire that would bring a smile to the face of Voltaire. Rent it if you can.

Fictional tobacco industry lobbyist Nick Naylor finds himself in a dilemma. He wants to be a paragon of virtue in the eyes of his son—teaching him right from wrong— and yet, while going on business trips to earn his paycheck, Naylor testifies before Congress as a hired gun for Big Tobacco, denying the horrific effects of smoking, trying to scam a deal in Hollywood that'll bring cigarettes back into vogue by glamorizing them on the big screen and hooking impressionable kids, including perhaps the friends of his son.

A classical moral dilemma pitting rational self interest (what some might call greed) against telling the truth? Sure, there's some of that, but this deception, like the one involving the so-called skeptics of climate change, assumes a more sinister quality.

Every credible journalist I know who has written about climate change has done their homework in assessing the evidence.

Does this make them biased or partisan or, my favorite, "alarmist"?

A few weeks ago, some would argue that a real-life equivalent of fictional tobacco lobbyist Naylor, Senator James M. Inhofe of Oklahoma, mentioned in his waning tenure as chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, that maybe he was exaggerating when he said human-caused climate change was "one of the greatest hoaxes ever perpetrated on the American public."

Inhofe declared in his Jurassic swan song that instead of climate change being a hoax, those who are swayed by THE SCIENCE—including a majority of Americans, according to polls—are, in his mind, "delusional."

Of course, by making such assertions, maligning the very process of accumulating empirical knowledge, upon which breakthroughs in medicine, technology, and ultimately better-informed governance have been based, Inhofe is attacking American-style Democracy itself, the very underpinning being free speech.

If McCarthyism taught this nation anything it is that intimidation, blackballing, and harassment of individuals just because they dare to challenge authority, runs counter to the interests of an informed society.

On global warming, there has been strains of McCarthyism confronting both the scientists whose research has corroborated the existence of climate change and the scientists who say their data refutes it, or at least does not tie it to human causes.

What's fascinating is that Mr. Inhofe over the last few years, as leader of the most powerful environmental committee in Congress, has not allowed free, open, honest discourse about the science of climate change in the hearings he's presided over. He has, however, summoned people like science fiction novelist Michael Crichton to be an expert witness.

He also has refused to acknowledge just how little the number of climate change skeptics is.

Inhofe and others have suggested that climate experts from NASA (which put men on the Moon and probes on Mars), the U.S. National Academies of Science, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, researchers from the leading universities in the world, the pro-business governments of most nations on Earth, conservative sportsmen's groups like the Theodore Roosevelt Conservation Partnership, CEOs who are careful in rendering conclusions, and the conservative insurance industry, have got it wrong.

Even the senator, whose tenure in politics HAS BEEN aided significantly by campaign contributions from oil, gas, and coal lobbyists who have been instrumental in stalling action on addressing CO 2 emissions, cannot stop the mass movement of corporate executives, including those from Wal-Mart, BP, Dominion Power and IBM, from saying that climate change must be addressed through alternative energy, at the very least for business, national security and moral reasons.

An Apollo or Manhattan project targeted at rapidly advancing alternative energy makes sense with or without the loom of global warming, Sen. Wirth told me.
He added that when the peer-reviewed science of climate is factored in
and the destabilizing consequences for civilization in the future are weighed—the costs of New Orleans style exoduses from coastal areas; costs of treatment for expanding human diseases; disruption to clean water supplies and food delivery etc) it is as important to vigorously question the credentials of the so-called skeptics as it is to buy into their specious counterpoints.

What is the agenda of the skeptics, who is paying for the data they use, how are they benefiting financially and what proof can they produce other than citations an internet site here or there linked directly or indirectly to lobbyists like the fictional Naylor for whom it is in their personal interest to ensure oil and coal are unbothered by other ways of approaching energy production?

On a personal note, here's another question for readers: For those of us whose mutual funds are invested in oil-related activities—including drilling, auto and air transportation companies, and plastics—are we willing to modify our portfolios to accommodate alternatives to petroleum?

When we look into the eyes of our children and grandchildren, do we place our own rational self interest above the kind of a world they will have to cope with?

Critically acclaimed author Tim Flannery, a paleo-geo historian who wrote The Weather Makers, says he has no problems with dissent.

Dissent is good.

Dissent is necessary.

Dissent, in fact, is the foundation of the peer-review process by which the overwhelming majority opinion on the science of global warming has been built.

What's interesting to note, he says, is that the scientists studying global warming were initially dissenters themselves in the eyes of other scientists who advanced the hypothesis decades ago of global cooling but their prediction of another Ice Age has not withstood rigorous challenge and the growing contravening evidence of warming.

When dissenters refuse to subject their own preconceived notions to scrutiny by thinkers who are learned on the subject, their so-called dissent becomes nothing more than conjecture and thin-iced opinion.

Indeed, I invite—I encourage you— to follow the instructions of Pete Geddes of the free-market Libertarian think-tank, Foundation for Research on Economics and the Environment. Geddes advises us to Google the words "uncertainty" and "climate change" ostensibly to prove that the science of climate change is rife with uncertainty and that society should wait to take action.

Here's an example of what you find when you do the search: A report from the 2005 U.S. Congress written with heavy influence from the committee of Sen. James Inhofe and advisors related to the fossil fuel industry he enlisted as experts; a number of skeptical citations several years old, and reams of statements and articles offered up by the think tankers.

Just for fun, also Google the words "uncertainty", "cigarette smoking", and "cancer" and you'll find references to studies, underwritten by the tobacco industry, that deny there are serious health consequences from lighting up.

Do the same thing with asbestos and cancer. Unfortunately for the people who believe their ability to Google somehow makes them an expert on climate change, it does not. The experts are those scientists who have subjected their theories to peer review and are today truly alarmed by what the science is telling them.

The science on climate change is no less convincing than the science that existed on the health effects of tobacco when executives from the major cigarette makers went before Congress and denied the link between their product and lung cancer.

Go back in history a little ways and the same tactics—of carefully orchestrating confusion, obfuscation, and ignorance—were employed by the tobacco industry to ensure their profits were unaffected as millions of their customers died.

The free-marketers and the provincial skeptics doing their Google searches from computers in the American West, write about the blessing of cheap goods sold at Wal-Mart—products manufactured in Chinese factories powered by coal-fired electricity. They tout those goods as helping to elevate the lives of all humankind, but have they ever surveyed firsthand what they are talking about? Would they want their kids to be breathing in the foul Chinese air or scrambling to find potable water?

What they write about in the abstract is detached from reality. There is a price being paid for the luxurious consumer lives we Americans enjoy and the bill is coming due first on the Chinese and second on the atmosphere all of us share.

As I watch my son and daughter wheel across the backyard rink with a puck on their sticks, I ponder the two file cabinets full of scientific documentation confirming human-caused climate change and, near it, just a single drawer of credible studies cited by the skeptics.

I know that I've given the dissenters their fair day in the sun. But how is history going to judge the morals of Mr. Inhofe and members of the Bush Administration on their inaction?

Is the federal response to New Orleans what they have in mind when they say the best reaction to climate change is "adaptive management"? As they tout the opening of new shipping lanes for trade through the melting polar ice caps, is this what they have in mind to offset the swamping under of hundreds of millions of humans worldwide who live along coastal areas?

Is this what they coldly call "externalities" and "tradeoffs"?

Midway through this century when the glaciers in the mountains are gone, and the snow pack has been reduced to a fraction of what it used to be, and the question of how we spend our recreation time becomes the least of our kids' concerns, will anyone remember the final wails of the deniers and the rhetorical tripe of the think tankers?

Maybe someday they, too, will serve as fodder for characters in a climate change movie modeled after Naylor in Thank You For Smoking.

As for the kids who knew real winters, their solace may be that for a few moments, once upon a time at the turn of the 20th century, they dwelled on outdoor Christmas ice before the picture of their memory was snapped.

[End of article]

Relax. Global warming is cultural. It’s not real. It was born United Nations politics and bred in the lazy media and by ambitious glory seeking so-called scientists. Of course the media considers anyone a scientist.
The UN says global warming has been effecting weather for over twenty years now but winters are still here according to my home heating fuel bills. Skiing was great last year and I went south to get warm…………………. again.
How can CO2 that comes out of my mouth and is required by plant life and Methane that comes out of your anus be considered evil gasses that will make the icecaps melt and the oceans boil?
If there is an increase in CO2 from combustion, where is the corresponding shortage of Oxygen?
Some day our planet will be once again like the inside of a mall like it used to be and we will all act and think the same. No thanks.

Yes, well, there it is... It's all cleared up now and we can all go back about our business. It was all just a temporary matter of too many notes. Our thanks to you, Mr or Ms Stop the Panic, whichever the case may be. Todd, you can now go back to writing about something else.

Hey Todd thanks for your articles. I have begun to think that right-wing nutjobs will never come around to the true "Calling of our Generation" - which is not bombing democracy down the throats of civilians halfway around the globe like they like to propogandize.

What do we do about this? Well, I think it is only a matter of time, as in 2008, until the progressive generation outnumbers the regressive voters that either are too dense to comprehend scientific fact, as you and thousands of others clearly present in your articles and speeches, or truly do not care and are instead interested in maintaining a "culture" of SUVs and mallrats, suckling at the teets of the oil, timber, and coal companies.

More skeptics I see in the comments so far. These people will be left in the dust as the need for preparation to survive begins. Many have already died due to climate change even at this early stage. Many environmental changes are already well advanced. Perhaps these skeptics are just too young to know that major changes that have already taken place over the last 100 years.
Of course there are very intelligent people who do not have the ability to reason, who when they put two and two together, always get four. That's what intelligent people refer to as incredibly stupid. These are the people that don't know which came first, or believe sliced bread was a good idea even though it defeats the whole purpose of the crust. We all need to understand that extinction of the lowly mosquito means extinction of mankind. Since you are reading this, I suggest that you can enjoy reading the skeptics while they still exist, but start learning and planning for your own survival. May I suggest a good location to move to would be a nice home on the San Andreas fault line with a handy school for your children just down the road on same. Oops, sorry just kidding, New Orleans is much better. After all the fact that we humans, who think we are so far above the average intellect of all other species on the planet, have let our greed bring us to this brink is pretty funny. In my opinion Todd Wilkinson has said it all very well.

Hey Todd...... http://digg.com/environment/Making_Backyard_Ice_In_An_Age_Of_Global_Warming

I beg to differ...the skeptics are the ones in power and those that vote for them--the "older" generation. Once the younger, progressive generation outnumber these fogies, then recognition of these problems will be brought to the forefront of policy. I contend this could occur in the next election.

Young people nowadays (in general, of course, and not counting those that were raised and manipulated by right-wing nutjobs) have a far greater appreciation of the Earth and our impact than those that have been perpetrating the changes of the past 80 years.

Not all the old foggies like me are unmindful of our effect on the climate. I have been living in a solar heated house with propane backup and super insulation for over 30 years. I do not own a vehicle so I combine my trips with others. I have just built a motorized bicycle and am installing a huge solar dish to obtain further heating and cooling. Also I have designed and built an effluent pasteuriser that is capable of producing potable water from houshold "waste" and will continue to reduce my CO2 emissions by as much as possible. I do not recycle anything that I can reuse. Yes I do have some failings; I suffer from self-indignation, arrogance, and depression when I watch my grand children continue to waste and consume.

The relentless statistics and economic effects of global population growth will subsume serious efforts to redress climate change. Eliminate people and your problems MAY become manageable. If not, the Four Horsemen will do the job for us. Maybe it would help if we had politicians publicly declaring personal reproductive suicide as role models for the general public. One thing's for certain. Personal responsibility is in short supply.

Reality, your logic is greatly flawed when you begin to assign generations/age as the fault or reason for the shape of our world. Have you never heard of the "Young Republicans"? They played a major role in re-electing a president that has no regard for the earth. His interest and his agenda is tied up in oil. Part of the problem not the solution. He surrounded himself with a group of people with the same mindset. They are the powers that be and their age is irrelevant.

You can't make a decent argument using age as the culprit. Ralph Nader crusaded for the earth in the 70's and is still doing so in his 70's.

29 November 2006 – Cattle-rearing generates more global warming greenhouse gases, as measured in CO2 equivalent, than transportation, and smarter production methods, including improved animal diets to reduce enteric fermentation and consequent methane emissions, are urgently needed, according to a new United Nations report released today.
I'm not a conservative by the way. But cows now are the problem? This proves that global warming is cultural, not scientific. Kinda like witch burning, hoolahoops and feltching.

Why are reputable time-served scientists who disagree with the catastrophic global warming mantra referred to as "sceptics" and "deniers" whilst those who promote it are called "genuine scientists". The argument about funding plays both ways. What about the financial support received by Hansen and Holdren from "Big Beanz" and the massive funding pumped into the climate modellers to come up with ever more scary scenarios?

There is an interesting article in the most recent issue of Range Magazine dealing with the early "global warming" stuff.

http://rangemagazine.com/features/winter-07/wi-07-greening-part-ii.pdf

I reuse and save and am very frugal, at least in part because I was born during the depression. I have a hard time taking someone spouting about "global warming" while flying a person jet between multiple homes and speaking engagements. That doesn't seem to me that he is very concerned, he just doesn't think others are entitled to more than the bare necessities so there is more for him. I will start to take them seriously when they do as they preach.

Environmentalists put the MENTAL in environmental sometimes. Like look at recycling. It’s recycling wasteful packaging. Imagine how much garbage people put to the curb in 1900: NONE. Name one thing they would throw out please. We have diesel powered trucks picking up our “bagged “ leaves so they can be composted because we are too lazy to do it ourselves. (my city anyways) . We should bring back trains to get all of the trucks and cars off the roads. Use refillable containers and not make environmentalism so convenient. Clingfrees, ziplock bags, paper towels, plastic forks………………..

Marion,
Why am I not surprised you read the fine journalism in Range Magazine? Please, get out more.

As I wrote “Serious policy analysts are different; they generally favor less dramatic action applied over the long term. What explains this difference? Perhaps it’s because the analysts understand long-term adjustments are much cheaper and easier than rapid ones, especially for the poor. They know that like other environmental problems, climate change is complex. In many important areas subtle links between cause and effect are hard to discern. Hence, the most effective policy response is not immediately apparent. And the cost of getting it wrong is high in financial, ecological, and human terms.

Here’s a perfect example.


http://www.pnas.org/cgi/reprint/97/18/9875


Global warming in the twenty-first century: An alternative scenario
James Hansen*†, Makiko Sato*‡, Reto Ruedy*, Andrew Lacis*, and Valdar Oinas*§
*National Aeronautics and Space Administration Goddard Institute for Space Studies, ‡Center for Climate Systems Research, Columbia University Earth
Institute, and §Center for Environmental Prediction, Rutgers University, 2880 Broadway, New York, NY 10025
Contributed by James Hansen, June 16, 2000

A common view is that the current global warming rate will continue or accelerate. But we argue that rapid warming in recent decades has been driven mainly by non-CO2 greenhouse gases (GHGs), such as chlorofluorocarbons, CH4, and N2O, not by the products of fossil fuel burning, CO2 and aerosols, the positive and negative climate forcings of which are partially offsetting. The growth rate of non-CO2 GHGs has declined in the past decade. If sources of CH4 and O3 precursors were reduced in the future, the change in climate forcing by non-CO2 GHGs in the next 50 years could be near zero. Combined with a reduction of black carbon emissions and plausible success in slowing CO2 emissions, this reduction of non-CO2 GHGs could lead to a decline in the rate of global warming, reducing the danger of dramatic climate change. Such a focus on air pollution has practical benefits that unite the interests of developed and developing countries. However, assessment of ongoing and future climate change requires composition specific long-term global monitoring of aerosol properties.

All bets aro off. The UN delared as I mention, that cows cause more global warming than humans. The rules have been changed and the world's longest emergency is now officially terminated.
Any person on the street takes global warming as a truism since it is viewed in the media as one of the many dangers and challenges we face. News papers constantly have such content as; “the majority” of scientists agree, students are taught it in school and governments at all levels have policies that acknowledge it as a fact. How does one even begin to make people aware that it is nothing more than a theory at best and more pricelessly modern day mythology thanks to the global village of the internet. If we defined global warming as cultural rather than scientific, we may be able to finally put this to rest?

Pete, Unless you've been in contact with Jim Hansen, my advice is to be very cautious about quoting from his work, especially papers delivered six years ago. One of Hansen's biggest complaints is about those who cherrypick from his work and make broad extrapolations that do not reflect his point of view. What Hansen, NASA and the rest of the scientific community know today is far more evolved than what it collectively knew in the late 1990s leading up to the presentation of this paper. There is far less uncertainty about uncertainty.

Hi Todd:

I agree with you.The lag time between research and publication is at least three years. The FAR form IPCC will soon be out with more current info. I didn't cherry pick, though. Just copied Hanson's abstract.

Uncertanity will always be with us and is not a cause for inaction. The policy questions involve what action to take and to what degree?

New West readers might be interested in this interview with John Dingell will soon take the helm of the House Energy and Commerce Committee. It's here: http://www.grist.org/news/maindish/2006/12/20/dingell/index.html

I know its from one of those evil two headed goat horned republicans from the cold hearted right wing devils but at least give it a read: The Skeptics Guide To Global Warming. A Media Guide For Journalists:
http://epw.senate.gov/repwhitepapers/6345050Hot&ColdMedia;.pdf

P.S. regarding uncertainity and climate change here's a very good non-technical summary from the CBO.

http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/60xx/doc6061/01-24-ClimateChange.pdf

Dear Relax: I rather like the "follow-the-money" framework. Sen. Infofe, R-OK received $314,000 from the oil and gas industry from 2001-06 and published the Skeptics Guide. Yet another fine example of the best Congress money can buy.
Source: http://www.opensecrets.org

PS: If the right can beat up on George Soros for funding leftie groups, turnabout is only fair.

The Grist interview with John Dingell is excellent. What's impressive to me is that he's committed to holding REAL hearings on climage change and he, as chairman, with an understanding of the auto industry, will be approaching them with an open mind. That's how the country is going to get its arms around the challenge. We need to think beyond Kyoto. The U.S. also needs to re-embrace the idea that it is part of the global discussion and can be a leader in setting the tone. The problem with the CBO document is that it didn't emerge from honest discourse but had blinders attached to what scientific evidence could actually be used and what could not. I have spoken with a couple of of folks who know how the report was assembled—people who would love to be convinced by the data that climate change doesn't exist—but they are completely unimpressed by the biases that went into the way the document was produced.

Dear BRODIE, Good grief! I did not know that. Thanks so much. I will now disregard all of the research I've done on both sides of the issue for the last 20 years since the UN announced that our planet has been boiling faster than Al Gore can empty his tissue box and go back to the comforts of panicking, finger pointing and blaming. Everyone has an agenda I guess. Sad but true. Call it democracy? Or do you prefer the Stanish guilty by association?

Jean: Points well taken, however, I still maintain that the "older, generation" stopped voting for their economic/health interests about 15 years ago. At that time, they shifted to voting for "values issues" like abortion, marriage, etc. elevating these above their economic/health concerns and putting the rethuglicans in power (as they are on the "right" side of these issues for many older folk).

This is what these voters have elected to do over the past 20 years with 3 right-wing presidents and a regressive congress: an ever-widening gap between the rich and the poor, a blatant abuse of our environment, the expansion of individualism over contributing to the society at large, the prevalence of having children, even if you are irresponsible, economically insecure, and/or emotionally detached, and the relentless abuse of people's fear's and our nation's soldiers to propagate mission-less wars in far-away lands (not to mention the destruction of ancient civilizations and lives). What a sad story the right-wing has done to our country and the world.

The Young Republicans, as a whole, did not put these people in power. Instead, the values-over-self/country voters, typically above the age of 50, were the difference in "swing" states and are the base in arch conservative states like Idaho, the South. I contend their impact will be mitigated in future elections as progressive voters, now between the age of 16-45, outraged at the results of the right-wind nutjob movement, will revert to voting for their economic/health interests over the trivial values issues that have gotten the USA where it is today.

Anyone read the current National Geographic issue about the Amazon Rainforest? Should dispel the common notion by those doubters that humans are capable of preserving the Earth if given free reign.

As far as reading right-wing trash from inhofe, the cbo under the rethugs, etc, why waste our time? These loonies are in the pockets of the anti-environment corporations and probably get their material straight from the source. Shame, shame, if you actually read that trash and believe it--you are being standardized my friend.

Boy, where to begin! Reality, with you and your erudite, well thoughtout, informative posts, I suppose there is no reason for anyone else to post huh? Mr. Retney, obviously I read as many "sides" as I can about any issue.
Again, I will say when I see "global warming" proponents actually concerned enough to curb their own excesses, they will gain credibility in my opinion. I cannot take anyone who burns thousands of gallons of fuel to tell me to save 10s of gallons, seriously. Believers set the example. I am still laughing over someone calling my little Focus a big SUV. Much of the rest seems to fall in the same catagory.

Here's another site for those seeking a basic overview of this issue.

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/globalwarming.html

"Sometimes when trying to regurgitate something that you've only half digested, it can be very difficult to maintain an orderly flow".
But! I think the following mixed metaphor says it all.
"It’s easy to distinguish loving parents from those driving SUVs."
Obviously the oil barons put greed above their own children's welfare. "Yes Sally, of course I love you, but I love money even more".

Won't we be feeling silly when: the asteroid hits us; the magnetic poles shift; the caldera explodes;a thermonuclear war breaks out from starving chinese; the influenza pandemic hits; cancer kills us; the oceans' micro ogranisms die; the aliens attack; a giant marshmallow man invades New York City, and we've spent all this time kvetching a couple of degrees of global warming that started at the end of the little ice age.

Who ya gonna call?

Having been through the last half of the twentieth century, when the Soviets were gonna attack and duck and cover and kiss your ass goodbye was the school kids' drill, when being the first one on the block to bring your boy home in a box was more than a quaint woodstockian slogan, when natural gas was gonna run out, and Hal's late great planet earth tribulation was imminent, and some guy from Norfolk Virginia had, not california on his mind but Livingston Montana as beachfront property, well, I'm strugglin with the whole crisis de decade.

SUVs aint the problem. They can be quite efficient filled with a bunch of kids going to play a hockey game. It's the holier than thou types who think they've got claim to some moral high ground because of the car they drive who are jerkin off in the corner while society tilts off axis.

Uh, Mr. Blaber, I believe we each buy our vehicles based on a number of things, but profit for oil barons has nothing to do with it. As for those driving SUVs not being loving parents, have you read the latest safety stats? You might want to do that before you blaber any more.

noodlyappendage, If you were responding to my comments, I wasn't talking about SUVs. Perhaps you think regurgitation refers to throwing up. The language is complicated. Global warming or climate change has very little to do with the minor temperature increase. It's about the climate in which we live and is necessary to sustain all life. That climate is not about to change. It is already changing, but unlike the past millions of years, over the past thirty years the rate of change, acceleration, has surpassed every other variation before it. Many of those climate changes in the past lead to extinctions and this one will probably do the same. We can't stop it. That's what all the excitement is about. That's why the 'real' scientists hold very little hope for our future.
It's not about morality it's about survival.
If you don't agree that climate change is a problerm, fine, but you might want to hedge your bets, just in case the leading scientists of the world are right. However unlikely.

"I'd love to change the world, but I don't know what to do"... So if you had fifty billion to save the world, what would you do with it?

According to Reason magazine, February 2007 edition (look ma, I'm time travelling), the global answer would be quite different from those in a panic about global warming. It certainly wouldn't be punishing those evil SUV dweller fellers. Nope.

Sanitation. Communicable diseases. Education. Hunger...you'd have to get to twenty third on the list before you hit anything resembling "global warming" from the representatives of 54% of the earth, from Australia to Zambia. Let's face it, if you're having bloody diarrhea, or are facing an AIDS epidemic, or are on the wrong end of a dictator's plan for genocide, the end of the little ice age ain't all that big o deal.

"real" scientists are as optimistic a bunch as I've ever met. It's mystical earth worshippers and their other fundamentalist brethern and sistern who see the end of the world at every turn! Like those out to kill the Great Satan or save the hommasekshuls, its guilt, guilt guilt that the earth worshippers are selling. Repent NOW, give up that SUV !

Yeah, the end of the world, that'll show those damn SUV parents!

Yep, that hockey rink in the backyard may fade. But we might refocus on what's important, not so much to us, but to community of earth we use to guilt trip each other but really only pay lip service to.

See, Blaber, it ain't that hedging bets isn't a smart play, but it's an expensive play. Since resources are limited, finite, especially mine, I guess I'd prefer to pick my spots, and I'd think we would listen to those of the world community before we picked that one issue we might apply ourselves to. Potable water and sewage treatment, the plagues of communicable diseases, genocide and hunger, ignorance and violence. I see those as far more threatening. We may just be fiddling around to save that one degree when our efforts might have resulted in great things elsewhere.

Thank you noodly, you said it so well. The nice thing about global warming though, it does not require those who "believe" to do anything except criticize others. Their big houses, travel, etc are "not going to change anything", but it does justify telling others that having a 4WD in snow country is blasphemous. However I don't believe those driven by skiers to get to areas where they can show how much more concerned they are about "the environment", actually pollute because they are driven by good people.

Guess you guys think I'm a consumer just like some of you. Well 'tant so. I live in a 25 x 26 foot 30 year old self-built partially solar heated 'A' frame with solar hot water. I don't own a vehicle and I have just completed the design of an effluent purification system for household waste that produces potable water according to government testing. Although my hydro consumption is less than $50 CDN a month I am building a solar dish that should, when completed, take care of most of our heating and electricity requirements. My concern is not for myself but rather my great grandchildren, of which I have 3. I have been studying "The Nature of Things" for as long as I can remenmber and David Suzuki and others have been telling us for over 30 years that if we didn't smarten up we would kill ourselves. It is not 'holier than though' or arrogant or blassphemous, or alarmist for people with true knowledge of our predicament to try to warn others. Especially when their actions will kill not only their children but mine too. If you don't understand the horrendous magnitude of the problem, then may I suggest, humbly, The Weather Makers by Tim Flannery. I live in snow country. Oops, I did live in snow country. The usuall annual snows, about 2 feet, are missing. We have no snow. As to the purification of effluent see page http://www.stueysplace.ca to discover why no-one in hius or her right mind would want to attempt to stop polluting our environment. I have pretty much lost my respect for humanity. We are all such a stupid lot, me included.

Dear readers: want to know the root of all this "doubt" about human-caused global climate change?

Check out yesterday's new report by the Union of Concerned Scientists, how Exxon has spent millions on rightwing think tanks and organizations to foment doubt.

See: http://www.ucsusa.org/news/press_release/ExxonMobil-GlobalWarming-tobacco.html

I saw that Brodie. Perhaps it's time to revoke ExxonMobil's charter. Corporations were created for the common good, not to promote our destruction for greed. Seems that the executives of Exxon have no children, 'least none that they give a damn about.

Once more, quit using the products they produce if you don't like them.
Idealogues obn both sides of an issue put out their story the way they want it believed. Those who make money convincing people that they need to take away other folks property and rights put out their views and support "scientists" who spout their propaganda. Oil companies or wind farm companies or whatever do the same.
I can tell you that I appreciate having heat in my home to keep me from freezing to death, and to keep my water lines open, and having fuel for my vehicle. Try to imagine life without it. Even though I have a fireplace and could probably manage longer than some, I'd have to be able to burn some of that fuel to go get more sooner or later.
I know it drives you guys crazy that we don't all subscribe to the left wing idealogy, but that is what makes the world go around. People support the things they believe in.

Marion says "I can tell you that I appreciate having heat in my home to keep me from freezing to death, and to keep my water lines open, and having fuel for my vehicle." Marion I don't think your getting what the scientists are saying. I'd rather believe them than the oil exec's. I have no business ventures to protect, only my family. How many people should we kill in order to have our toys? As for heat, I need it too, but I don't want to kill to get it. Next time you go outside take a look up in the sky. You'll see a big round ball that we call the sun. It will provide you with more heat than you can ever use and without any cost to others. We can no longer live the way we are and expect our species to survive. Please learn what it's all about. It isn't ideology, it's survival, and if everyone , including you, doesn't help we are doomed. Personally I don't care about the politics, left or right. I care about my family, and correct me if I'm wrong, I think you should too. I can remember life without a vehicle, without television, without computers, without transistors, without much pollution even. It was great.

Was there ever some sort of wonderful ecological past when humans lived in harmony with the earth? Was it when four children in five died of disease before the age of five? When one woman in six died in childbirth? When the average lifespan was 40, as it was in America a century ago. When plagues swept across the planet, killing millions in a stroke.

And what about indigenous peoples? Did they live in a state of harmony with the environment? Of course not. By far the worst wave of species extinctions among large animals since the extinction of the dinosaurs was caused by stone-age people. About 50,000 years ago, the first people to reach Australia quickly wiped out the 25 largest mammals and birds.

Approximately 13,000 years ago, the first people to reach North America took just 300 years to wipe out three-quarters of all large mammals including mammoths and ground sloths. This all with stone age technology.

Perhaps it's time to re-read Todd's article. Personally I don't care what happened even 100 years ago. I care about what is happening right now and I'd rather believe the scientists who have been saying this problem was coming for over 30 years. Where I live we normally have very cold temperatures in winter. The trees move their sap down into their roots for the winter. We are now having unseasonally warm weather. If this persists then the sap will start to run and and when it goes below freezing again the trees will be killed. The sap will freeze and split them. Billions of them will die. That will reduce the absorption of CO2 even more and reduce the O2 at the same time (We have lots of O2). Increased CO2 means warmer temperatures and a spiraling effect is created that may already be unstopable. This is only one of the many effects of climate change. It just could be that we are about to become extinct by our own hand.

What...if...this ...is ...all...is..."natural".....

You may not care what happened a hundred years ago, but it is indicative of changes that occur naturally. The world has been changing since the Lord created it all of those years ago. And guess what it will keep right on changing, you are not going to stop it. That being said, I think it is only the right thing to do to conserve as much as possible.

Good article, Todd! ...stimulated lots of comments! The Seattle newspaper carried an interesting little article on a peak oil group operating there. Although trying to establish the exact point of peak oil can be a fruitless catfight in and of itself, peak oil will occur at some point, with significant effects, and I believe that a little coverage of the peak oil concept and the runaway economic effects that might be created if we weren't prepared would also be very good at keeping this kind of discussion going. If we can get people to keep talking, we can eventually get them to articulate core principles, which is helpful in framing the debate and establishing credibility one way or another.

Did you make that ice rink with a massive air conditioning unit? Cos that'll help the global warming along!

Anyway Stop the Panic - you're an idiot. Why shouldn't CO2 be bad? Just because it's (relatively) "inert" doesn't negate the global argument! Nor does being skeptical of the media!

So you know, (and check it out elsewhere if you don't believe me) the atmosphere roughly is made up of 21% oxyen, 0.04% carbon dioxide. Therefore you can double the amount of CO2 with a negligible (relative) change to the amount of O2. There will be no real "corresponding" loss to the O2 around.

Edward, I don't think an air conditioning unit was necessary to make the ice rink. You can see by the snow in the picture that it is colder than heaven (hell is hot). You are probably right about the O2, in the short term at least, but is that really the problem?
As to stopping the panic; I think the panic has not yet begun and if it doesn't start soon we will perish. Thge only reasons a person isn't in panic mode is, either they are already preparing as best they can, or they don't even begin to understand the problem.
Perhaps you should review your own credentials before saying that Todd is an idiot.

Edward: The fact of oxygen being abundant and the argument that the atmopshere can hold alot more CO2 with a negligible effect on the atmosphere and the climate below it is, as you well know, one of the arguments that skeptics like yourself like to make. And it would make sense if it were so simple as that, and the reality, of course, that it's been dismissed by the leading scientists in the world dealing with climate change. I may be an idiot and it's always valuable to be skeptical of the media, but your insinuation that concern about climate change being expressed by the scientific community, world leaders, business leaders, citizens (and related by the media) is somehow some groupthink exercise in everybody delighting in trying to scare each other, is nonsense. You're entitled to dismiss or downplay the implication of human-caused CO2 emissions. But the argument has already been rigorously engaged and scrutinized for merit in the peer-review process by the scientific community and dismissed. As for making my backyard rink, Mother Nature is still cooperating but the number of days with which I've been able to keep ice on the backyard has been steadily winnowing.

To quote Pete Geddes "What...if...this ...is ...all...is..."natural"....."

Pete, I find this statment really interesting for a couple of reasons. First, you cite James Hansen's work, but you obviously don't read it...or perhaps understand it. If you did you probably wouldn't be asking the question "what if this is all natural?" And second, it's your typical two-faced approach to the topic where on one hand you use science to back up points you want to make (cherry picking aside), and then you use conjecture, or flat out biased opinions, to cast doubt on the areas of science you don't like.

This makes you effective at casting doubt on the subject, but the unfortunate thing is at its root it is a malicious and misleading practice.

Things people have to remember...NOT ALL INFORMATION IS CREATED EQUALLY...Case in point...There is a google ad on this website for CO2 science, which is an industry funded organization that does nothing but distort published science with the specific purpose to cast doubt on the subject. I should know because my own work, and the work of many of my collaborators, has been attacked and distorted by this group. The pretty webpage makes them look repuitable...even though they are far from being a repuitable source. Science is in the business of investigating what can be known, and it is truly rare when you can get so many scientists to come to consensus on a topic of research. The rest of the world has taken note of this, why is the U.S. so far behind?

It's....was....a....rhetorical....question....