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Politics : Politics of Energy -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Wharf Rat who wrote (36042)	12/4/2012 2:54:38 PM
From: Wharf Rat	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 86356

World’s Largest Mining Firm: ‘In A Carbon Constrained World, Coal Is Going To Decline. And Frankly It Should.’ By Stephen Lacey on Dec 4, 2012 at 1:45 pm One of the world’s biggest mining firms says that extreme weather caused by climate change is already impacting some of its assets, thus forcing the company to re-evaluate its investments in the coal sector. Speaking to investors and analysts on Monday, the Chief Executive of BHP Billiton’s coal division explained how the company is reinforcing infrastructure around its coal export terminal in Queensland, Australia because of increases in extreme weather that threaten the facility. BHP Billiton is one of the largest producers of aluminum, copper, thermal coal, metallurgical coal, nickel, silver and uranium. The Australian company also owns and operates the Hay Point Services Coal Terminal, a coal facility that makes up a large portion of the biggest coal port in the world. And now that facility is under threat from intensifying extreme weather, says BHP executive Marcus Randolph. His comments were reported in the Australian Financial Review after the company’s presentation on its sustainability strategy: “As we see more cyclone-related events .?.?. the vulnerability of one of these facilities to a cyclone is quite high,” he said. “So we built a model saying this is how we see this impacting what the economics would be and used that with our board of directors to rebuild the facility to be more durable to climate change.” Mr Randolph said the decision was taken after cyclone Yasi hit further north in Queensland in February 2011. “If cyclone Yasi had hit Hay Point, we would have lost that facility,” he said. “So it is a recognition that as these cyclones become more severe, we need to have facilities that are more able to withstand them.” Simply reinforcing a coal export facility with extra jetties to withstand an increase in extreme weather caused by carbon pollution from the coal that the company wants to continue exporting isn’t exactly a ringing endorsement for sustainability. But this plain-spoken admission that climate change is having a measurable impact now — without trying muddle the science — is very unique for a coal company. “You couldn’t ask for a more surprising source for our basic message: coal causes climate change, climate changes creates more extreme weather, more extreme weather will force us to make huge new investments in trying to protect ourselves,” said Carl Pope, former executive director of the Sierra Club, in an email. In his presentation, Randolph made another stunning comment about the need to address carbon pollution by clearly stating that there is an “absolute ceiling” on emissions that can be pumped into the atmosphere: BHP’s internal target over the next four years is to maintain its greenhouse gas emissions below 2006 levels, adjusted for material acquisitions and divestments. Mr Randolph said the target would stay even if a future government repealed the carbon tax. “If you look at the targets .?.?. there is not a qualifier saying it is okay to emit more greenhouse gases if the carbon tax is eliminated,” he said. “An absolute ceiling is an absolute ceiling. Even if there isn’t a carbon tax, it still needs to be an issue we devote a lot of attention to.” Just one month before, Randolph — the chief executive of the company’s coal division — told the Australian Financial Review that he believes the market for coal is going to decline because of environmental constraints, and that “frankly it should”: “In a carbon constrained world where energy coal is the biggest contributor to a carbon problem, how do you think this is going to evolve over a 30- to 40-year time horizon? You’d have to look at that and say on balance, I suspect, the usage of thermal coal is going to decline. And frankly it should.” Mr Randolph said it was positive that investment was being made in examining clean coal technology but he had his doubts that would be enough to make coal a good choice for power generation in the longer term. He said the rapid rise in shale gas production in the United States, which this year lowered demand for thermal coal in that country, had caught the world by surprise. “We’ve been cautious in our energy coal investments,” Mr Randolph said. “There are a couple of reasons for that: the cloudy future, the general return on investment that is available in the industry and there are some structural reasons why it is the way it is. And it is also the availability of better returns on other projects that exist in the broader [BHP] portfolio.” In 2009, as a member of the American Council on Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE), BHP was swept up in a scandal around the U.S. climate bill then being considering in Congress. A lobbying firm that worked for ACCCE was caught sending fake letters to members of Congress asking them to vote against the bill. At that time, BHP was a prominent member of the coal lobby; however the company is no longer listed as a member on the coalition’s website. So while one of the world’s largest mining companies makes these stunning admissions about the reality of coal’s contribution climate change, the U.S. coal lobby continues to smear the climate science, target state renewable energy targets, and organize fake campaigns to make it look like the industry has wide public support. thinkprogress.org

To: Wharf Rat who wrote (36042)	12/4/2012 11:37:14 PM
From: Hawkmoon	1 Recommendation Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 86356

No shit, sherlock.. Of course we have a "GG" effect.. That's not in question.. The question is whether there are OTHER, more potent, GG gases than CO2 that are the problem, or is this more natural than man-caused.. And then what degree of warming is occurring in comparison to the paleo-climatic record and is it "irreversible" because of some perceived "tipping point".. What factors limit the increase of such GG in the atmosphere is ALSO a critical issue. Frankly, I'm more concerned about some tectonic event disturbing methane hydrate deposits, thereby releasing them into the atmosphere. en.wikipedia.org How are you going to prevent, or mitigate, such an event? Geo-engineering authorized? Spewing reflective gases into the atmosphere to reflect sunlight? All kinds of possibilities to maintain some form of temperature balance that we currently experience.. But let's NEVER FORGET that "mother nature" has been more responsible for creating catastrophic climate change than mankind ever could.. Hawk

To: Wharf Rat who wrote (36042)	12/5/2012 9:04:42 AM
From: Brumar89	2 Recommendations Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 86356

‘Skeptical’ ‘Science’ gets it all wrong – yet again Posted on December 4, 2012 by Anthony Watts Guest post by Christopher Monckton of Brenchley Even the name of the “Skeptical” “Science” blog is a lie. The blog is neither skeptical nor scientific. It is a malicious, paid propaganda platform for rude, infantile, untruthful, and often libelous attacks on anyone who dares to question whether global warming is a global crisis. That poisonous blog has recently attacked 129 climate researchers, of whom I am one, for having dared to write an open letter to the U.N. Secretary-General asking him not to attribute tropical storm Sandy to global warming that has not occurred for 16 years. The following are among the blog’s numerous falsehoods and libels: 1. On at least four occasions we are referred to as climate “denialists” – a term as unscientific as it is malevolent. We do not deny that there is a climate, or that it changes, or that the greenhouse effect exists, or that Man’s emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases enhance that effect and may cause some warming. We raise legitimate scientific questions about how much warming Man may cause, and about whether attempted mitigation can ever be cost-effective. 2. It is claimed that our “preferred route” to air our “grievances about global warming is via “opinion letters published in the mainstream media” rather than via peer review. Yet most of the signatories named by the blog as having “no climate expertise” have published papers in the reviewed literature. To take one example named by the blog, Professor Nils-Axel Mörner of the University of Stockholm has published some 550 papers, nearly all of them in the reviewed literature, and nearly all of them on sea-level rise, which he has been studying for 40 years. 3. It is claimed that our arguments are “unsubstantiated”. Yet our letter offered a great deal of substantiation, as will become evident. 4. Tom Harris of the Climate Science Coalition, one of the letter’s organizers, is described as “best known for grossly misinforming … university students about climate change in a Climate and Earth Science class he should never have been teaching”. The only sources given for this grave libel are a farrago of childish falsehoods on the “Skeptical” “Science” blog and its sole citation, an error-ridden screed circulated by the dishonestly-names “Canadian Committee for the Advancement of Scientific Skepticism”. 5. The fact that there has been no statistically-significant global warming for 16 years is described as a “myth”. Yet the least-squares linear-regression trend on the Hadley Centre/CRU dataset favoured by the IPCC indeed shows no statistically-significant warming for 16 years. The minuscule warming over the period is within the margin of uncertainty in the measurements and is, therefore, statistically indistinguishable from zero. 6. It is claimed that we were wrong to say there has been no statistically-significant global warming because the oceans have warmed. However, the standard definition of “global warming” is warming of the near-surface atmosphere. Also, measurements to date are inadequate to tell us reliably how much – if at all – the oceans have warmed in recent years. 7. It is claimed that we were wrong to say that computer models are now proven to exaggerate warming and its effects. Yet we had pointed out, correctly, that a paper by leading climate modelers, published in the NOAA’s State of the Climate report in 2008, had said that 15 years or more without global warming would indicate a discrepancy between the models’ projections and real-world observations and that, therefore, the models were proven incorrect by their creators’ own criterion. 8. It is claimed that we were wrong to state that some scientists point out that near-term natural cooling, linked to variations in solar output, is a distinct possibility. Yet some scientists have indeed pointed out what we said they had pointed out, though our use of the word “some” fairly implies there is evidence in both directions in the literature. 9. It is claimed that we used “careful wording” in saying that there is an absence of an attributable climate change signal in trends in extreme weather losses to date. Yet we were merely citing the IPCC itself on this point. 10. It is claimed that we were wrong to state that the incidence and severity of extreme weather has not increased. Though it is trivially true that temperature maxima have increased with warming, there has been no trend in land-falling Atlantic hurricanes in 150 years, and there has been a decline in severe tropical cyclones and typhoons during the satellite era. 11. It is claimed that we “falsely” accuse the U.N. Secretary General of “making unsupportable claims that human influences caused” tropical storm Sandy, and that “in reality, Ban Ki-Moon did not say climate change caused Hurricane (sic) Sandy”. Yet he had said: “Two weeks ago, Hurricane (sic) Sandy struck the eastern seaboard of the United States. A nation saw the reality of climate change. The recovery will cost tens of billions of dollars. The cost of inaction will be even higher. We must reduce our dependence on carbon emissions.” We had rightly written: “We ask that you desist from exploiting the misery of the families of those who lost their lives or properties in tropical storm Sandy by making unsupportable claims that human influences caused that storm. They did not.” 12. It is claimed that we are “a list of non-experts”. Yet half of the 129 signatories are Professors; two-thirds are PhDs, and several are Expert Reviewers for the IPCC’s forthcoming Fifth Assessment Report. One day, the useless “Skeptical” “Science” blog may perhaps have a curiosity value to historians studying the relentless, lavishly-funded deviousness and malice of the tiny clique who briefly fooled the world by presenting themselves as a near-unanimous “consensus” (as if consensus had anything to do with science) and mercilessly bullied anyone with the courage and independence of mind to question their barmy but transiently fashionable beliefs. The blog’s falsehoods have made no serious contribution to the scientific debate that we who are genuinely skeptical and truly scientific have by our patient endurance now largely won. wattsupwiththat.com