Another Warning, Another Chance For The World To Do Nothing - Scotsman

[hatrack]

EDIT

After this latest report, there will no longer be any serious debate about whether a large proportion of climate change is man-made," boomed a commentator in the Times, speaking for the collective media wisdom. Excuse me? For years past, denying that "a large proportion of climate change is man-made" has had the intellectual validity of insisting that the cow jumped over the moon.

That is not to say that the work of the 2,500 scientists from 113 countries, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, is without value. It has upped the stakes by, quite literally, another couple of degrees. It has forced the world's politicians to buzz around giving the impression of doing things and perhaps even to deliver some of them. It has prompted 1,000 portentous columns declaring the debate to be over and demanding action this day.

But what happens next? Wherever one looks, whether micro or macro, domestic or global, there is little evidence that the scale of response is remotely proportional to the warnings of apocalypse. While the debate may be over and "the question mark removed", there is no guarantee that this landmark will cause one vested interest to be yielded, one prejudice to be dropped, or two pieces of disconnected governance to become joined-up.

EDIT

They have to make these unsubstantiated and indeed hypocritical assumptions about what renewables can deliver, mainly because they are also opposed to nuclear power - which, inconveniently from their point of view, is the major provider in Scotland, the UK and much of the world of carbon-free electricity. I would be delighted, if I was around in 30 or 40 years' time, to see nuclear power phased out - but the idea that we can meet carbon reduction targets and eliminate nuclear power in the short term is patent nonsense. Britain's most eminent environmentalist, James Lovelock of Gaia fame, faced up to that dilemma more than a decade ago and came to the conclusion that, whatever the problems of nuclear power, they are as nothing compared with those of global warming. Will those who shirk from that argument by pretending that no such choice has to be made suddenly repent or even reconsider in the light of the IPCC report? I doubt it.

EDIT

http://news.scotsman.com/opinion.cfm?id=184482007

[kestrel91316]

1. This report was the straw that broke the camel's back for one RW

radio host. Bill Handel (KFI - Los Angeles) has finally awakened and smellls the coffee. He practically read the whole report this AM, live.

Unfortunately his response the other day was some crack about just turning the A/C up a notch.

The RW is finally accepting the truth (except for Rush and the rest of the christofascist backwash).