Thursday, February 14, 2013

Climate Warriors Take a Hill: Support for Climate Summits


With all the talk of dwindling budgets, cut backs in weapons systems, and the drawdown in Afghanistan, there is one place were the fight continues and the warriors are unrelenting.   For those who are still deep in denial about climate change, who rationalizes Sandy and Nemo as just part of the grand scheme of weather events, turn the page and look elsewhere.  If you are one who recognizes the impact of the industrial revolution and man’s contribution to the carbon content of our atmosphere then you are in good company.  An op-ed in the Huffington Post by Lieutenant General (R) Norm Seip and Brigadier General (R) Steve Anderson lays out, not the case for climate change, but a step toward a solution. 

Their goal is to encourage a series of climate summits in support of the President’s stated inaugural goals.   They see these events as a means to “give our Armed Forces colleagues, faith and labor group leaders, farmers' unions, insurance and other industry executives an opportunity to join our Commander-in-Chief in implementing proven solutions to this crisis”. The initial summit was speculated about in the Guardian in early January.   In the vision of the two generals, the first event would be supported by Nation-wide community satellite meetings.  It would be intended to identify solutions to ending the political paralysis fomented by business interests that do not want short term profits garnered from profligate carbon emissions to be sacrificed just so we will not have to suffer increased economic and political instability worldwide.  

This is a time for conversation, not conflict.  We need a reasonable discussion without histrionics  I know this will be difficult in the current environment, but National Security requires mature consideration.  This should extend to the current nomination imbroglio. 

    In addition to those focused on the National Security implications of Climate Change, six scientific societies delivered a letter to the White House supporting a climate summit.  If the President is serious about getting serious about climate change, there are more than a few people who have his back.   Dan Nolan

3 comments:

Unknown said...

-An international team of scientists using new measurements from ESA’s Crysat ice mission has discovered that the volume of Arctic sea ice has declined by 36% during autumn and 9% during winter between 2003 and 2012.

- I attended a session sponsored by Georgetown U pitting NOAA, Exxon Mobil, and two national studies groups. The NOAA ice analysts have models that make the arctic ice free by 2057.

-Its more than just an increase in sea level. The North Pole acts as a climate regulator. In November a LNG freighter left from Oslo Norway and navigated the pole to Japan. This was an unheard of possibility 5 years ago.

- Within the next three years there will be more Chinese citizens in Iceland than Icelanders.


-1/4 of the earths untapped oil reserves are in the Arctic. Exxon, Royal Dutch Shell, Statoil and Eni have the main tracts.

- The US has one icebreaker in its fleet and a second one in build. They fall under the Coast Guard. The Russians have 27.

- You should know that a cubic mile of ice melt runs off of iceland weekly. This is the equivalent of the fresh water supply of the City of Los Angeles for a year.

- While we are obsessed with Co2, we also need to be tuned to methane from decomposing permafrost, and nitrogen triflouride which is 30,000 times more wicked than Co2. We make NF3 from the bathing process of PV panels and flat panel monitors. Just so happens that that process started in 2004 and the volume in the atmosphere has grown by 10% per year. Nobody other than Scripps Institute and the undersigned want to say boo. Heavy forbid that we put a dent in Silicon Valley...

We are going to face a global collision between climate protection, oil and gas hysteria, defense concerns, and trafficability of shipping over the pole thus reducing transit time by up to 19 days.

I really dont care about the smoking gun on climate and histograms. We hit the lowest point in polar ice in November in all of recorded history. We are killing ourselves. Welcome to the "Wild Wild West.....oops I meant North) We are on an irrecoverable spiral unless someone hits a panic switch.

- Frank Prautzsch

NVH said...

DON'T PANIC. I can have someone put a model together that says the artic is ice free by 2056, or 2016, just in time for the next election. So What? The doom and gloom doesn't frighten me. The cartoon says it all by turning it on its head..."what if it's all a hoax and we bankrupt ourselves for a couple more tons in refrigeration and air conditioning costs?" The science is OUT, and those policies that were put in place were IGNORED and FAILED (Kyoto). How can global carbon emissions be up over 50% and global temperatures have decreased over the 15 year period of the treaty? When did we start calling Hurricanes "Superstorms" and naming winter storms after Disney characters? When the industry reliant on climate change legislation and funding realized it was losing the battle with one of the more liberal administrations in to get funding to continue their science experiments to figure out nature, the climate, weather patterns. Which I'm totally fine with by the way, just don't waste my taxpayer money and time by increasing my reliance on unreliable power sources b/c you're scared of the heat. Get out of the kitchen and put your hands in the dirt of how to make what we use more efficient, clean burning and able to spread to emergent economies so they don't pollute back to us. My energy policy is simple, I'm in favor of air conditioning and cold beer (kudos the Robert Bryce). I am not a robot

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