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Like, the pentagon, for example, that hotbed of the loony-left, right?

http://www.environmentaldefense.org/documents/3566_AbruptClimateChange.pdf

Before blasting nuclear energy as *potential* radioactive hazard READ THIS FIRST: coal-fired power plants dump tons of mercury polluting water and fish and turning good source of omega3 into a poison:

http://www.epa.gov/waterscience/fishadvice/advice.html
http://www.environmentaldefense.org/documents/3370_MercuryPowerPlants.pdf

thank you for your time

I did... and a very large scale roll-out of wind and solar would yield significant amounts of energy (albeit not at a high energy density). Honestly, outside of nuclear power, it's not clear what other "high yielding, carbon-free energy sources" there are. Hydroelectric? Fine, but most of the places where you could put a dam, already have a dam... there isn't much room for growth there.

Right, because if I disagree with you on environmental policy, obviously I must find Bush convincing.

No, but since you've pre-determined that most environmentalists are control freaks with an ulterior motive, I needed to find someone who is clearly not an environmentalist to present the opposing view... otherwise you'd just dismiss it our of hand as a sinister attempt to control your life. So, does Bush's position have merit, or does it not?

For someone critical of caricatures, you'd do well not to attribute to me the position that fission is "perfectly safe". More generally, you should recognize that nothing is perfectly safe, and by holding any technology you already decided you don't like, to that standard, you are becoming the caricature.

You're right, the actual question is: is it "safe enough" for people to want to use it? Between the potential for nuclear proliferation, the potential for nuclear terrorism, the potential for nuclear accidents, and the problems with safe long-term storage of radioactive waste, the answer IMHO is "only as a last resort".

However, if we are to take a more common sense view of what you meant, such as "the overwhelming majority of environmentalists" or "the most visible, credible environmental groups", then I believe my statement holds. Can you name even one notable environmentalist who thinks any amount of carbon emissions is okay, as long as the emitter pays to have it sunk? No? Then you agree that for most of them, controlling others is more important than protecting the environment.

Here you go: Environmental Defense Praises Carbon Sequestration Incentive Act

As far as "any amount" of carbon emissions, that's an ambiguous phrase. Are you asking about whether it's okay to sequester any carbon at all (i.e. greater than zero), or a potentially infinite amount? If the former, I doubt you'd find many environmentalists who didn't approve, as long as the sequestration process is effective at keeping the carbon out of the atmosphere. (your challenge: find me a significant environmentalist who wants to outlaw carbon sequestration. No? Then you agree that most environmentalists are concerned with -- gasp -- protecting the environment.... and that your paranoia is unjustified). If the latter, then it's a silly question to ask: nobody is going to say "yes, I hereby give you the okay to emit an infinite amount of carbon forever, regardless of the consequences".

There are dimmable CFLs now.

Jack

I've been looking into them a little and this site:

http://www.environmentaldefense.org/page.cfm?tagID =632&campaign=mts

seems useful. Maybe they list a bulb that will work for you.

The reason they are so big is that the maximum amount of light they emit is proportional to their surface area, and I'm guessing that it also depends on how much gas is energized, so the volume of the bulb is important to, if you want a bright light. The coils are a good compromise, but they have to be fairly big to be bright enough.

Yup.

http://www.environmentaldefense.org/documents/3566 _AbruptClimateChange.pdf -- a report commissioned by the DOD and presented to the Oval Office.

Summary: If the arctic conveyor shifts, we can expect nuclear war within 20 years.

Why do you need "both" sides of an argument presented to the public when one of those sides is held by a fringe minority who commonly hide their conflict of interests?

One thing that can make a response look like political banner waving is simply presenting unsubstantiated statements as fact. To-wit...

"First, the ozone hole opens and closes each year- it doesn't just sit there gaping open. Its part of a natural cycle."

Says who? also, I think the article indicated this particular event as an anomoly, are you refuting that?

"Second, even evolutionistic meteorologists deny the theory (THEORY mind you) of global warming."

Got a name for us? Most of the studies I've read would indicate the exact opposite of that statement.

But ya know, I just googled "global warming myth" and found this little gem:

http://www.environmentaldefense.org/documents/382_ myths.htm

I don't have hard numbers, but the Environmental Defense site (bias warning) addresses it in passing:

http://www.environmentaldefense.org/page.cfm?tagid =269&campaign=mts

The poll wasn't taken by Environmental Defense, they are just reporting it. I believe the poll was done by Pew or someone similar. Also, while the article calls them an advocacy group, Environmental Defense employs more PhDs than any other environmental group. You can see their past acheivements and mission statement on their website if you want a better handle on their biases and what they believe.

The poll wasn't taken by Environmental Defense, they are just reporting it. I believe the poll was done by Pew or someone similar. Also, while the article calls them an advocacy group, Environmental Defense employs more PhDs than any other environmental group. You can see their past acheivements and mission statement on their website if you want a better handle on their biases and what they believe.

Tierney's widely regarded as a grumpy-old-man crank with a self described "contrarian" streak a mile wide. In other words, he does this sort of thing to get a rise out of people.

His article is pretty thouroughly debunked, and was nicely discredited within months of its publication.

You can listen to the scientists, or you can listen to the crackpot at the NYT.

http://www.environmentaldefense.org/pressrelease.c fm?ContentID=499

It's easy to overlook 'facts' when they are in reality fiction.

In reality Clinton's administration negotiated, supported, and he personally eventually signed the Kyoto protocol.

"Former President Clinton's vice president, Al Gore, negotiated the treaty for the United States and had a major role in its final form."

According to Wikipedia:
"On June 25, 1997, before the Kyoto Protocol was to be negotiated, the U.S. Senate unanimously passed by a 95-0 vote the Byrd-Hagel Resolution (S. Res. 98), which stated the sense of the Senate was that the United States should not be a signatory to any protocol that did not include binding targets and timetables for developing as well as industrialized nations or "would result in serious harm to the economy of the United States". On November 12, 1998, Vice President Al Gore symbolically signed the protocol. Aware of the Senate's view of the protocol, the Clinton Administration never submitted the protocol for ratification."

The criticism is that Bush doesn't support the Kyoto protocol. If Clinton commanded a congress with a dominant Democrat majority, as Bush commands a Republican majority, the Kyoto protocol would have passed under his administration.

His administration undeniably supported the Kyoto protocol.

It seems very strange for me to hear conservatives, which I'm sure you undeniably are, cry foul at simply criticizing the policy of the Bush administration. The only way you could find these criticisms innately negative, is if you agreed that the policy they criticize is innately negative. Clinton suffered an array of actual 'shots' that had nothing to do with his policy, by 24 hour cable news networks, and independent councils; working full time to dig up information on fabricated crimes he supposedly committed (yet predictably never yielded anything substantial).

Oh, come on. The whole point is that the most vocal critics of climate change are paid off by companies with a huge stake in it. You can manufacture fantasies of power-mad ivory-tower cranks in white coats trying to destroy capitalism (If you don't imediately stop believing all else and do as we say, we're all doomed!), but the fact remains that reputable scientists don't have to be paid off by lobbyists to come to a conclusion. Those are not real scientists.

And you're just trying to muddy the waters, make it so that a casual reader of this discussion will conclude that there are crazy zealots on both sides and, gee, maybe we shouldn't do anything because science is divided on the issue. Which it ain't.

--grendel drago

A few days after the slashdot story I read about Barton and the $11,600,000,000 subsidy to his sugar-daddy thanks partly to the work of Mckintyre and McKitrick. How could this happen, is there anyone in US politcs who is not feathering thier nest with lobby money. Kick the lot of them out of power and replace them with some thinkers or artists or even the village idiot .... oh, umm, forget that bit.

"Also peer review is no substitute for replication and full data and analysis audits, which is what McIntyre and McKitrick did."

A non peer-reviewed replication of a non peer-reviewed paper has as much weight as my "say so", ie: Worthless.

I'm not astroturfing. I have no connection with the energy industry or the researchers.

McIntyre and McKitrick have been funded to the tune of over $500,000 by ExxonMobil. Ok, maybe I went overboard with the astroturf.

"I just enjoy exposing and correcting bullshit such as yours."

Ditto, but now you are just repeating the chant and cloaking yourself in gobble-de-gook. Let me know when the crap you speak actually gets published in Nature or any other peer-reviewed journal.

"You could argue whether trying PCA on a series with chunks missing is extrapolation or just stupid."

I could, but I won't (Mann did a much better job than I could ever muster).

My argument is that you are using the term PCA to hide the fact that the "hockey stick" is a simple moving average!! When that doesn't work you attack the data but neglect to mention even a fraction of the other peer-revieved studies that draw the same conclusion as Mann using different methods and different data. Finally you come up with a pathetic magical list of problems, that without any backing, amounts to nothing more that "because I said so".

You do this so that lay people will take you seriously, tell your mates at ExonnMobile to get with the fucking program. I regard your "astroturfing" of me as a compliment, but it is a complete waste of time for both of us.

Yes, also look at my other posts in this story and check out this site for enlightenment about who is funding McIntyre and co.

Ho ho he he ha ha. You call that a lambasting, a director of a resources company and a proffesor of economics attempting to baffle people with climate bullshit. If either of these two have even a glimmer of a serious scientific argument then where is the fucking peer-reviewed paper, where is the methodology and where are thier references? None of these basic things are in your pdf link because they don't exist.

The fact of the matter is that McIntyre's "paper" was rejected by Nature due to faulty and biased statistical analysis. Instead of listening to Nature's critique and resubmitting they simply turned to US newspapers to push thier perverted claims that Mann is the one who is incompetent, little wonder Mann responded with "I don't have the time".

"I checked to see what years his data started. Mostly it started in odd years, 1999 and 1949, not the even years we like to start with."

Considering Mann was published in 1998 and 1999 how is it they can claim his data starts in 1999, did Dr.Who lend them his Tardis? What a crock of transparent psudeo-scientific shit!

"...never responds in any relavant way to the massive evidence presented that he is incompetent...

A congressman with two paid up ExxonMobil fools pushing his anti-warming barrow does not strike me as massive evidence. If you can't understand Mann's responses in the link I provided then I can't help you, save to say there are many other peer-reviewed papers that discredit McIntyre and co.

I do however wonder why is it that you take the pdf at face value. You display an enourmous amount of faith in the simple "say so" of two people who are not trained in climate science in preference to the trully masive amount of peer-reviewed science contained in the IPCC report. If someone shot you in the arse would you go and see a doctor or a economist?

These two idiots you hold in almost God like regard think that if they can discredit Mann then the whole "IPCC house of cards" will collapse. Nothing could be further from the truth, if you discredit Mann then there are plenty of others who have obtained the same results using different data and different methods (ie: The gold standard of confirmation by replication). Mann's "Hockey stick" is just one small piece of evidence in a landslide, removing Mann's paper will not change the scientific conclusions.

"...Also sounds like Mann is an asshole..."

So was Issac Newton, what's your point?

There are no solid conclusions among all scientist on the effects of global warming. You can look here, here, here, and here to see the lack of consensus on this subject among scientists.

This is nothing more that a main stream media hype of one guys opinion to try to invoke fear in the general population.

Anyone can single out and focus on one area of the planet for a 100 year period in the Earth's history and come to a conclusion that would sound devastating if it really did apply to the whole planet for a longer period of time.

From http://www.environmentaldefense.org/article.cfm?co ntentid=774
Coal produces 55% of the Nation's electricity, so it is the most relevant example, with 32% being clean( nuclear and wind ) and the remaining 12% hydrocarbons. So the electricity is still being produced by dirty methods.

uhh... I'm not shure what you're thinking. The cars are flattened for easy transport to a recycling facility where they usually have big ass shredders to turn large objects such as cars to tiny shreds. The batteries have most likely already been removed and recycled by GM.
Here's the first link I came up with referring to this: http://www.environmentaldefense.org/documents/892_ GC_salvage.htm

If you want to see some numbers check out http://www.environmentaldefense.org/TailpipeTally/ . You can compare vehicals based on annual milage.

For 12,500 miles per year, your Echo produces 6585 lb CO2, 330.7 lb CO, 17.5 lb NOx, 7.4 lb HC vs. 4363 lb CO2, 208.3 lb CO, 7.2 lb NOx, 5.5 lb HC for the new Prius. That's a pretty big difference especially in CO and NOx.

You're not serious that you don't "GET IT" are you? The evidence is overwhelming. And those who trot out some trumped up fiction that refutes the majority are mostly politcally motivated, or funded by oil companies. There is really buig bucks at stake to these people, at least for them. But if the planet compromises it's long term future, what have we done? Look at this month's "Discover" magazine; or any simple searching dregs up tons.: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/ch ronicle/archive/2001/04/13/MN211246.DTL http://home.earthlink.net/~cevent/11-10-04_solid_e vidence_gw.html http://www.carleton.ca/~tpatters/teaching/climatec hange/globemail4.11.97.html http://archives.cnn.com/2001/WORLD/europe/02/19/en vironment.report/ http://www.ehleringer.net/Biology_5460/Projects/cl imatedata/globalwarming3.pdf http://www.climatesolutions.org/pubs/pdfs/gwih.pdf http://www.climateark.org/articles/2001/2nd/statto ce.htm http://www.mmmfiles.com/archive/gw2001.htm http://www.environmentaldefense.org/documents/3970 _ConferenceBoard.pdf http://www.colorado.edu/pwr/occasions/salliebaliun as.htm http://www.physicstoday.org/vol-58/iss-1/p13.html

For a list of "scientists" who are really shills for big industry denying global warming, see:
environmentaldefense.org
Also, when your right-wing relatives start citing contrary "legitimate sources", it's always good to look them up at the Disinfopedia:
sourcewatch.org
Here you can easily identify sheep-skinned pundits and astroturfers.

>Get real, folks. It's all about the sun.

From this site:

MYTH: If the Earth has heated up since pre-industrial times, this warming is due to an increase in the intensity of the sun.

FACT: The sun's intensity does vary. In the late 1970's, sophisticated technology was developed that can directly measure the sun's intensity. Measurements from these instruments show that in the past 20 years the sun's variations have been very small. Indirect measurements of changes in the sun's intensity since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution in 1750 show that variations in the sun's intensity do not account for all the warming that occurred in the 20th century and that the majority of the warming was caused by an increase in human-made greenhouse gas emissions.

Having trouble finding exact bills- but got loads of press about it in the last few days:

http://www.environmentaldefense.org/article.cfm?co ntentid=2727
http://www.wilderness.org/Library/Documents/BushRe cord.cfm
http://www.bushgreenwatch.org/mt_archives/000223.p hp
http://forums.macrumors.com/archive/index.php/t-99 537
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/120604G.shtml
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story .jsp?story=589884
http://bobwhitson.typepad.com/howlings/2004/12/bus h_sets_out_p.html

Global Warming Is a myth

A while back Environmental Defense and FedEx teamed up to start making hybrid FedEx trucks. It was a really great idea. DIdn't get as much press as it should have though. Press Release

it is a wonderfully progressive step forward - chips with no lead. however, lead in processors accounts for a small fraction of lead used each year. as with so many other environmental problems, the main polluter is the automobile industry. during its lifetime, each car uses about as much lead as would be required to paint a house with lead-containing paint. most of the lead in cars is used in lead-acid batteries. perhaps our environmental r+d dollars could be better spent...

Their Action Center is pretty cool. Makes it _very_ easy to shoot out a comment to government and corporate people.

Their Action Center is pretty cool. Makes it _very_ easy to shoot out a comment to government and corporate people.

Yes, a 1997 Honda Accord pollutes more than a 2001 Ford Excursion. The Accord first met LEV requirements in 1998, and the 2001 Exursion is LEV certified. The Excursion may use twice the gas, but it has lower emissions per mile than does the Accord. The Exursion will more quickly deplete us of our fossil fuel supply, but the greenies want that. Correct only if you look solely at hyrdocarbon emissions, and at the smaller, lighter Explorer. I can't find emissions data for the Excursion, but being generous and using the 2WD Explorer (also LEV certified in 2001), it still doesn't add up if you look at all emissions:
values are driving 12,500 miles per year
year/make/model MPG Fuel Fuel $ CO2 CO N oxides Hydrocarbons
2001 EXPLORER 2WD 17.1 mpg 733 gal $1172 14655 lb 223.1 lb 25.0 lb 6.6 lb
1997 ACCORD 25.0 mpg 500 gal $800 10000 lb 193.0 lb 24.1 lb 9.0 lb
2001 EXPEDITION 4WD 14.7 mpg 851 gal $1361 17015 lb 223.1 lb 25.0 lb 6.6 lb
2001 ACCORD 26.1 mpg 479 gal $766 9581 lb 175.7 lb 18.0 lb 4.7 lb
2001 Toyota Prius 48.6 mpg 257 gal $412 5144 lb 103.3 lb 1.8 lb 1.2 lb
2001 Ford Focus 28.7 mpg 436 gal $698 8725 lb 193.0 lb 18.0 lb 5.7 lb

source: EDF's 'tailpipe tally'
Sorry about the lack of coulmns; that's the only way I could get /. to accept it, as it doesn't take <pre> tags, and it doesn't take American Express®. Now imagine you'd gotten a 2001 Accord instead of the 2001 Excursion or Explorer. Or a Beetle. Or (heavens!) a Toyota Prius! But for fun, let's assume your original statement was 100% correct. Do you think that the extra metal, plastic, rubber, etc. that go into an Excursion beyond what goes into the Accord is free? That there's no environmental impact of that? That tires from a heavy vehicle somehow wear more slowly and contribute less to water pollution than a smaller vehicle? Or that the refining, distribution and sales of more gasoline are without cost or environmental impact? Somebody should invent a "actual cost-o-meter"® that shows what our actions and choices actually cost, both in terms of real money and impact on the environment. Of course, then I'd log off Slashdot, power down my computer, and (gasp!) go outside. Which I'll be doing shortly to take the clothes off the line...