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Climate Deal: US and China Join Paris Climate Accords (bbc.com)
An anonymous Slashdot reader quotes the BBC:
The US and China -- together responsible for 40% of the world's carbon emissions -- have both formally joined the Paris global climate agreement... It will only come into force legally after it is ratified by at least 55 countries, which between them produce 55% of global carbon emissions. Before China made its announcement, the 23 nations that had so far ratified the agreement accounted for just over 1% of emissions. This will put pressure on G20 nations over the weekend to move faster with their pledge to phase out subsidies to fossil fuels...
There's a G20 summit starting on Sunday, and the BBC's environmental analyst reports that the accord "will just need the EU and a couple of other major polluters to cross the threshold." Its ultimate goal is to stop global temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius -- "well above the aspirational 1.5C heating that the UN accepts should really be the limit" -- though U.K. researchers report that already 2016 temperatures may be rising 1.1C above pre-industrial levels.
There's a G20 summit starting on Sunday, and the BBC's environmental analyst reports that the accord "will just need the EU and a couple of other major polluters to cross the threshold." Its ultimate goal is to stop global temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees Celsius -- "well above the aspirational 1.5C heating that the UN accepts should really be the limit" -- though U.K. researchers report that already 2016 temperatures may be rising 1.1C above pre-industrial levels.
He'll make sure that america stays on coal and gas, just so that the coal miners still have work and don't have to adapt to progress. Great, isn't it?
Now please quit arguing that since China isn't doing anything, there's no point in the U.S. doing anything either. Fact is, the U.S. and China together are responsible for more than 38% of global greenhouse gas emissions, more than the EU, Russia, India, Japan and Brazil combined. We have a unique responsibility in the fight against global warming.
Our dictator in chief cannot ratify any treaty. Unless we have been overrun by communists like China.
5 out of 6 people enjoy Russian Roulette & 6 out of 7 Dwarfs are not Happy
How Does the United States Ratify Treaties?
"The President...shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur..." Constitution of the United States, Art. II, Sec. 2
[http://www.childrightscampaign.org/why-ratify/how-does-the-united-states-ratify-treaties]
It sounds like these people would welcome a global economic collapse, or at least a Western economic collapse, as a shortcut towards reducing major sources of GHGs like industrial/power generation activities and population numbers through attrition from the resulting wars, mass starvation, and domestic rebellion/violence/riots within the various affected developed nations that a major global economic disaster would precipitate.
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
but Trump can't do anything about coal either way. Coal is in decline because most of it wasn't being used to generate electricity. It was being shipped to China to make steel. China (and the rest of the world) isn't building infrastructure anymore (those tax cuts have to come from somewhere, amairight?). That's what killed coal. Not the environment. Not outsourcing. Just plain ole fashion drop in demand.
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He'll make sure that america stays on coal and gas, just so that the coal miners still have work and don't have to adapt to progress. Great, isn't it?
Trump will invent a new type of energy system to get us off of coal once and for all. That's pretty smart for a politician!
(For those following at home, I projected something wonderful onto my candidate, then praised him for it. The OP projected something stupid on my candidate, then scorned him for it.)
Instead of all this projection, shouldn't we stick to what the candidates actually say and do?
Tell me about *your* candidate. What has she actually done? No projection or words, what has she actually done that you can point to with pride and say "my candidate did *this*!!!"
Anyone who has ever done the classic experiment of heating ice water while recording the temperature increase will know that the word "already" has no place here.
The temperature dynamics of the earth's biosphere are a Rube Goldberg contraption. It's not even clear that adding heat couldn't lead (for some period of time) to a temperature decrease.
For example, let's suppose that the gas trapped in the permafrost was not methane, but a methane-like gas that promotes a net global cooling (under the condition of maximal sustained release); however, the net cooling effect is not evenly distributed, the permafrost at the poles continues to melt, this entrenched source of anti-methane is ultimately exhausted, and then the earth's temperature begins to warm again, now in a rapid rebound.
This story is not even a huge change in the particulars as we found them.
Just imagine if scientists were presently gasping in alarm at a global cooling of 1 degree C which presages (in accepted theory) a rapid rebound in the other direction. Then we'd be writing (perhaps correctly) that we've already experienced a fatal 1 degree C of cooling en route to an impossibly dire 2 degree C global warming.
The word "already" is being used here to cue the naive reader into the lazy presumption that we can cast off the nefarious ashes of system theory, and bust out instead narrative compass and straightedge.
No. We. Can't.
To be ratified, Congress must vote for the accord. That has not happened, and likely will not any time soon.
The US 'formally' joining the Paris Accord is based on Obama's claim that it's not actually a treaty, and therefore doesn't actually require Congressional ratification, despite the fact that that it incorporates compulsory actions on the part of the signatory countries, and is therefore a treaty.
Well it doesn't have any penalties.
Is that the relevant point?
You don't think that agreements should be ratified when they don't have penalties?
You're saying it's okay for the president to speak for the country and make agreements without oversight?
Could there be any bad consequences down the road if we let it pass this one time?
China needs to be brought under control QUICKLY. The idea that they be allowed to build out 50 GW of new coal plants every year until 2030 is just plain STUPID. As it is, they are NOT at 33%, but are close to 50% OR MORE of emissions. Go look at OCO-2 sat. You can see how much they emit.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
When it comes to carbon footprint the top two on energy produced per greenhouse gasses emitted are hydroelectric and nuclear. Wind and solar are close behind. So close that if anyone wants to argue with me on this I'll call them all equal, perhaps I'd even grant wind and solar a 10x lead because even then nuclear is so much better than coal and oil. Geothermal is up there somewhere too but, like hydro, it is highly location dependent. Wind and solar are still location dependent but much less so. There are few places we cannot put nuclear.
Then there are lives lost per terawatt hour produced. Nuclear gets 0.04 lives lost per TWh produced, and this includes Fukushima, Chernobyl, and deaths by mining uranium. Rooftop solar has 0.1, wind has 0.15, hydro has 1.0 (mostly due to China, 0.1 otherwise), with the world average around 47, mostly due to coal, oil, and natural gas. Again, even if we take the nuclear number and multiply it by 10 it is still not bad compared to the rest.
When it comes to costs I'll take average numbers from the EIA because I feel like it and I found their numbers real quick. Nuclear is $95.2/MWh, conventional coal is $95.1, hydro is $83.5, peaking natural gas is $113.5, combined cycle natural gas is $75.2, wind is $73.6 onshore and $196.9 offshore, Solar is $125.3 for PV and $239.7 for thermal. Nuclear doesn't have a 10x advantage here but If someone wants to argue the numbers I'll grant a 2x advantage since then it still beats out the unreliable wind and solar in many cases. What I will not do is allow claims that wind and solar prices will improve but nuclear will not. If we grant that future technology improvement grants a better price for one energy source then we should be able to assume an equal gain on any other energy source. This is especially true if discussing any technology that turns heat or mechanical motion into electricity since nuclear power uses those just as much as wind or solar thermal.
Then it comes down to whether or not we can actually build it all. I saw a comparison on these energy sources based on a cubic mile of oil. This comparison spreads the construction over 50 years, and if we assume a 50 year lifespan of these power sources then it turns into a continuous rate of construction. We'd need one new 900MW nuclear power plant every week. 200 new 18GW hydroelectric dams every quarter. 1200 new windmills every week with 1.65MW capacity each. For PV solar we'd need to cover 250,000 roofs per day with 2.1kWh capacity each.
Here's where I think the final nail in the coffin on the idea that we can replace coal with wind lies. To replace coal with wind worldwide would require 10 billion tons of steel and concrete, and current annual production is 1.5 billion tons. Wind requires over 500 tons of steel and 1000 tons of concrete per MW installed, about ten times that of nuclear, coal, or gas. I got most of these numbers from the EIA and from Morgan Stanley.
I've heard people claim it is impossible for us to produce one new nuclear power plant per week worldwide. I call bullshit because nuclear power takes no more resources than coal or natural gas and we are currently building them at a similar rate. Arguments against nuclear on costs in lives and dollars also go out the window to anyone that does an honest analysis. Comparing nuclear to wind on resources required makes nuclear look so much easier. I tried to do a similar analysis on solar but my calculator doesn't do numbers that big.
I've largely ignored issues like reliability, location restrictions, etc. that count against wind and solar because I don't have to go there to make my point. If someone wants to argue about nuclear being unreliable but wind and solar can be predicted then I'll go there, but you'll lose.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
I'm really glad everything is solved now and we won't have to listen to climate change alarmists any more. Congrats guys. You can stop spending your time on prophetic doomsday storytelling and go out and do something productive now -- if you can somehow find a way to produce anything of value without using any energy.
Obama is lying to the world, The United States has not ratified the Paris agreement. We have a constitutionally defined process to ratify any international agreement (i.e. a treaty), which has not happened. Although Obama may have extended his personal promise, the United States of America has not. I think a few Senators should point this out to the rest of the world, so that they are not tricked into expecting that we are honor bound to this agreement. I think it is very evil to try to trick people into thinking you have promised something that you have not actually promised... that is really kind of worse than breaking a promise you did actually make. If Obama wants the United States of America to actually enter into this agreement, he knows what he has to do to make that happen.
The agreement is not valid in the US without the Senate voting to ratify it.
Obama knows this full-well. He is just counting on those other countries not paying attention to the details. The action has no force of law in the US other than that President Obama may choose to have his executive branch employees enforce it during his last few months in office (knowing that if anybody challenges with a lawsuit it will be stuck in the courts until after he has retired). This is hazardous to any federal employee who tries to enforce any of this garbage on any American citizen or business, given that it is not valid law and these employees presumably still plan to have jobs next spring and will be subject to congressional action, and legal action.
It's exactly like the Iran nuke deal - it has no binding authority on anybody within the US or on any US policies. Just as Obama could not unilaterally confirm the Iran treaty and thus any business entity in the US dealing with Iran (still a violation of actual US law) can be arrested and prosecuted by any future administration, anybody going along with Obama's charades on this climate action will be similarly left to swing in the wind after Obama leaves office. Put another way: If you change your behavior or business plan in response to this idea Obama has in his head but which the US Senate does not share and has not ratified, then you may be operating on the wrong assumptions and plans when February arrives.
This is becoming the new normal under President Obama.
On immigration, he said he had no legal right to act, then he acted anyway and said he could because congress did not do what he wanted.
On the Iran deal he acted, and then when congress refused to support the deal, he presumed they supported and challenged them to undo his actions.
Now on the climate deal, he knows congress will not approve, so he is doing it anyway.
This is 100% anti-American. The Constitution does NOT have a clause that says that anytime the congress does not do what a president wants, the president is free to go ahead. That would make a President into a king and eliminate any need for a congress or the consent of the people. Obama is just lucky he has a congress lead by feckless, stupid, flaccid, chicken s%&t, establishment Republicans who are so scared of their own shadows that they have never actually opposed him on anything. They have supported every one of his budgets and every one of his debt ceiling increases, have been unwilling to stop any of his social policies, foreign policy actions, or do anything on issues like Obamacare, car bailouts, bank bailouts, government takeover of student loans, treasury department money printing etc.
Obama supporters have been cheering this lawlessness for 7+ years, but they will panic if Trump gets elected and decides to use all the precedents that Obama set. Trump will be able to implement nearly every policy he wants without worrying about congressional interference, just by executive authority. We used to be a nation of laws, but Democrats have changed all that for the momentary satisfaction of Obama successes. Hopefully a Trump administration will use the IRS, FBI, EPA, and ATF against a wide range of liberal organizations just as Obama has used them against conservatives. If Government oppresses the left enough, maybe they will lose their appetite for fascism and tyranny and then return to the position they had in the 60s of being afraid of big government and then liberals and conservatives can join forces to return the idea of being a nation of laws again with a government of three functional branches with checks-and-balances.
I have recently heard that several colleges and private institutions consider quoting the US Constitution to be hate speech and a microaggression. Someone's sensibilities might be offended!
If I want to put solar panels on my roof I have to go through the following process:
1. Pay the power company about $200 to have them consider letting me have a grid-tied system.
2. Spend a few weeks filling out a big stack of forms required by the power company.
3. Pay maybe $2000 for panels, transfer switches, wires, etc., etc.
4. Pay a power-company-approved installer to install all that stuff. (They won't allow me to do it myself.)
5. Pay a power-company-approved inspector to inspect the work several times.
6. Pay the power company an extra monthly fee for the privilege of having a grid-tied system.
We have the third-highest electricity rates here, and yet I only use about $600 worth of electricity per year.
Given the frequency of lightning and wind storms in my area it is unlikely that the system would ever pay for itself.
http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/nonerrors.html#between
Keep your eyes to the sky.
Big country is big ! Film at 11.
The USA isn't bound by any treaty until and unless it's ratified by the Senate.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
CHina is the worst polluter on the planet, and continuing to grow it.
They account for 33%, while adding 50GW coal plants EACH YEAR (and only 33 GW of AE, which are very inefficient there).
And America is is the bottom 1/3 of polluters when Co2 per $ GDP. China is in top 3.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
"Obmam"[sic] did not go easy on executive orders - he started issuing them as soon as he got into power, and unlike previous presidents who used them for small things, Obama has issued a smaller NUMBER of them BUT they have been very large and sweeping in their effects. He has also issued a flood of executive memos (a difference in name only) which has allowed him to do far more orders but provide his obamabot supporters a very dishonest "talking point" abut his using fewer "executive orders".
Since you referred to my world relative to kill lists: I have absolutely NO problem with the bold slaughter of huge numbers of terrorists, and doing it with drones/robots is just all the better. I do however draw the line at killing US citizens (or foreign national CIVILIANS) without due process. Obama could have gone to congress and tried something he has never tried yet - negotiate. The congress and president should have negotiated a deal to change the laws to make it so any American who joins a terror outfit could be publicly named and accused, and then put on trial in court after a suitable delay (allowing time for the accused to get a lawyer and peacefully appear for trial) and if convicted (probably in absentia for all but the truly innocent) with the result being that they are stripped of citizenship and designated as combatants after which time they could be legitimately droned. Obama has no experience with negotiation or compromise. In every fight with congress he just refuses to deal and waits for the establishment Republican morons to wet their pants and give in to his demands. To be fair to Obama: the GOP leaders in congress always fold, so they have taught him that this behavior always works to his benefit. Rather than compromise with congress and create a law that attempts to honor the Constitutional niceties and honor the rights of citizens, Obama gets out his pen and writes a "kill list". Typical, and in-your-face psychopathy.
Funny that when Democrats announce that they are out to block Republican presidents and do everything they can to stymie Republican presidents they claim to be "the loyal opposition" and can be regularly seen proclaiming the patriotism of opposing a President - but when Republicans announce that they are out to stop a Democrat president and weakly feign opposition to him, while actually giving him every budget and funding his every action, Democrats whine about conspiracies and "do-nothing obstructionists". By "do nothing" they basically mean: fail to help the Democrat fulfill left-wing fantasies. The current "do nothing" congress has actually done nothing to stop Obama and he and his supporters should not be complaining at all.
The basic point remains however: If Trump is elected and uses all of Obama's precedents in ways that oppose what the left want, the left will have no legitimate moral or intellectual right to oppose him or even to complain, having cheered through 8 years of Obama flagrantly setting every single precedent, only for his different partisan ends. If you live by the sword, you die by the sword.
I was attempting to avoid unneeded partisanship. The point is that there is LAW which is written by congress and signed into effect by a president, and then there is the daydreams of a president. The government employees who work for the citizens and are paid by the taxpayers are expected to follow the LAWS, and allowed to do this according to the policy edicts of the President (who is head of the executive branch) as long as the President's edicts are consistent with the LAWS
Should Trump be elected and then find that executive branch employees have been ignoring laws and instead doing Obama's bidding, he would be able to fire them for cause and even prosecute them should he choose. He probably would do neither, simply ordering them to go back to following the laws.
Should Hillary be elected and then find that executive branch employees have been ignoring laws and instead doing Obama's bidding, she would be able to fire them for cause and even prosecute them should she choose. She probably would do neither, and depending on the policy might order them to continue, or order them to increase the activity, or order them to go back to following the laws.
In either case, Obama is comfortably retired, building one or more "Obama Foundation" entities to get rich on speeches and books etc BUT all the minions left behind in the federal government will be dangling at the mercy of their new master who will no longer have their backs. They ought to always be mindful of the legal and career peril they put themselves into when they go full-NAZI (not in the Godwin-invoking genocide sense but the oath and allegiance sense) and think they serve the MAN rather than the OFFICE and the LAWS.
Per person is one of the WORST measures on this since ppl do not make the choices.
The choices are made by Businesses and Gov. As such, GDP is the ONLY measure that will work to bring it down.
Also, America is not even in the TOP 10 of the worst per capita.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
You are clearly retarded if you think China growing even bigger and polluting even more will make the world a better place as long as it increases its GDP as well.
China grows 2 times as big and produces twice as much CO2, but in your fantasy accounting, it's all good for the environment because their GDP grew 4x at the same time. That's a 50% reduction in pollution according to you, and not a doubling according to any sane measurement system.
One can only wonder who is paying you to be this monumentally stupid.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
America is more than triple the world average (also more than double China).
It's clear to anyone who looks at any version of the numbers for any year you care to mention. Only oil producing gulf states or micro-nations are even in the same league as American polluters.