Visit by renowned British economist could be Kyoto embarrassment for H

[hiti]

DENNIS BUECKERT Wed Feb 14, 6:58 PM ET

OTTAWA (CP) - The Harper government may be in for a Stern lecture. Nicholas Stern, the renowned British economist whose massive report on climate change made headlines around the world last fall, is coming to Canada - and it's not at the invitation of the Conservative government.

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Stern has compared the potential costs of climate change to those of the world wars and the Great Depression.

He has a packed schedule in Toronto on Monday, including a joint news conference with David Suzuki, an outspoken critic of the Tories' climate policies.

Stern, a former chief economist at the

World Bank, has become an unlikely celebrity since his 700-page report, the Stern Review, was tabled in October.

Stern's report contradicts the Conservatives' arguments on almost every major point.

He says cutting greenhouse emissions to acceptable levels will cost a mere one per cent of global

GDP by 2050, while failing to do so could cost up to 20 per cent - which would amount to trillions of dollars.

Stern says rich countries must take the lead in addressing a climate problem they have largely created, so as to ensure a sense of fairness and bring developing countries into the process gradually.

"What we're being told by the government is we're going to go bankrupt if we do this (fulfil the Kyoto targets)," said Emily Moorhouse of the

Sierra Club.

"But Stern's report says the opposite - we're going to go bankrupt if we don't."

http://news.yahoo.com/s/cpress/20070214/ca...ies_kyoto_stern

So is Steve going to cut and run (like missing the vote today on the Kyoto bill of Pablo Rodriguez) and let his mouth do all the yapping?

[Argus]

DENNIS BUECKERT Wed Feb 14, 6:58 PM ET

OTTAWA (CP) - The Harper government may be in for a Stern lecture. Nicholas Stern, the renowned British economist whose massive report on climate change made headlines around the world last fall, is coming to Canada - and it's not at the invitation of the Conservative government.

An er, economist? And just what is his expertise on climatic events and climatalogy? If he has none, which, let's admit it, is not generally an area of training for economists, then how can he know what causes global warming, or how bad it will be, or the results? And how can he therefore estimate the costs?

BTW, Stephen Harper is an economist. Why should I believe this foreign guy who is clearly on a mission from God, so to speak, against Harper, on his own mission from God?

Stern Report on Climate Change is utter Rubbish

[scribblet]

Stern Report on Climate Change is utter Rubbish

Clearly the Stern report has been debunked

http://theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,2...94-7583,00.html

Unfortunately, this claim falls apart when one reads the 700-page tome. Despite using many good references, the Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change is selective and its conclusion flawed. Its fear-mongering arguments have been sensationalised, which is ultimately only likely to make the world worse off.

[margrace]

I have family working in the oil sands for instance and they say when gas prices go under 90 cnts a litre then there is a cut back on production. Do the two posters debunking climate change then lose money on their shares when this happens?

[scribblet]

I wish..... or maybe I'm a U.S. mole ROTFLMAO

There's lots of stuff out there, abut peddling hysterical sentiment

http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/st...6a-5a286a5b374c

This is particularly good considering how the alarmists are hyping up GW, maybe they have special interests huh

http://www.torontosun.com/Comment/2007/02/...627010-sun.html

Here is the process Sowell describes by which the liberal "anointed" -- who typically believe they alone possess the wisdom to govern -- constantly seek to impose their views on society.

Judge for yourself whether Sowell's four-step process accurately reflects how the Liberals have handled this issue.

Stage 1: The anointed declare "the crisis" in which, Sowell observes, "some situation exists, whose negative aspects the anointed propose to eliminate. Such a situation is routinely characterized as a 'crisis' even though all human situations have negative aspects ..."

'It pays to shop when others don't' - The Nightowl -

Stage 2: "The solution" is proposed in which "policies to end the 'crisis' are advocated by the anointed" who dismiss claims by critics that their proposals won't work or may even make things worse as "absurd and 'simplistic,' if not dishonest."

Stage 3: "The results" reveal "the solution" chosen by the anointed either didn't work, or made things worse.

Stage 4: The anointed give "the response" to their critics, in which they dismiss them for being "simplistic" and for "ignoring the 'complexities' involved as 'many factors' went into determining the outcome."

Now consider how the issue of man-made global warming played out in Canada under the Liberals. more

[Charles Anthony]

An er, economist? And just what is his expertise on climatic events and climatalogy? If he has none, which, let's admit it, is not generally an area of training for economists, then how can he know what causes global warming, or how bad it will be, or the results? And how can he therefore estimate the costs?

In principle, this is a poor criticism. An economist can do all of the things you ask by working with a climatologist. A climatologist could not possibly "estimate the costs" without economics.

[Keepitsimple]

Al Gore and Nicholas Stern. A fine pair. The sad part is, one day this planet will face a very real, imminent crisis - one that we can't ingnore.....and because of the Global Cooling (70's/80's) and now the Global Warming alarmists - people won't be listening.

[Catchme]

Nice try using Christopher Monckton to try and discredit Stern. Oops sorry, not quite.

So which was the august journal that published it? Science? Nature? Geophysical Research Letters? Not quite. It was the Sunday Telegraph. In keeping with most of the articles about climate change in that publication, it is a mixture of cherry-picking, downright misrepresentation and pseudo-scientific gibberish. But it has the virtue of being incomprehensible to anyone who is not an atmospheric physicist.

The author of this "research article" is Christopher Monckton, otherwise known as Viscount Monckton of Brenchley. He has a degree in classics and a diploma in journalism and, as far as I can tell, no further qualifications. But he is confident enough to maintain that - by contrast to all those charlatans and amateurs who wrote the reports produced by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change - he is publishing "the truth".

The warming effects of carbon dioxide, Lord Monckton claims, have been exaggerated, distorted and made up altogether. One example of the outrageous fraud the UN body has committed is the elimination from its temperature graphs of the "medieval warm period", which, he claims, was "real, global and up to 3C warmer than now". He runs two graphs side by side, one of which shows the temperature record over the past 1,000 years as rendered by the UN panel, and the other purporting to show real temperatures over the same period.

And it's all in the words, LOLOLOL

His claims about the Stefan-Boltzmann equation have been addressed by someone who does know what he's talking about, Dr Gavin Schmidt of Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies. He begins by pointing out that Stefan-Boltzmann is a description of radiation from a "black body" - an idealised planet that absorbs all the electromagnetic radiation that reaches it. The Earth is not a black body. It reflects some of the radiation it receives back into space.

Schmidt points out that Monckton also forgets, in making his calculations, that "climate sensitivity is an equilibrium concept": in other words that there is a time-lag of several decades between the release of carbon dioxide and the eventual temperature rise it causes. If you don't take this into account, the climate's sensitivity to carbon dioxide looks much smaller. This is about as fundamental a mistake as you can make in climate science.

What of his other claims? Well, the reason the "medieval warm period" doesn't show up on the UN panel's graphs is simple. As far as climatologists can tell, there wasn't one. So why did the Vikings, as Monckton points out, settle in Greenland?

As a paper published in Reviews of Geophysics shows, Vikings first arrived in Greenland at the very beginning of the "warm period" Monckton discusses, when temperatures, even according to his graph, were lower than they are today. They did so because life had become too hot for them in their adopted home (Iceland): not climatically, but politically.

Of course, there is much more out there to discredit Monckton's erroneous assertations, that I would gladly post.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/st...1947248,00.html

[Catchme]

Clearly the Stern report has been debunked

Unfortunately, this claim falls apart when one reads the 700-page tome. Despite using many good references, the Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change is selective and its conclusion flawed. Its fear-mongering arguments have been sensationalised, which is ultimately only likely to make the world worse off.

NO clearly it has not be debunked. In fact quite the oppoisite. The US Davis report backs it up, the UN report backs it up, Monckton has NO credentials and has bee debunked himself, as was the fellow you linked to Lomborg, the Skeptical environmentalist, was also hugely debunked in his spewings.

You Gotta Loathe the Guy

Anti-Lomborg website

The anti-Lomborg website is run by "a bunch of environmental writers, academics, and activists in Oxford, England, who were mildly irritated by the publication in the Guardian newspaper of a series of 'green wash' articles written by Bjorn Lomborg." Here, you'll find a critique of the Lomborg articles that appeared last summer in the London Guardian, -- and a great photo of Lomborg getting a pie in the face

TomPaine.com

TomPaine.com, a truth-seeking online periodical known for its weekly ads on the editorial page of the New York Times, wags its finger at the media for going gaga over Lomborg. Upstanding Cambridge University Press, publisher of the The Skeptical Environmentalist, also takes a hit. Check out the related ad (with its swell mention of Grist).

World Resources Institute

For those of a green persuasion, the World Resources Institute offers up a handy kit for tackling Lomborg's work, including "Nine things journalists should know about The Skeptical Environmentalist" (a critique by the WRI and World Wildlife Fund), as well as a similar list geared toward environmental educators, and yet another set of links (in case you still can't get enough).

Union of Concerned Scientists

The Union of Concerned Scientists has more than a few things to say about The Skeptical Environmentalist: The organization plans to run a series of reviews by experts on water resources, biodiversity, and climate change. The first review, by Peter Gleick, takes on Lomborg's arguments on water resources..

http://www.grist.org/advice/books/2001/12/12/short/

It is a great link above and it links to the the 100's who have debunked Lomborg.

[southerncomfort]

Al Gore and Nicholas Stern. A fine pair. The sad part is, one day this planet will face a very real, imminent crisis - one that we can't ingnore.....and because of the Global Cooling (70's/80's) and now the Global Warming alarmists - people won't be listening.

Yup, I suppose we could all provide hundreds of links debunking Stern and Al Gore, but whats the point. The Green crowd are pushing the agenda regardless of cost or accuracy of the claims. Umpteen posts saying they are right and others are wrong doesn't make it so. The squeaky wheel gets the most oil - no pun intended :

[Argus]

I have family working in the oil sands for instance and they say when gas prices go under 90 cnts a litre then there is a cut back on production. Do the two posters debunking climate change then lose money on their shares when this happens?

No, we get extra stipends from the oil company executives we work for.

Man, it just shows you how the hysteria of this global warming junk science has gripped weaker minds that anyone daring to criticize it must be part of some kind of evil conservative capitalist cabal.

[southerncomfort]

I have family working in the oil sands for instance and they say when gas prices go under 90 cnts a litre then there is a cut back on production. Do the two posters debunking climate change then lose money on their shares when this happens?

No, we get extra stipends from the oil company executives we work for.

Man, it just shows you how the hysteria of this global warming junk science has gripped weaker minds that anyone daring to criticize it must be part of some kind of evil conservative capitalist cabal.

: :

[Argus]

Clearly the Stern report has been debunked

Unfortunately, this claim falls apart when one reads the 700-page tome. Despite using many good references, the Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change is selective and its conclusion flawed. Its fear-mongering arguments have been sensationalised, which is ultimately only likely to make the world worse off.

NO clearly it has not be debunked. In fact quite the oppoisite. The US Davis report backs it up, the UN report backs it up, Monckton has NO credentials and has bee debunked himself, as was the fellow you linked to Lomborg, the Skeptical environmentalist, was also hugely debunked in his spewings.

I love the the sputtering, bug-eyed, howling outrage that anyone would dare to make a case against the junk science weak minds have accepted (though few of them are educated enough to even understand what the science is about) and adopted as biblical lore. Damn the man! How dare he! How dare he! He's an "anti-environmentalist!" - yes , he HATES the environment! Heresy! Burn him! Burn him!

[geoffrey]

When science tries to stiffle debate by calling all opposing viewpoints impossible without exception, I've really got to wonder if they are hiding something.

So many 'facts' have been tossed on their head. But the academic groupthink in the Western world will no longer allow it. No matter whether Global Warming is right or wrong, it will exist forever, as any other theory simply cannot ever be true no matter what no exceptions don't even both to argue it good night.

It's a terrible attitude and it makes scientists look like fools.

[Catchme]

The not so environmentally conscious CPC have showed their true feelings about the environment today.

Independent environment chief endorsed

BILL CURRY

Globe and Mail Update

OTTAWA — The Commons environment committee has endorsed a motion calling for an independent environment commissioner who can't be fired by the auditor-general.

But the five Conservative MPs on the committee abstained from voting on the Liberal motion, setting up yet another battle between the opposition and the government over an environmental issue.

The non-binding motion, which passed 6-0 at the committee on Monday, calls on the government to remove the commissioner of the environment and sustainable development from the Auditor-General's office so that the commissioner is a fully independent agent of Parliament

And of course our former environmental commissioner was fired last month for some unknown reason by our Auditor General, which is weird in itself. I guess harper did not want to take the fall for gettind of the person who was appointed to make sure our environment was safe.

...goes to the heart of the controversy over Auditor-General Sheila Fraser's surprise dismissal last month of environment commissioner Johanne Gélinas.

Ms. Gélinas, who now works in Montreal for the accounting firm Deloitte & Touche, wrote a letter this week to committee members supporting an independent office. “He or she must be fully independent of the Office of the Auditor General of Canada, because the two mandates are incompatible,” she wrote. “Parliament has an obligation to give environmental protection an independent voice.”

The committee's motion will now go to the full House of Commons for an eventual vote by all MPs.

“I don't understand why [the Conservatives] didn't support it,” he said. “I think this is the right thing to do. Everybody else at the committee did. Ninety-nine per cent of the witnesses that showed up think it should be strengthened. I think this is a time for us to strengthen the function.”

CPC again block positive moves to look after our environment

[scribblet]

I love the the sputtering, bug-eyed, howling outrage that anyone would dare to make a case against the junk science weak minds have accepted (though few of them are educated enough to even understand what the science is about) and adopted as biblical lore. Damn the man! How dare he! How dare he! He's an "anti-environmentalist!" - yes , he HATES the environment! Heresy! Burn him! Burn him!

It is now a case of whipping up the sheeples into mass hysteria; manipluating them for political ends. Its amazing what the media can do with a message they buy into.

[Posit]

What's even more amazing as the number of right wingers who are threatened by an open discussion on the economic benefits of doing something positive for the environment. I mean if the guy's data and propositions are irrelevant, then you would think that the right wingers would welcome an opportunity to debate the information instead of trying to dismiss the messenger before he has even delivered the message.

Ah...but....there must be some validity to get some many people upset while trying to protect their own personal investments, right?

[Wilber]

They are not irrelevant but there are those who are not prepared to accept a hypothesis based on a hypothesis as the gospel. An educated opinion based on observations, yes, The gospel, no. It is the messengers who are being embraced, more and more without being questioned.

[Saturn]

An er, economist? And just what is his expertise on climatic events and climatalogy? If he has none, which, let's admit it, is not generally an area of training for economists, then how can he know what causes global warming, or how bad it will be, or the results? And how can he therefore estimate the costs?

Next time the Fraser Institute puts out an anti-Kyoto report written by Ross (an economist) and a bunch of geologists, you are going to dismiss it outright, right?

[Posit]

Kyoto is not the solution to global warming. It is the beginning of the discussion and the impetus to change that we must undertake ourselves. There has been much said about the cost of Kyoto yet very little about the economic benefits. I suggest that to weigh this out properly we must listen to all and discuss the viability that has been proposed. Attempting to outshout the counter argument to Kyoto economic cost is no more beneficial than for anarchists to complain about how government is run.

BTW I remember watching a CTV docu on the City of Edmonton, who undertook to take responsibility for their part of global warming by looking for energy efficiencies in their buildings and operations. Turned out they saved the taxpayers in many ways since the benefits of switching to things like compact and energy efficient fluorescents outweighed the initial costs of buying that slightly more expensive lighting technology. There is definitely an economic argument to be made in support of greener technologies - something we should all be allowed to hear.

[hiti]

“I don't understand why [the Conservatives] didn't support it,” he said.

Because they would get their ass*s kicked off the committee and moved to seats behind the curtains. These Con whipped puppies do as they are told.

Click on environment update at the top of the page. http://www.sierraclub.org/

[Catchme]

“I don't understand why [the Conservatives] didn't support it,” he said.

Because they would get their ass*s kicked off the committee and moved to seats behind the curtains. These Con whipped puppies do as they are told.

Click on environment update at the top of the page. http://www.sierraclub.org/

Yes, they would, and so much for "the greening of the CPC " more smoke and mirrors. Thanks for the link