THIS PAGE HAS BEEN ACTIVATED AS THE NEW STATESMAN BLOG IS NOW CLOSED FOR COMMENTS
At 10am this morning, the New Statesman finally closed the Mark Lynas thread on their website after 1715 comments had been added over a period of five months. I don’t know whether this constitutes any kind of a record, but gratitude is certainly due to the editor of of the New Statesman for hosting the discussion so patiently and also for publishing articles from Dr David Whitehouse and Mark Lynas that have created so much interest.
This page is now live, and anyone who would like to continue the discussion here is welcome to do so. I have copied the most recent contributions at the New Statesman as the first comment for the sake of convenience. If you want to refer back to either of the original threads, then you can find them here:
Dr David Whitehouse’s article can be found here with all 1289 comments.
Mark Lynas’ attempted refutation can be found here with 1715 comments.
Welcome to Harmless Sky, and happy blogging.
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10,000 Responses to “Continuation of the New Statesman Whitehouse/Lynas blogs.”
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Brute,
I see you have asked two questions:
“Nationalizing oil companies will be the next step. How well did that work in the United Kingdom?”
As far as I know, the UK government has never nationalised oil in the same way it nationalised coal or the railways. However they did at one time own half of BP, which I would imagine that Mrs T’s government sold off pretty quickly when they had the chance. The British taxpayer may have been better holding on to their half share. They’d get a much better price now and they would have collected annual dividends too. Did it work? Well I’m not sure that many people would have noticed any difference.
There are arguments both for and against the nationalisation process. Providing that it’s all democratically decided then I don’t have a problem with it. I believe the Iraqis would like to nationalise their oil assets. I hope the US government will allow the democratic process to take its course free from any outside interference. :-)
“By the way, why does a gallon of gasoline cost twice as much in Europe as in the US?”
That’s an interesting question. The simple answer is that there is less tax in the USA. However the European countries do tend to try to balance their budgets, or at least not let their borrowing get out of control. The US Federal budget is something else entirely. I believe the deficit is approaching a half trillion dollars this year? The current world economic crisis stems from the way that the US economy has been mismanaged in recent years.
I doubt that any other country in the world would either be able or want to run its economy this way. If the US lived within its means and balanced its budget, you’d be paying a little more for your petrol too.
Its a bit rich being lectured by an American on wanting something for nothing!
Tony,
I know it was probably a typo, but I do like your phrase “surley AGW sceptics”. If you’d used the spell checker “surly AGW sceptics” would have been just perfect!
Hi Peter,
Coming back to your 872.
“You already know that your calculations on carbon sensitivity are not generally accepted, and the true picture is much worse than you are painting, so I’ll say no more about them!”
Please do say more about them, Peter. But try to be a bit more specific. What is not generally accepted? By whom? What do you specifically mean by “generally”? How is the “true picture is much worse” than I am “painting”.
Specifics, please, Peter. Not unfounded innuendos.
If you are going to contradict a specific point or calculation I have presented, do so with facts. Otherwise stick your comments in your hat.
Your next point: “However, I do need to say something about your assumption of …at current (2004) consumption of 6 Gt/year. This will last 167 years
Energy consumption tends to follow economic growth which is maybe a few % per year. Even a growth figure of 4% p.a. , which is often considered to be quite modest, would mean that energy consumption would double after 18 years.”
Peter, you’ve got to do a better job of reading before you shoot off critiques. I clearly specified the basis for my calculation as follows: “Let’s assume all the carbon locked up in coal, oil and oil shale gets released at essentially the same rate we are releasing CO2 today and that all growth (over today’s emission rate) will be covered by other carbon-neutral sources (nuclear, wind, solar, geothermal, biofuels, etc.)”
Did you get that last part about all growth being covered by carbon-neutral sources?
This means that over the 167 year period on average there is no increase in annual CO2 emission from today’s level, as other sources begin to take up the growth and eventually even start to replace some fossil fuel plants.
That’s the assumption. If you do not like this assumption, please state so and why. And provide me your idea of a better assumption, while you’re at it.
To your final point: “I suspect that there may still be a lot more undiscovered [coal] under the ocean, but it isn’t going to last 167 years if there are no restraints placed on its use.”
There you go again, Peter, talking about “restraints”. How silly and irrelevant!
What does that have to do with the topic we were discussing, namely your obviously incorrect claim that the combustion of all the oil and coal reserves of this world would have us “cooking”.
I showed you that under the IPCC assumption of a 3C climate sensitivity for 2xCO2 this would raise temperature by 2.9C over the 162-year period from 2008 to 2170 and under a lower assumption of 0.7 climate sensitivity for 2xCO2 the temperature increase would be 0.7C.
I also pointed out that recent physical observations on cloud feedbacks by Spencer et al plus satellite observations on water vapor increase (and resulting feedback) reported by Minschwaner + Dessler have shown that the 3C climate sensitivity is likely to be overstated by a factor of 3 to 4, putting it into line with other estimates (Shaviv + Veizer, Lindzen) at 0.7 to 0.8C instead, so that the 2.9C warming by 2170 is most likely overstated, and that 0.7C to maybe 1C is a better guess.
That’s all. No “cooking”!
If you have an issue with any of this please state so with specifics and leave the “innuendos” aside. OK?
Regards,
Max
Robin,
“….consensus means that nearly all scientists agree that mankind is clearly responsible for global warming (or even more absurdly ‘climate change’) and that therefore ‘the debate is over’ ”
I would say that the ‘consensus’ is that the earth is warming and that anthropogenic activites have made a significant contribution. Of course there are uncertainties over the degree of danger that the problem presents.
Incidentally, I’ve no real problem with the words ‘climate change’ but the term was originally promoted by none other than President Bush himself. Republicans abandoned the phrase ‘global warming’ and started using ‘climate change’ in 2002 after a memo offering advice on alternative terms, from political consultant Frank Luntz.
Max,
Well, if you are saying that emissions have to be at least kept constant for the next 167 years, I think you might be in danger of being expelled from the climate sceptics club!
You might need to argue that they need to be reduced to gain entry to our club, but maybe we can offer you some sort of probationary deal!
But, seriously, how can we be sure that emissions will even be held constant unless some sort of restraint is applied to them. It is possible that the progress in the renewables will be so rapid that the natural laws of economics will ensure that they are. But I’m not so sure. We need a ‘belt and braces’ policy to make sure that the technology goes the way we want it to.
Hi Brute,
Agree that Peter has some strange ideas on putting “restraints” on using coal, “nationalizing” oil companies, “carbon trading tipping the scales in favor of cleaner energy”. All sort of fits the Big Brother Knows What’s Best For You planned economy approach (which failed in the USSR). Only difference: this time it’s a “planned carbon footprint economy” (but underneath it’s the same).
Read with interest the T. Boone Pickens “hot air” article you linked. Tony and I went through that one several weeks ago and agreed it doesn’t make sense. Nuclear is about half the investment cost of wind and much more reliable. Wind proponents (like TBP) talk about 40+% online factor but the “hot air” article says it’s closer to 20-30%.
But I can see TBP’s angle: sell his natural gas as a motor fuel (getting subsidies to help pay for the infrastructure), sell it as backup power fuel source (when the wind doesn’t blow) and have a piece of the wind farm action, as well. All supported by taxpayer money. Smart guy.
A real “Boone-doggle”.
Regards,
Max
Hi Peter,
You say “We need a ‘belt and braces’ policy to make sure that the technology goes the way we want it to.”
I cannot agree. Who is “we”? How do “we” want technology to go?
Oil will slowly run out, even with oil shale, tar sands, ANWR, other Arctic regions, increased US offshore, Brazilian continental shelf, etc. As it does, it will become even more expensive and will be limited to higher added-value end uses (feedstocks). As a motor fuel it will slowly be replaced by bio-fuels, hybrid cars, all-electric cars, maybe even (although I doubt it) hydrogen cars.
Coal will also eventually become scarce, and will gradually get replace by nuclear, geothermal, hydroelectric and a bit of local wind and solar where this makes sense.
All of this will happen naturally as economic forces drive the process and new and improved technologies are developed.
And, as I showed you (although you haven’t bought in as yet), fossil fuel will run out before greenhouse warming cooks us all. There’s just not enough of the stuff there to more than double the current atmospheric CO2 concentration. It’s sort of a “peak CO2” situation.
So there is no need for cap and trade or carbon taxes or mandatory restraints, thank you.
Things will all work out without all that, and a whole lot more efficiently, as well, by keeping “big government” (national or international) out of the loop as much as possible.
Regards,
Max
Max,
I’ve just been looking through your calculation which I think essentially shows that if we switched from oil to coal at the same rate of usage that the rate of increase in CO2 concentrations will maybe just increase slightly up from 2 to 2.25ppmv per year.
This is a good illustration of how the CO2 levels in the atmosphere will continue to rise even if emissions remain constant. So if we want to keep CO2 levels from rising then we have to reduce C02 levels. Agreed?
It all well and good making these ‘assumptions’. How are you going to ensure that your assuptions are valid? One of your assumptions is that the earth will abosrb maybe 40% of emissions. Tha’s true if the emissions are low. In fact it may be even better than 40%. However if they rise too quickly then its likely to be a lot less. That is why it is necessary to do more than just assume that emissions will not rise.
Its interesting that you should scoff at my ideas on nationalisation when I haven’t expressed an opinion either for or against, just an opinion in favour of the democratic process deciding the issue. So you disagree with that too? Incidentally, in Australia we have, largely, nationalised railways, water supplies, electricity supplies, one main TV station, and most roads. There are some privatised toll roads and bridges but they aren’t too popular with drivers. There is little popular appetite for going along the Thatcherite privatisation route over here. I think its just a matter of common sense but maybe some Americans ( you sure you’re not American?)think that because we have a Labor Government we’re just one step away from Communism! You must think that, yourself, as you’ve just brought the USSR into the debate.
It does seem that McCarthyism is still alive and well.
“There’s just not enough of the stuff {fossil fuels} there to more than double the current atmospheric CO2 concentration”
That’s just not true.
The generally accepted danger level is 450 ppmv and that is only for a short period.
Even using your figures, the answer you get is just about double the current level, and more than double the pre-industrial level. This is enough to cause serious and catastrophic climate change.
And you have to assume that 40% of annual emissions are absorbed every year over a 160 year time scale to get even that. Make a few different assumptions in your calculation and you’ll get a figure of over 1000pmmv for CO2 in the atmosphere which would be truly cataclismic.
TonyN, 861,
Many thanks for your link to “Morgan on abiotic oil“, which I found to be very interesting and worthy of further investigation, but that might take ME a month or more to check-out the references etc.
At first sight, it seems to be a worthy hypothesis, but I believe that the biotic hypothesis in sedimentary rocks is also worthy, especially since there are various types of crude oil, (and gas), that might be explained from diverse biotic origins.
It is interesting that this expose, be it right or wrong, comes from yet another awesomely attributed engineer, a forensic one at that, whom collectively with many other engineers, are kindred of many geologists, such as Bob Carter and Steve McIntyre, in exploring science from a coalface perspective.
One thing that caught my eye, keeping it brief, was this:
“…So far, the Russians have drilled to more than 13 km and found oil. In contrast, the deepest any Western oil company has drilled is around 4.5 km…”
If that is true, then it merits some reflection on whether Western technologies are up to understanding the game-play.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The following ramble is a précis that may seem irrelevant, but it tortuously relates to paradigms and what-if and whatnot concerning the origins of oil:
I think it was back in the 70’s that I first read all of Immanuel Velikovsky’s books, and probably some of them again through the 80’s and 90’s, together with all of the VERY hostile counter-literature from Sagan and “The establishment“. Some of the most violent critics proudly declared that they had not and would not read V’s books, but were nevertheless able to totally dismiss them!!!!
I did a lot of research on Velikovsky’s claims, especially relating to his very controversial “Worlds in Collision”, including such as, difficult to find independant interpretations of an ancient scribe of Egypt: Ipuwar. From this, (in my Victorian State library archives, and another version in the British Library via my brother), I found that Velikovsky cherry-picked that ancient scribe’s alleged record of the time of “The Exodus”, and joined things together that perhaps should not have been joined together.
However, Velikovsky truly had an astonishing cross-discipline understanding of archaeology, the Jewish Bible, other history physics, chemistry, geology, and just about every field of science, and made an astonishing number of predictions, back in the 50’s which were scoffed at the time, but which were eventually proved to be correct. For instance, he reasoned that Jupitor, (? or one of those gas giants) would with improving technology, be found to emit radio waves….yep! True; the “experts” were proved wrong again!
His brilliant book on geology of the Earth: “Earth in Upheaval” was required reading back then in some U.S, universities. And, and, he did a lot of other stuff, and was a friend of Einstein. However, I find his various books that contradict the standard Egyptian history of the pharaohs to be the most powerful. For instance, among other things, how can “standard” Egyptologists simply ignore that tiles from one Egyptian tomb (in a British museum) have imprinted craftsman’s Greek initials on the reverse in a style positively datable to a different era to that of the alleged date of the pharaoh’s tomb?
Oh, sorry, where was I?
Oh yes, that’s right, Velikovsky argued that the origin of oil was not necessarily that of the biotic paradigm. That it came from somewhere else, although his proposed source seems to be unlikely to me.
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Peter Martin, 864, August 1st, 2008 at 2:17 pm
Congratulations on your ability to respond to such a complex issue, and several other posts within a few hours. How do you do it?
Geez, I need a much longer time to work through all the references, and other sources to be able to make an informed response….. Even if I can ever find the time and energy to do so!
PeterM 884, you wrote in part:
Well actually, tomato plants just love 1000ppm, and the human workers within their controlled enclosure don’t seem to have a problem with this life giving natural gas.
You do realize that when stuff is measured in ppm, that means parts per MILLION?
Brute 841 quoted in part on the forecast inundation of Bangladesh:
“…many climate experts had failed to take into account new land being formed from the river sediment…”
I’m just whimsically beginning to wonder if Hansen and his discipled “experts” may have not encapsulated all of the possible unknown or “not fully understood” variables in their models. In this particular Bangladeshi example:
“It’s the mud stupid!”
Well, well, Peter – just a touch of backtracking methinks. In your excellent post 863 (with which I largely agreed – rather to my surprise) you said, referring to my post 861, “the examples you have given and the table you have quoted are part of that consensus too. The consensus is more a range of views that one fixed view”. Well said. Now you are saying (879) that “the ‘consensus’ is that the earth is warming and that anthropogenic activites have made a significant contribution.” Just to remind you, I summarised Table SPM.2 by taking one of its conclusions:
I don’t think that “a better than evens chance that there may be some human contribution” is the same as “anthropogenic activites have made a significant contribution”. Do you?
Lynas had a piece in the Guardian yesterday. And, yikes, it seems that “based on existing science” we’ve “only got 100 months left if we are to have a reasonably high chance of staving off runaway global warming“. We’re all doomed. Or maybe not (muses the pieman) – but “the 100 months campaign” is needed to inject “a sense of urgency into what is in reality a very slow process of cooking ourselves.” Hmm.
But his first paragraph is useful in drawing attention to the important Stockholm Environment Institute report that comprehensively debunks the UK Government’s claims to have reduced its CO2 emissions. One of the reasons of course is that (as I have said many times) we happily exclude big chunks of the economy, in particular aviation and shipping, along with the substantial emissions we have, in effect, exported to China.
The reality is that such sleight of hand isn’t going to change. So, if the alarmists are right – yes, we’re all doomed.
Morgan on abiotic oil
Tony,
Don’t know what happen to the previous post……
“Fossil Fuel” is probably a misnomer. I do agree that oil is produced within the bowels of the Earth continuously, so essentially the assertion, (I believe) is correct. I think that the issue is that we are pumping it out of the deposits at a greater rate than it can be replenished at the present locations. I have read articles wherein Texas oil wells that were “pumped dry” in the early part of last century are naturally being replenished.
There is also evidence that oil deposits, (off of the coast of Santa Barbara for example) are naturally percolating to the surface and being deposited on the local beaches. This would indicate that the deposit is “full” and the oil is escaping naturally through fissures at the sea floor. Environmentalist oppose drilling off the coast of California when many geologists proclaim that relieving the pressure by drilling in these areas would actually relieve the “pressure” contained within these deposits and prevent the oil from escaping and fouling the beaches as is occurring naturally today.
I’m not a geologist; however, it certainly makes sense that the natural process that created the oil deposit is still occurring even though the readily available oil has been removed; sort of like a pressure vessel constantly being filled until it can hold no more and escapes through the path of least resistance.
I haven’t done the research, but just off the top of my head common sense would dictate that industry has tapped into the most productive, least costly, oil deposits leaving the more costly undersea (and located in inhospitable regions….. the Arctic & Antarctic) yet to be utilized. It may be after the largest oil wells in Saudi Arabia are depleted that they will replenish, (after a few million years).
Being that 3/5ths of the Earth’s surface is covered with water; it only makes sense that there is much more oil to be discovered under the world’s oceans. Getting at it will prove to be much more expensive than discovering oil by digging with a shovel in Texas or Kuwait.
I guess the bottom line is that oil drilling/pumping technology is much more efficient than the natural process that creates the oil deposit in the first place, (we’re pumping it out of the “underground storage tanks” faster than the Earth can re-produce it in these specific areas). Unless areas such as ANWR and offshore are opened for drilling/exploration than the world demand will overcome the present day “supply” of oil.
Not a particularly erudite response, but I think it conveys the sentiment.
By the way, Barack Hussein Obama says that all we have to do is keep our tires properly inflated and the energy problem will be solved.
Well, I checked my tire pressure yesterday, (it was fine), and the price of a gallon of gasoline hasn’t dropped a bit!
Have others noticed how the final point of no return or “tipping point” beyond which it is too late to avoid catastrophe keeps getting pushed further and further into the future? Lynas the pieman, for example, was demanding “urgent action now” back in 2003. Yet even today, in the Guardian article I refer to above (post 889), he’s not quite buying the 100 months deadline specified by a body called the New Economics Foundation. (BTW, its aim is to “challenge mainstream thinking on economic, environment and social issues” – hmm). Although its analysis is (he says) “based on existing science”, he’s worried that, if he defines a deadline and it isn’t met, sceptics will say, “things don’t look any different – I thought you said the world was going to end?” So he prefers to “inject a strong sense of urgency”. In other words, repeat the same old message – “but this time I really, really mean it”. In the meantime, politicians set targets for the massive cuts to be made “by 2050”.
It’s a great wheeze: coupled with “improved understanding of the science” and better models explaining why things haven’t quite turned out as originally predicted (sorry: projected), and with a mainstream media that’s so wedded to the AGW line that too many reputations would be ruined if it were disproved, it means the alarmists can never be proved wrong (or even seriously questioned) and can go on drawing their paycheques year after year. Unless of course Stargazer (what happened to him?) is right and the world moves into a serious cooling phase within the next few years. But I suspect that’s unlikely – I sincerely hope so. Even if Stargazer is right, they’d probably show how “the science” proves it was really the result of mankind’s CO2 emissions.
It’s all very worrying: I’m celebrating my 72nd birthday next week so probably won’t be around when, as I suspect will happen, it’s eventually shown that the emperor has no clothes and the long-suffering and much maligned sceptics can have a good laugh.
Hi Peter,
In response to your #883:
“I’ve just been looking through your calculation which I think essentially shows that if we switched from oil to coal at the same rate of usage that the rate of increase in CO2 concentrations will maybe just increase slightly up from 2 to 2.25ppmv per year.
This is a good illustration of how the CO2 levels in the atmosphere will continue to rise even if emissions remain constant. So if we want to keep CO2 levels from rising then we have to reduce C02 levels. Agreed?”
No. Not agreed.
We were not talking about keeping “CO2 levels from rising”. I simply did a “reality check” on your earlier statement that if all the fossil fuel reserves were burned, the CO2 emission from this would cause the planet to “cook”. And I showed you that at roughly today’s consumption rate this would take 160+ years. And that this would not quite double atmospheric CO2 concentration, assuming the same % stays in the atmosphere as today. And that this would, under the “worst case assumption” of 3C climate sensitivity for 2xCO2 cause a long term never ever again to be exceeded increase of just under 3C. And that under another (what I have described as a “more reasonable assumption” of 0.7C for 2xCO2, this would cause a long-term increase of 0.7C.
The point here is obvious, Peter.
It is not (as you have erroneously deduced), “So if we want to keep CO2 levels from rising then we have to reduce C02 levels”.
You will agree that a total never ever to be exceeded temperature increase from all fossil fuels of 3C is not “cooking” the planet.
I will agree that 3C warming would possibly put our globe back to where it was during the MWP or Roman Optimum (or maybe even higher), but would not necessarily mean a major disaster for humanity and the planet (you might disagree, but, if so I would ask you to present evidence – and not IPCC reports or Hansen hysterics).
And you will agree that a 3C 2xCO2 sensitivity is the “current paradigm” of the “consensus”.
But you will certainly agree that if Lindzen, Shaviv + Veizer and others who question the “current paradigm” are correct, and the 2xCO2 climate sensitivity is only 0.7C to 0.8C, this changes the picture completely. In this case the total never ever to be exceeded temperature increase from all fossil fuels of 0.7C to 0.8C would neither “cook” the planet nor even be anything to talk about.
The 3C “paradigm” has been challenged by physical observations on clouds and on water vapor. It rests on a shaky foundation of computer outputs rather than physical observations. Like many “paradigms” before, it may soon crumble. So what do we need to do?
We need to do more work like Spencer and Minschwaner + Dessler have done to determine what the climate sensitivity of 2xCO2 REALLY is based on PHYSICALLY OBSERVED DATA instead of on model studies.
Using the bird in the hand analogy “one study based on actually observed and recorded physical data is worth more than a thousand computer model studies”.
We are now betting the future on a “paradigm” that is suspect.
Let’s challenge this paradigm until it can either be conclusively validated or refuted and replaced by a new paradigm.
In summary:
· All the known fossil fuels on Earth will generate enough CO2 to not quite double today’s atmospheric concentration (that’s all there is, folks)
· If we consume these, on average at around the current rate, taking up all growth with non-fossil fuel sources, they will last until around 2170
· This will cause a theoretical greenhouse temperature increase over these 160+ years of between 0.7C to 2.9C, depending on which assumption we make for climate sensitivity, based primarily on the assumed feedback from water (as vapor, as liquid droplets or ice crystals in clouds)
· Recent physical observations on both clouds and water vapor indicate that the assumed 3C climate sensitivity may be overstated by a factor of 3 to 4
· More physical observations are required in order to determine whether a threat from AGW even exists at all, and, if so, to determine its magnitude
· If these additional physical observations validate those most recently made, we can forget about AGW as a threat to humanity or our planet, and can fold up the IPCC as irrelevant
Get the point, Peter?
It’s not really that complex once you think “outside the AGW box” a bit.
Regards,
Max
PS I’ll get to your more political points later, but thought this basic point needed clearing first
Re: #877, Peter
Ouch!
Re: #885, Bob
If you do follow it up I would be very interested to hear what you find out. I have’nt followed this one at all as it seemed a bit way out, but you never know.
So far as the participation of engineers in the AGW debate is concerned, in the early days of Climate Audit they were very well represented and often took this line: if I make a mistake in the maths when I design a bridge, there is a catastrophe, but if a climate scientists plays games with statistics in order to get the result that they want, they may see their names on the cover of an IPCC report. The engineers tended to be very angry because, as they said, an engineer’s calculations are always tested empirically by the end users, while a climate scientist’s is merely peer reviewed. Engineers do seem to be very practical people.
Re: #892, Robin
It’s always worth waiting around for something you’re looking forward to.
Hi Peter,
To the remainder of your #883.
“One of your assumptions is that the earth will abosrb maybe 40% of emissions. Tha’s true if the emissions are low. In fact it may be even better than 40%. However if they rise too quickly then its likely to be a lot less. That is why it is necessary to do more than just assume that emissions will not rise.”
Give me a better assumption, Peter. And provide the basis for this assumption. The ball is in your court.
Now we get into the political part:
“Its interesting that you should scoff at my ideas on nationalisation when I haven’t expressed an opinion either for or against, just an opinion in favour of the democratic process deciding the issue. So you disagree with that too?”
I live in Switzerland, where we have a very well developed (but certainly not perfect) democratic system, with around 600 years more experience in this area than you have in Australia (and 500 years more than the USA).
Unlike Australia, Switzerland is a small, fairly densely populated nation with major contrasts in its population and three major languages and a fourth minor language.
The tax system, as indeed the democratic decision making process, flows “from the bottom up” rather than “from the top down”.
As an example: the Community gets around 45% of the taxes paid by an individual residing there, the Canton gets around 40% and the Federal government gets the remaining 15%. These rates vary from Community to Community and Canton to Canton, and (to the great dismay of the “left wing” parties) there are local and cantonal “tax havens”, where wealthy people pay lower tax rates (but higher real estate costs in return).
The parliamentary system and latest constitution was patterned after that in the USA (3 branches: executive, legislative and judicial), with a 2-house parliament. The executive branch is different in that there is no elected president who stays on office for a term, but there is a 7-member executive council (each member also acts as minister for a department, such as treasury/finance, foreign relations, interior, etc). one of these 7 is selected by the group to represent the nation as federal council (or acting president) for a year, and this position is rotated annually.
Most major issues (of either a national, cantonal or communal nature) are settled at the urns by the voters, rather than by federal or cantonal decree or parliamentary vote.
As with all countries in these modern times, there is a push-pull between those who want to move toward more central decision-making power and those who want the power to stay at the grass roots with the people themselves. In the current political spectrum, it is generally the social democrats and green party that want more “central control” invoking arguments such as “the common good” and the more right wing parties, such as the conservative “people’s party” and the liberals (strangely called the “radicals”, in French), who want to keep the power at the grass roots level, with the centrist parties switching back and forth, depending on the issues.
The “left” has generally been more positive toward giving up some national sovereignty by joining the EU, sometimes joined by the more business-minded liberals, but the majority of the Swiss are opposed to this. When this issue came up for referendum one heard statements such as “we’ve had to fight our way to freedom from the larger European empires and rulers in the past; why should we give this up and become vassals of Brussels?” The Swiss voted “nein, non, no” (depending on where they lived), keeping the option open for negotiating special “deals” with the EU, which is an on-going process they are very good at.
A study commissioned by the federal environmental ministry recommended that it is in the best interest of Switzerland not to support “adaptation” (including support for the development of new non-fossil fuel technologies) rather than “mitigation” (in the form of taxes or other measures that would reduce the GDP), concluding that the best thing we can leave our children is a healthy economy with which to respond to any challenges that might arise in the future.
As far as “carbon efficiency” is concerned, the Swiss economy is the world leader in GDP generated (prosperity) per ton of CO2 emitted (in my opinion the best indicator for measuring “carbon efficiency” of a country). There are several factors for this: a high percentage of hydroelectric power, a high population density with an efficient electrically powered public transportation and goods transport system, a large service industry, less heavy industry with more light industry, etc.
So much for the Swiss approach to democracy. I believe we have a system that works.
Now to your other statement: “Incidentally, in Australia we have, largely, nationalised railways, water supplies, electricity supplies, one main TV station, and most roads. There are some privatised toll roads and bridges but they aren’t too popular with drivers. There is little popular appetite for going along the Thatcherite privatisation route over here. I think its just a matter of common sense but maybe some Americans ( you sure you’re not American?) think that because we have a Labor Government we’re just one step away from Communism! You must think that, yourself, as you’ve just brought the USSR into the debate.
It does seem that McCarthyism is still alive and well.”
This is rather confused and rambling, but I’ll try to make sense of it and respond.
Public services (railways, water supplies, etc.) do well under some sort of governmental control. Whether this is national (trains in Switzerland, with some exceptions, motorways, etc.) or cantonal/municipal (water supply, cantonal and local roads, etc.), it works. Major new expenditure plans are usually approved or rejected by plebiscite, as was recently done for a major overhaul and up-grade of the railway system and an earlier one for a deregulation and partial privatization of the “postal/telepone/telegraph” service.
The Swiss have a social democratic party that shares power with others, but we do not have a “Labor” or “Conservative” government (like Germany, the UK and apparently Australia). When they get too strong or assertive, the voters have a way of pulling them back to the center again. Same is true for the right wing parties, although their appeal has currently picked up a bit.
The periodic back-and-forth black and white switch between Labor/Conservative or Democratic/Republican would not be attractive to the Swiss, who prefer solutions based on pragmatic compromises with the voters having the final say in any case.
From what I have heard from Brits, “Thatcherism” was the cure needed by the UK at the time, when the economy was in the doldrums and the coal union (Scargill?) had a stranglehold on the economy and all Europe was talking about the “British malaise”. Look at it now. With the boom from North Sea oil and gas and a reawakened economy with a strong private sector, nobody talks about the “British malaise” anymore. How much of this can be credited to Thatcher, Major or the New Labor movement of Blair is immaterial. It happened. She took some major first steps for turning the nation around, and for that she deserves credit.
No, Peter, you are doing a poor job of reading my messages to you if you think I feel Australia is “one step away from Communism” because as you wrote, “You must think that, yourself, as you’ve just brought the USSR into the debate.”
I brought the USSR centrally planned economy (for the “common good”) into the debate because of the proposals being made to switch the world from a free-market “carbon economy” to a “centrally planned and regulated carbon economy” (again for the “common good”).
I simply pointed out that this will work no better than the old USSR 5-year plan approach did.
“McCarthyism?” What’s that?
Hope this clears things up for you, Peter,
Regards,
Max
Correction for Peter:
The sentence in my earlier post should read: “A study commissioned by the federal environmental ministry recommended that it is in the best interest of Switzerland to support “adaptation” (including support for the development of new non-fossil fuel technologies) rather than “mitigation”.
Remove the “not”.
In other words, the report recommended “adaptation” rather than “mitigation”.
Sorry for typo.
Max
Max,
Thank you for the lengthy description of the Swiss constitution. To be quite honest, I hadn’t given it much thought previously and probably won’t give it much in future either! Look, its entirely a Swiss decision whether or not to join the EU or nationalise the ski resorts, cuckoo clock and watch industries or whatever else they have. You won’t hear any objections from me!
The same is true for the UK. If they want to privatise their water, rail, electricity etc, paying up to three times more than we pay for similar services from our Aussie nationalised industries that’s entirely up to them too! There’s still room here for a few more Poms if they want to take the trip over to get away from it all. I love England, and the English countryside but not the English class system. I’m not sure that I would like to live in a country that allowed people such titles as the Viscount Monckton of Brenchley and then further allowed them to sit in the “House of Lords” ( you’ve got to be kidding!) to sign off on legislation from the more democratic part of the building.
McCarthyism?” What’s that? Joe McCarthy was a US senator, who in the 1950’s made the USA safe for democracy, and the American way of life. They had a big problem at the time with too many reds under their beds. Maybe they needed some extra room for storage space? Anyway you should know that he didn’t do Switzerland any favours either. That’s where one dangerous Communist by the name of Charlie Chaplin was exiled to.
Give me a better assumption, Peter A flippant answer might be: How about that we assume that the scientific warnings are going to be taken seriously and that whatever measures are necessary to avoid the CO2 concentration rising higher than 450 ppmv, and, yes I do know that is parts per million by volume.
A more considered answer, would be that you can’t ‘assume’ future energy consumption will be the same as present day consumption. If you don’t agree, go back 25 years and try out the figures for yourself. A better assumption would be to factor in a percentage rise to allow for economic growth. Again, if you go back 25 years you’ll see that works out to be reasonably accurate.
On a point of information: The full title of Australia is “the Commonwealth of Australia”. I’m not saying that we are perfect, in fact we are probably more imperfect now than we were fifty years ago, but I do like to think we still look out for each other, and still do have the ‘common good’ at heart as the name implies.
Abiotic Oil,
Brute raised some interesting supporting points, and I’ll add a couple more quickies:
1) The White Cliffs of Dover in England facing France are famously pure white limestone comprising uncountable zillions of microscopic skeletal fossils. The exposed seam at Dover is only part of it, and it is around 500m deep in parts….simply mind-boggling. This type of sedimentation is probably typical of very clear warm seas, and something similar is reportedly observed in process in the Caribbean today. Question: Where did all the hydro-carbon bits go? My understanding is that they disappear variously in the carbon cycle, and as far as I am aware, there is no evidence anywhere of sedimentation that looks like oil. Perhaps Max could add on the chemistry of this? OK, maybe millions of years ago, things were different, but what about all that chalky stuff at Dover?
2) Carbon dating cannot be used on very old stuff because of the short half-life of C14. I just did a Google on it, and people are still saying that there is “far too much C14 in oil…should be ~zero“. One source infers a date of 50,000 years, but I seem to recollect that Velikovsky claimed dating much younger back in the 50’s.
Biotic source and the Carbon dating are incompatible, so one of them is probably invalid.
Carbon Dating:
BTW, Ive seen lots of doubts about its reliability in the literature, and many discrepancies in ancient wood etc.
Robin,
The amount of AGW is debatable but, for the sake of argument, let’s say that the temperature is about 0.7deg C higher now because of anthropogenic CO2 emissions.
This is the scientific consensus. Its not the same thing as the example you have quoted about heatwaves, where the IPCC has assigned a probablity figure of 50%. I’m sure that just means that they don’t know!
I’ve not checked what definition of heatwave is used, but , say it is a temperature of 10 deg C above average. In this case, both the average and the heatwave temperature are 0.7deg above what they would have otherwise been. And so, you can see, using this definition, that there could possibly be no direct connection between AGW and heatwave frequencies.
Even if the 0.7 deg C figure is allowed for in the heatwave temperature it would just mean that the threshold would be slightly reduced from 10 deg C to 9.3 deg C above average. This would result in more heatwaves, but only slightly more.