Get Energy Smart! NOW!

Elizabeth Kolbert is one of the most beautiful and, often, thoughtful reporters on energy and environmental issues. In the latest New Yorker, she turned a quite critical pen to the Super Freaky Economists with her review of SuperFreakonomics.
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Sad-to-say, the air waves and oped pages and blog posts have been filled with Steven Levitt’s and Steven Dubner’s shallow, truthiness-laden Superfreakonomics.   The continued attention feeds on itself, as ignoring the deceptions and the mediocre interviews booked due to the authors’ Super(freaky)star status has the problem of giving it credence due to non-truthful truthiness and misleading mediocrity on the critical issue of climate change science and other issues. There essentially innumerable works more worthy of our attention and engagement, even if we constrain ourselves simply to books also published in 2009.

Thus, after the fold, ten books published this year that are more worthy of your time and money that the shallow distortions from the Super Freaky Economists of Superfreakonomics.

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There are all too many denier efforts to confuse and distort the discussion related to climate change. One element of this, which all too often ends up in the press, is to suggest that the random and anti-science voice of deniers, some form of group “petitioning” against a society’s climate-change statement, somehow merits equal weight against the huge body of science and the huge number of scientists who “are behind the headlines.

Spend a few moments with Rachel Pike to get a perspective on the extent of work “behind the headlines”. As she comments,

It is such a large community that our annual meeting is the largest scientific meeting in the world.

Hat tip to Greenfyre, who provides a range of worthwhile links in The science behind a climate change headline.

This is a powerful video from World Wildlife Fund. Take the moment to watch … and, as you wish, share. (And, if you wish, rate it at Youtube.)

This is a call for President Barack Obama to go to Copenhagen.

The “ABC” call?

A. Help developing countries and fragile ecosystems cope with climate impacts.
B. Guarantee access to clean technologies to all countries.
C. Save the world’s forests.

Is it as simple as ABC? No, but these aren’t bad items to call out for attention.

From the video after a list of countries that are moving toward substantive action to reduce emissions:

Question: So, why would the United States stand in everybody’s way?
Answer: I don’t know.

The video ends:

Do you think he knows how to get to Copenhagen?

Actually, this isn’t quite what the American Physical Society (APS) said, but that short-hand doesn’t really misrepresent what occurred.

For several months now, Global Warming deniers (no, not “skeptics”, but active purveyors of misinformation demonstrating severe anti-science syndrome) have sought to get the APS to turn aside from the Society’s 2007 Statement on Climate Change. The APS’s consideration of the deniers’ “silly petition” was warmly (and loudly) proclaimed among those seeking to distort the national (and global) discussion re Global Warming and the bests paths forward to mitigate against catastrophic climate change. (See Science Bypass for a 128 page tour de force analysis by John Mashey.) Yesterday, the APS leadership council did an ‘in your face’ response to these efforts to promote unscientific arguments.

Council of the American Physical Society has overwhelmingly rejected a proposal to replace the Society’s 2007 Statement on Climate Change with a version that raised doubts about global warming.

No equivocation.

No stepping back from the 2007 statement which rests as APS policy.

Emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities are changing the atmosphere in ways that affect the Earth’s climate. Greenhouse gases include carbon dioxide as well as methane, nitrous oxide and other gases. They are emitted from fossil fuel combustion and a range of industrial and agricultural processes.

The evidence is incontrovertible: Global warming is occurring. If no mitigating actions are taken, significant disruptions in the Earth’s physical and ecological systems, social systems, security and human health are likely to occur. We must reduce emissions of greenhouse gases beginning now.

Because the complexity of the climate makes accurate prediction difficult, the APS urges an enhanced effort to understand the effects of human activity on the Earth’s climate, and to provide the technological options for meeting the climate challenge in the near and longer terms. The APS also urges governments, universities, national laboratories and its membership to support policies and actions that will reduce the emission of greenhouse gases.

Have to wonder whether those who gleefully discussed the petition, APS consideration of it, and (their belief in) the potential for a reversal of the earlier statement will take any meaningful message from yet another major scientific institution, yet again, stating that the scientific evidence is clear that humanity is the leading actor in driving global warming and that we must act to reduce emissions … or face quite significant consequences.

Note: Last month, scientific institutions released a statement about climate change.

Observations throughout the world make it clear that climate change is occurring, and rigorous scientific research demonstrates that the greenhouse gases emitted by human activities are the primary driver. …

contrary assertions are inconsistent with an objective assessment of the vast body of peer-reviewed science

If we are to avoid the most severe impacts of climate change, emissions of greenhouse gases must be dramatically reduced.

Who were those minor little organizations that put their institutional power and reputation behind those words?

• American Association for the Advancement of Science
• American Chemical Society
• American Geophysical Union
• American Institute of Biological Sciences
• American Meteorological Society
• American Society of Agronomy
• American Society of Plant Biologists
• American Statistical Association
• Association of Ecosystem Research Centers
• Botanical Society of America
• Crop Science Society of America
• Ecological Society of America
• Natural Science Collections
• Alliance Organization of Biological Field Stations
• Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics
• Society of Systematic Biologists
• Soil Science Society of America
• University Corporation for Atmospheric Research

APS’s continuing review of the petition is what led to it not being among them.

And, a month later, the APS Council Overwhelmingly Rejects Proposal to Replace Society’s Current Climate Change Statement and, implicitly, joins those 18 institutions in seeking to inject science into the policy discussion about how best to tackle climate change.

PS: For a direct slap down of climate deniers, see Australian PM Rudd takes Global Warming Deniers to the Shed for a Spanking

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Every so often it is worth calling out and reminding oneself where it is worthwhile to go to get good thinking and information on energy and climate issues.

Here are a few such top-notch sites to spend time with:

Joe Romm, Climate Progress, will never fail to inflame your passion — very knowledgeable perspective delivered with wit in a (politely put) quite blunt manner. Combination of ‘news’ and analysis.

Grist is a great “group” site, combination of paid reporters (see David Roberts) and posts from top-notch experts.

The Wonkroom provides a progressive focus on policy-related news, with Brad Johnson‘s reporting re climate issues very much worth paying attention to.

Real Climate is the critical site for peer review-quality work on energy and climate issues. In addition to their high-quality debunking work re climate change deniers, they often serve as an excellent ‘translation’ service between the scientific community and broader audiences.

Earth2Tech is a fun stop through site. Often with good analytical pieces, but with plenty of ‘blurbs’ that can bring to your attention items of (potential) interest.

The Oil Drum is, of course, a ‘must-pay attention to’ site those concerned about energy issues. Top-flight analytical pieces combined with knowledgeable and impassioned readers.

Solve Climate‘s excellent work, under the direction of David Sassoon, could be described as “the site for journalists to check out before writing an energy/environmental piece”. They bring energy/climate/science issues out in a way that many journalists find invaluable. Often have breaking ‘investigative’ pieces on critical issues (like their recent work on HFCs).

The Campaign for America’s Future blog has really stepped in recent months, with a collection of bloggers, who are highlighting issues related to green manufacturing and the linking of industrial policy with building a cleaner economy. (Check out Natasha Chart‘s work.)

Ahh … Inhabitat … when you need inspiring looks at actual and potential steps forward in our built environment, this is not a bad place to check in.

NRDC’s Switchboard has really moved up in recent months, in part due to Pete Altman’s excellent work.

It’s Getting Hot in Here, the voice of the Youth Climate Movement, is honestly uneven — which is what should be expected from any real group site On the other hand, they often feature voices and focus on items that don’t seem to find a home elsewhere on the web and have had plenty of stories that merit greater attention.

DeSmogBlog is De Place to get De Scoop on DeNiers.

Josh Nelson has an endless stream of great material at Enviroknow. And, well, HuffingtonPost Green has an endless stream, mainly from top-notch people

We should remember, those concerned about climate catastrophe are Only in it for the GOLD!

DC Action Factory provides you first-hand reporting of climate activism from the Halls of Congress and the alleys of DC (don’t know which is dirtier …).

Let’s be honest. Media reporting on energy and climate issues is, all too often, abysmal. Media Matters helps keep journalists honest.

And, well, for that self-promotion: Shouldn’t we Get Energy Smart? Now?

The global economy’s life-blood (even if it has been on life support) truly doesn’t flow through the CAC 40 or Wall Street, but is pumped from the ground and into our chemical plants, manufacturing processes, and transportation. We should, as a global society, be working to “keep the grease in the ground” for a variety of reasons, but this is a necessary process of weaning off dependency, not a reckless nose-dive of suddenly going cold Turkey.

One of the nightmarish realities that we should face is how resource limitations intersect. Our carbon cycle limitations (e.g., Global Warming, Acidification of the Oceans) could partially be reduced when we hit the wall of oil limits, Peak Oil. When it comes to these, rather than hitting walls and dealing with crises (massive crises), we (as individuals, nations, global economy) would be much better off if we make reasoned and thoughtful plans of action based on sound knowledge to reduce our abuse of the resource and move toward sustainable resource use before we hit walls and suffer calamitious consequences.

When it comes to tackling climate change, there are legions of active disinformers, seeking to confuse the discussion and delay (if not defeat) action to mitigate catastrophic climate change. (They act from reasons ranging from mercurial financial greed to religious extremism to ideological blinders to dogmatic contrarianism.)

When it comes to Peak Oil, the general political discussion is not nearly as intense or broad, even as ‘experts’ debate over what might really be happening. The International Energy Agency (IEA) has long been toward the upper side of optimism about Peak Oil, having numbers about likely “Peak” production seeming to match likely demand growth rather than production possibilities. When it came to the 2007 World Energy Outlook,

what a magnificent resource — a tremendous amount of data that anyone interested in energy issues will be citing.

Their rearward look — what’s happened already — invaluable.

Their forward look — what will happen — would be laughable if it weren’t so sad.

Optimistic estimates from authoritative institutions enable planners (business, government, etc …) to push solutions to the right, as those estimates ‘prove’ that there really isn’t a serious problem that requires near-term addressing.

The globe uses, roughly, 80 million barrels of day (mbd) of oil which is over 90 percent of global production capacity. Earlier this decade, IEA asserted that production capacity would grow to about 130 mbd with demand growing to about 125 mbd.  See, no problem.

Last year, IEA changed this to a peak production of about 105-110 mbd.  Hmmm … okay. Real problem, but still some breathing space. We need to slow growth of demand, but not crisis.

However, others focused on this issue have questioned whether the 84 mbd range represents just about the peak level of production capacity. Even more importantly, Peak Oil highlights that there is roughly a mountain to describe the oil production path: once you’ve climbed to the peak of production, you will inexorable face a decline — and you (as individual, community, nation, globe) will be far (FAR) better off if your demand curve trajectory is a more rapid decline than production potential rather than assuming continued growing ability to produce (and therefore burn) more and more oil.

Whether for climate change or Peak Oil, good information enables to better decision-making.  We know that, when it comes to climate change, there are cabals recklessly endangering humanity by seeking to confuse the debate and hinder progress forward.

Today, the Guardian reported about potential efforts to distort the discussion about Peak Oil in what might be termed ‘reckless endangerment of global economic prosperity’. (Note that this risk from getting Peak Oil wrong is even greater than the disasters caused by the financial improprieties and insanities behind our current woes.) Key oil figures were distorted by US pressure, says whistleblower reports that a “top EIA official” is asserting that there have been deliberate inflation of oil production estimates

The senior official claims the US has played an influential role in encouraging the watchdog to underplay the rate of decline from existing oil fields while overplaying the chances of finding new reserves.

“The IEA in 2005 was predicting oil supplies could rise as high as 120m barrels a day by 2030 although it was forced to reduce this gradually to 116m and then 105m last year,” said the IEA source, who was unwilling to be identified for fear of reprisals inside the industry. “The 120m figure always was nonsense but even today’s number is much higher than can be justified and the IEA knows this.”

What is driving the effort to distort what the IEA internal experts think? Concerns over near term term market fluctuations trump the necessity for good information to plan for tomorrow.

“Many inside the organisation believe that maintaining oil supplies at even 90m to 95m barrels a day would be impossible but there are fears that panic could spread on the financial markets if the figures were brought down further. “

Now, what is “American” in terms of influencing IEA? Is this, likely, still from Bush Administration policies and appointees?  Likely.   But, the Guardian article does not provide a conclusive case that American governemntal pressure has been driving IEA’s extreme optimism as to the global peak oil production potential.

A second senior IEA source, who has now left but was also unwilling to give his name, said a key rule at the organisation was that it was “imperative not to anger the Americans” but the fact was that there was not as much oil in the world as had been admitted. “We have [already] entered the ‘peak oil’ zone. I think that the situation is really bad.”

The IEA has consistently been on the high side of estimates as to peak oil production potential. And, as “the” authoritative global source for energy information, these estimates have enabled planners to push off focusing on oil dependency challenges and the need for ever more efficient resource use because ‘there will always be more tomorrow’ according to the IEA.

There have been, for a long time, real reasons to question IEA.  The Guardian article, however, raises the question: has there been a conspiracy (driven by America or otherwise) to inflate IEA numbers and thus distort the global conversation about our energy challenges?

Yesterday, a lone Republican, Representative Ahn Cao, voted for the (very weak) House health care reform bill.

I read the versions of the House [health reform] bill. I listened to the countless stories of Orleans and Jefferson Parish citizens whose health care costs are exploding – if they are able to obtain health care at all. Louisianans needs real options for primary care, for mental health care, and for expanded health care for seniors and children. …

I have always said that I would put aside partisan wrangling to do the business of the people. My vote tonight was based on my priority of doing what is best for my constituents.

Representative Cao spoke to and, more importantly, listened to his constituents and absorbed what he said. And, his vote reflected that.

Across the nation, the vast majority of people support the creation of a public option and for stronger oversight of the (abusive) health “insurance” industry. Yet, Ahn Cao was the sole House Republican willing to vote his constituent’s interests.

It is worth recalling that Ahn Cao is something of hero to Republican Party leadership. Minority leader John Boehner put out a memo last year entitled The Future is Cao.

The Cao victory is a symbol of our future. In the two years ahead, House Republicans will demonstrate our commitment to reform by holding ourselves to the highest possible ethical standard – and, with new faces like Joseph Cao and John Fleming and the rest of the incoming GOP freshman class in our ranks, by presenting principled, superior solutions to the challenges facing our country.

Actually, a paragraph above almost certainly has an error. “Cao is something of a hero” is no longer true, it should read “he was” …

Cao’s vote for HCR broke the unanimous wall of opposition (as some are, accurately, referring to it: RepublicaNOism or the belief system of simply saying no and hoping for America’s failure to regain political power). Voting for citizen and national interests over political partisanship is simply unacceptable to today’s Republican Party ethos.

Cao looked at evidence, listened to his constituents, and made a judgment about what was the better option moving forward based on his reality-based decision process.

It shouldn’t surprise anyone that Cao is already getting the same overheated response given those few (eight) Republican House members who rejected anti-science syndrome tantrums in voting for the Waxman-Markey American Clean Energy & Security (ACES) Act earlier this year. Conservatives have (repeatedly) threatened to purge from the Republican party those who supported science-based policy making. For example, global-warming denier Chairman of the RNC Michael Steele withdrew his support in the GOP primary for the Illinois Senate seat from Representative Mark Kirk (R-IL) over this vote.

Let’s face facts, neither the Health Care Reform bill passed yesterday or the ACES Act are what they should be. Neither are as effective as they could (should be) in structure or likely outcome, neither fully embraces the opportunities that sensible action could create, neither is what we need. But, both at least represents steps forward in the national conversation that could create an improved situation for America and Americans toward a stronger, more cost effective, and more sensible society in the future.

We can hope that these conversations and solutions can find a bipartisan space. More important than bipartisanship should be sensible policy and good solutions.

Sadly, before we even get near what is possible and worthwhile, even such half-hearted measures and weakened-down efforts toward strengthening America are anathema to doctrinaire RepublicaNOism.

See: Joe Romm, Climate Progress, House passes landmark health-care bill with one GOP vote — 7 fewer than climate bill. Conservatives still channel Groucho Marx, “Whatever it is, I’m against it.”

News organizations are reporting that the Obama Administration plans to appoint Dr. Al Armendariz to lead Region 6 of the Environmental Protection Agency.  Local environmentalists have greeted this with “high praise”.

“Our region has typically provided a haven for some of the worst polluters in the country, and has paid a steep price,” said Tom “Smitty” Smith, Texas Director for Public Citizen. “I believe the appointment of Dr. Al Armendariz signifies a new direction for Region 6.”

If the reporting is accurate, this could be a real step forward for the region. [Read more →]

Today, Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd spoke at the Lowy Institute. Entitled Check Against Delivery, this is one of the strongest statements seen from a Head of Government of a ‘developed’ nation on climate change and, more specifically, contains very strong denunciation of those deniers and delayers and self-proclaimed “skeptics” who are obstructing movement to mitigate climate change in Australia … and, even more so, the United States.

The full speech is after the fold and is highly (HIGHLY) recommended reading.  This is one of those cases where each read drives one to differing ideas as to which part to quote, which item merits the most attention.

But, as is sometimes best, let us start with the end and what might be termed as a beginning toward strong governmental confrontation of those so ready to mislead and deceive:

My message to the climate change skeptics, to the big betters and the big risk takers is this:

You are betting our children’s future and the future of our grandchildren.

You are betting our jobs, our houses, our farms, our reefs, our economy and our future on an intuition – on a gut feeling; on a political prejudice you have about science.

That is too big a risk, too radical a departure from the basic conservative principles of public policy.

Malcolm, Barnaby, Andrew, Janet – stop gambling with our future.

You’ve got to know when to fold ’em – and for the skeptics, that time has come.

The Government I lead will act.

Rudd has chosen a quite direct challenge to those fighting against action, ready and willing to disseminate falsehoods and deception in their efforts to guard their current fiscal and other interests even at the cost of creating grave risks for all humanity.

The Prime Minister lays down a very “stark choice”:

When you strip away all the political rhetoric, all the political excuses, there are two stark choices – action or inaction. The resolve of the Australian Government is clear – we choose action, and we do so because Australia’s fundamental economic and environmental interests lie in action.

Action now. Not action delayed.

To achieve that “action now” faces a serious challenge:

The challenge we face, and others around the world face, is to build momentum and overcome domestic political constraints.

The truth is this is hard, because the climate change skeptics, the climate change deniers, the opponents of climate change action are active in every country.

They are a minority. They are powerful. And invariably they are driven by vested interests.

They are a “constitute a powerful global force for inaction” and Rudd directly identifies where these minorities reside:

they are particularly entrenched in a range of conservative parties around the world.

Rudd calls out deniers and delayers by name. And, he didn’t hesitate to point to Americans, prominent leaders of the Republican Party, who are continuing to distort debate.

Climate sceptics are also a powerful political lobby in the United States.

Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steel said on 6 March 2009:
“We are cooling. We are not warming. The warming you see out there, the supposed warming, and I am using my finger quotation marks here, is part of the cooling process.”

House Minority Leader John Boehner said on April 19 2009:
“The idea that carbon dioxide is a carcinogen that is harmful to our environment is almost comical. Every time we exhale, we exhale carbon dioxide.”

Republican Congressman John Shimkus said on 25 March 2009:
“If we decrease the use of carbon dioxide, are we not taking away plant food from the atmosphere?”

These people, Rudd says, “happily play with our children’s future.”

The clock is ticking for the planet, but the climate change skeptics simply do not care. The vested interests at work are simply too great.

Those interests are too great to ignore, to stand idly by and allow them to deceive and inhibit action through their deceit.

Kevin Rudd has directly challenged these deceivers in a powerful speech (below the fold) that merits reading in entirety.

And, it is a speech that merits echoing and repeating from political and other leaders around the world.

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