So says the [url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17488450BBC[/url.

It's worth noting that several accredited reviewers of the IPCC, including David Wasdell, claim that such would almost certainly set in motion potentially irreversible release of sequestered methane clathrates.

This might be important when you consider that [iat least one[/i of the two worst extinction events in the planet's history (maxing out at somewhere around 98% of all life on earth) were caused by irreversible release of sequestered methane clathrates leading to runaway global warming, poisoning of the oceans etc.

We are thinking of buying a house in Leeds for the grandkids to inherit, by the time they are grown up it will be overlooking the sea

Its why I live on top of the highest point in Leeds



I'll be one of the last around here to get his feet wet, however if the water tower goes at the very top of this hill then I'm royally fooked.

I agree we need to curb our appetite for things that will harm the earth, but is there not some mileage in the notion that the earth goes through natural peaks and troughs, temperature-wise.

For instance, the fact we've had ice ages tells me that the earth gets cold sometimes, and I'm sure man-made greenhouse gases had nothing to do with that. Are we not just in an 'upward' cycle?

Climate change aside, I definitely support the reduction in the use of fossil fuels, and cutting down on waste. It's a central theme to my company and the changes we have to make are indeed very small and hardly noticable, and even habit forming when you get into a routine. It also has a very nice side effect of costing us less money!

The earth's climate does re-adjust because of occasional orbital wobbles and solar output. But these changes tend to occur over glacial time-scales.

The key factor here is carbon dioxide, which we know is a greenhouse gas. We have extensive records of atmospheric carbon dioxide stretching back hundreds of millions of years. So far we have found little evidence of such a massive injection of carbon dioxide in such a small amount of time (two hundred years, max). We really are in unprecedented territory here.

The big worry is temperature rise sufficient to release stored methane deposits which tot up to twice the total amount of all hydrocarbon deposits (oil, gas, coal etc.) put together.

Methane is twenty times more effective than carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas.

What's more, the release of this methane may well set in motion a feedback loop as methane release is directly proportional to temperature rise.

Fair enough, Mugwump. I get all that.

However, whilst I'm not ridiculing the theory behind all this, there is one thing I can't get my head around, genuinely, and that's rising sea levels due to melting glaciers and icebergs.

80% of an iceberg is reportedly underwater, and given that water reduces in size when it melts, then I don't get how sea levels can rise. Similarly, higher general temperatures should create more water vapour in the air. Seeing as no 'new' water is ever created (it is effectively recycled through vapourisation and subsequent rainfall), surely this water vapour will come from the sea, rivers, etc.

If I am wrong, then I will of course hold my hands up.

Icebergs are just little bits of glacier bobbing about in the sea. The issue is the [iglaciers[/i melting - the icebergs are a symptom rather than a cause. The sheer volume of the Earth's water locked up in glaciers and in permafrost is enormous, and this water is not currently in either the oceans or rivers - hence the rise in sea level if/when it melts.

Losing glaciers also has another effect on global temperatures. Glaciers are, by and large, highly reflective and serve to reflect some of the Sun's heat back out into space (the albedo effect). As they melt, more and more of the Sun's heat is absorbed rather than reflected.

If the human race had never happened, the earth would still be going through its current phase of warming up, it did it before we were here and it will do it long after we are gone.

The glaciers are on land, not in the sea. So if they do melt, they'll add to the sea water level.

To reinforce what's been said above: the melting of the Arctic ice cap, and other sea ice such as the Ross ice shelf will make no difference to sea levels, because of the reasons causing Robonson confusion.

The melting of mountain glaciers, the Greenland ice cap, the Antarctic ice cap, or any combination, would cause a rise in sea levels, because water currently sequestered on land as ice wou ld be added to the total volume of water in the seas

Cool. Can I be Kevin Costner?

As you are the first person ever to make that request, it must be a "yes"

Do some reading, FFS.

I don't think any of the scientists are arguing that. But there are many that accept that when you plot how the climate should be changing due to natural effects there are anomalies with what is [iactually[/i happening. They argue that these anomalies are caused by Human actions.

The other more worrying factor is it is believed that nature has a series of "tipping points" :

Just type it into google, there are many interesting hits including this one -[urlhttp://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2538841/[/url

Here are a few small extracts:

The term “tipping point” commonly refers to a critical threshold at which a tiny perturbation can qualitatively alter the state or development of a system.......

.....Human activities may have the potential to push components of the Earth system past critical states into qualitatively different modes of operation, implying large-scale impacts on human and ecological systems. Examples that have received recent attention include the potential collapse of the Atlantic thermohaline circulation (THC) (1), dieback of the Amazon rainforest (2), and decay of the Greenland ice sheet (3). Such phenomena have been described as “tipping points” following the popular notion that, at a particular moment in time, a small change can have large, long-term consequences for a system, i.e., “little things can make a big difference” (4).
In discussions of global change, the term tipping point has been used to describe a variety of phenomena, including the appearance of a positive feedback, reversible phase transitions, phase transitions with hysteresis effects, and bifurcations where the transition is smooth but the future path of the system depends on the noise at a critical point. We offer a formal definition, introducing the term “tipping element” to describe subsystems of the Earth system that are at least subcontinental in scale and can be switched—under certain circumstances—into a qualitatively different state by small perturbations. The tipping point is the corresponding critical point—in forcing and a feature of the system—at which the future state of the system is qualitatively altered.......

The important thing is that systems reach a critical point where small change gives a large effect(s) that cannot be reversed by making a similar small change in the opposite direction. Some scientists believe that human actions are enough to make the small difference required to make what is in effect an irreversible large scale change.

So, the written words of those who believe we caused global warming are the only ones to be believed, there are lots of scientists who believe the human influence is overstated, mainly by politicians who want to fleece us in green taxes and government funded scientists who would get sod all if they bucked the trend.

It's the .gov in the link that makes me wary.

The problem is that it's usually these 'some' scientists who get the publicity (and the funding). If all the research came back as 'actually, we are wrong, here is the proof that its not caused by humans' then they would all be out of work, no global warming scares, no funding.

I am not saying they are 100% wrong, but I do think that there is a lot of vested interests by politicians, research scientists and big business to make the case and you cannot dismiss everything that opposes these views.

It's a bit of a broad brush you're painting with. There are plenty of scientists who have no vested interest and yet still believe humans are having an effect on climate change. There are also plenty of "big businesses" and politicians (especially in the USA) that want to make a case against the human effect on climate change and pay for scientists to prove so.

It's just a shame that there are scientists on both sides of the fence that have been found to be telling porkies and therefore been jumped on by the opposition to discredit the research.

This is old news. I posted a thread on the subject several years ago.

As to those who claim climate change is not due to human factors, their argument is simply depressing and ridiculous for the simple reason that if the trend is not due to human factors there is even less we can do.

[url=http://jamesdelingpole.com/And then there's Delingpole[/url

Assuming you take as a given that use of fossil fuels is making a significant contribution to global warming, what do you do about it?

I can tell you what you shouldn't do:

1) Don't look to current technologies for renewable energy. Its an absolute myth that windfarms, tidal energy etc can replace large-scale baseload electricity without massive price increases (or in many countries they can't replace existing technologies at all). Renewable technology can lead to price increases without reducing CO2 at all. For example, under most scenarios (unless people are willing to tolerate blackouts), net CO2 production with wind turbines backed up by open cycle gas turbines is virtually identical to that with closed cycle gas turbines in the first place (CCGT being approximately 50% less emission intensive than OCGT). Plus CCGT is a heck of a lot cheaper than OCGT plus wind farms.

2) Don't lie to people about the cost involved in CO2 reduction. If you want to achieve real reductions in emissions under currently available technology then tell the truth - you are staring at massive real increases in electricity, oil and gas costs.

3) Don't claim that what happens in the UK or even Europe matters unless you get serious action in the US, China and India. China is installing massive new coal fired power stations every year, and shows absolutely zero intention of moving away from that model. Most countries are highly unlikely to introduce a meaningful carbon reduction scheme (i.e. one with serious price impacts). Case in point, China's 'carbon price' is ~$1.50/tonne - it would need to be maybe 30 times that to cause economic switching even between coal and gas, let alone any form of renewable energy.

4) Further, don't pretend that even Europe as a whole has the economic clout to impose its will on carbon pricing if the US, India and China don't play ball.

5) Don't put nuclear power off the agenda if carbon reduction is your objective. It is the only currently viable technology able to replace significant carbon emmitting baseload plant.

6) Don't pretend that the current European scheme is anything other than an attempt to push carbon reduction onto poorer countries. Prices are nowhere near high enough in Europe to cause actual reduction in CO2 levels in Europe itself (currently less than 7 Euros/tonne). All that happens is Europeans pay other countries not to do things.

7) Don't take all claims about reductions to date within the EC at face value. For example, the benchmark emission levels for Germany were based on those of West + East Germany before the incredibly emission-intensive (and otherwise polluting) East German factories and power plants were shut down. Germany proclaims to have reduced emissions, when in fact these closures were purely economic and would have been made with or without a carbon price.


If you take the above on board you actually have some chance of doing something about CO2 emissions. If you don't, all you'll do is increase everybody's cost of living whilst having negligible impact on the environment.

The first step IMO is to tell the truth about costs, because trying to cover up the real costs and pretending that 'greening' the economy is somehow cheap and possible without everybody in the world on board is bound to end in failure when the real costs start to materialise and global emissions keep rising.

I genuinely think the only real solutions are quantum leaps in the safety and efficiency of nuclear power, together with as yet unknown new technologies. Everything else may make people feel warm and fuzzy but does naff all to solve the problem.

I think if you bother going and looking, near enough all the scientists who say it's nothing to do with us are working for, or funded by, the people who we're accusing of causing the damage.
I think the phrase is "Well, they would say that, wouldn't they?".

I'm pretty sure that most of the early doubters have since crossed over to believing that it's our fault though - or that was the last thing I read on the subject.

Perhaps it's time to compare the cost of stopping global warming (which I don't believe to be possible simply by reducing emissions, and without a "positive" action as well/instead) with the cost of accepting and coping with global warming.

Nuclear power can be counted as a carbon reduction option ONLY if you consider plant emissions during the first twenty five years of its lifetime. Unfortunately, no one seems willing to consider the amount of carbon that goes into the [ienormously expensive[/i processes of uranium mining, refinement, plant construction (using some of the most expensive and highly engineered materials on earth) & decommissioning (anywhere up to 100 years). Then there are the estimated 200,000 years throughout which high-level nuclear waste must be kept safe (not to mention the one billion year plus years for ultra-high level waste).

I prefer George Carlin's view - the earth does not give a about global warming, in a few hundred thousand years it will shake off our transgressions. Life will begin anew and it won't include us.

The earth only brought us forth to create plastic, which it thinks is cool



Some good footage on that tube thingy.

I don't think you're quite getting this. Guys like David Wasdell, James Hansen etc. (who are nowhere near the most extreme end of the global warming argument) aren't just talking about a couple of degrees giving us all a nice Mediterranean climate in which we can make a bundle off growing oranges. They are talking about runaway global warming and [icatastrophic damage[/i to the environment. It's like saying we should learn to cope with the comet that killed off the dinosaurs.