Mosaic – Page 20 – COP 20: Lima, Peru

August 29, 2014September 21, 2014

Where the free market fails

Current political conservative rhetoric typically bashes the government’s regulatory role and promotes a completely free market economy. This view, which became very popular with Ronald Reagan, fails from the perspective of negative externalities and a lack of full cost consideration. If the US had a completely free market, business would be able to rape and pillage land to access mineral reserves, such as fossil fuels to feed our growing population and economy. Fortunately, for the environment, the US government has put in place a series of laws, which protect people, air, land and water. However, these laws and regulations are the very reason why we have climate deniers. Any group (governmental, non-profit, or business) which has a cost presented to it, through legislation or possible action, has a vested interested (benefit) from not having that action completed, this is why corporations have hired people like Seitz, Singer, Nierenberg and others to spread doubt.

These people such as Fred Seitz and Fred Singer (as described in Merchants of Doubt) are essentially climate hit-men, old reputable scientists working to promote the interest of corporations looking to profit from resource extraction or products that damage personal/environmental health (ie. Cigarettes or DDT). These corporations have a vested interest in avoiding the added externalities of their products, and thus are willing to spend millions of dollars to prevent any kind of environmental or health governmental action. This is where the media begins to unfairly represent climate change. Journalists are used to presenting two sides of any argument from neighborhood parks to health care, journalists attempt to cover both sides of the story. They are mistaken then when they attempt to do the same with climate change or scientific issues in general. Seeing as the public does not read scientific journals, Seitz, Singer, and others are able to insert their propaganda into the mass media. This leads to bias in the media in how climate change deniers are presented to the public. Deniers are typically given equal time and reputation for a factually incorrect viewpoint. This is the first step that must change in order to help the public understand the degree of certainty that we have (as scientists) in the current research on climate. (See John Oliver’s show here for a more accurate, and comic, representation of a debate)

In the end, it is the responsibility of those of us who have contributed most to the pollution to take action now to prevent future devastation. Climate change is like second-hand smoke. Those of us in the developed world (the smokers) have been polluting for decades and have raised levels of greenhouse gases to unsafe atmospheric levels. In this analogy the citizens of the developing world are the ones who are now faced with a problem in which they did not contribute (received all the costs without any benefits). The developed world still faces these issues, if not more so, because we must find an alternative way to run our economy.

August 28, 2014September 19, 2014

Steve Schneider: “We are not in the business of equal time for all claims”

Stephen Schneider (1945-2010) placed great importance on scientists engaging with the public and policy makers to raise awareness and understanding about climate change, and he was one of the most audible scientific voices on this issue in the public sphere. You’ll find a number of references to Steve in two of the books that we read over the summer for the Mosaic — Weart’s Discovery of Global Warming and Oreskes & Conway’s Merchants of Doubt.

I’m reading Steve’s book Science as a Contact Sport in which he recounts in detail some of the events described by Oreskes and Conway in which Steve was a principal participant or observer. In his book, Steve addresses the “doctrine of balance” as applied by media in news coverage of climate change. He writes that the doctrine

“is pernicious when applied to science, because science is rarely just two-sided like two-party politics, where balance is appropriate. Scientists winnow out the relative likelihoods of all of the various potential outcomes. We are not in the business of equal time for all claims; we are in the business of quality of evidence assessment. Therefore, what we need to do is report the relative strength of the arguments, not give equal time to all claimants of truth.” (pp 119-120).

I had the privilege of working with Steve on the IPCC’s 2001 report. This photo was taken of us at a meeting in Geneva near the end of our work on the Synthesis Report.

You can watch Steve talk about Science and Distortion in this video produced by Stephen Thomson of Plomomedia:

Stephen Schneider: Science and Distortion

August 28, 2014September 21, 2014

We want real green, not camouflage!

As a recent vegetarian of about two months ago, reading Diet for a Hot Planet by Anna Lappé has helped to solidify my decision in becoming a vegetarian and has all around helped me to dig deeper in thought about the food I consume. Anna Lappé touches upon several aspects of the food industry as a whole with the intent that the reader may not know that the food industry in its entirety has a larger effect on global warming than the entire transportation industry combined. She brings to the attention of the reader everything that goes into producing food; manufacturing of pesticides, fertilizers, and other chemicals, distribution of these chemicals, equipment and machinery used in on the farms, the multitude of feed crops for industrial scale farming that is needed to feed cattle and poultry, the transportation of feed crops, the transportation of meat and produce from country to country, etc.. Within her book, she also discusses several other issues with the food industry.

One thing in particular that I found most attention-grabbing in Lappé’s work was her “How to” section on deciphering whether or not large scale corporations are advertising their recent “green” initiatives for publicity and popularity or out of a sincere effort to reduce their carbon emissions. The following is a brief overview of what she has to say on this matter and questions to consider.

Are claims relevant? It is easy to take credit for something that does not require any effort such as claiming to be “CFC free” when CFC’s have already been phased out or claiming to be “GMO free” when ingredients may not even be available in modified forms.
Are claims vague? Terms such as “all-natural”, “chemical-free”, “eco”, and “green” have no true official definition.
Are claims a decoy? Companies are filled with hidden trade-offs. Example: Processed foods companies claiming to contain only organic ingredients while they are produced in toxic plastics.
What tense are commitments made in? Many companies use forward-looking language such as “may”, “might”, “intend”, or “expect” that actually take them off the hook of having to follow through with their promises.
Is the commitment generous or a gimmick? Companies that say they donate percentages of their profits have “total giving limits” in the fine print. Consumers may think that some of their purchase is helping a cause elsewhere, when the total giving limit has already been met and none of your purchase goes to the cause.
Does the context trump the commitment? Coca-Cola uses about 2.5 liters of water to produce 1 liter of beverage but they state they are “working to get that number down”. Even with a 25% reduction, they are still wasting to produce. The bigger issue here, millions of people in our world lack access to safe drinking water.

See also www.stopgreenwash.org, www.greenerchoices.org, and www.futerra.co.uk for more information on corporate industry greenwashing.

Lappé, Anna. Diet for a Hot Planet: The Climate Crisis at the End of Your Fork and What You Can Do about It. New York: Bloomsbury USA, 2010. Print.

August 27, 2014September 21, 2014

The Short Past and Long Future of Global Warming

By Maeve Hogel

In 2005, when I was only 12 years old, I asked my parents for something extremely unusual; a trip to Antarctica. To be honest, I have no idea what sparked my interest in Antarctica, but my parents, being avid travellers, looked into taking the trip. After much research, they told me no because trips were only available in January and February, the heart of Antarctica’s summer and the middle of my school year. I vowed that day that I would make it to Antarctica someday. Little did I know that someday would be only a few years later in 2008. The retreating ice was allowing boats to arrive at Antarctica as early as December 25 at that time. For my 15-year-old self, this was the greatest news I had ever heard. However, once we got there, I started to understand that although this loss of ice and increased temperatures allowed me to take the trip of my dreams, it also meant decreased penguin populations and possible rises in sea levels all over the world. All of a sudden the concept of global warming, which was a hot topic of conversation at that time, seemed much more real to me. I was amazed that in just three years, there could be enough of a change to allow tourists to get to Antarctica several weeks earlier. It has now been six years since I was in Antarctica and the IPCC in its most recent report, last year, stated, “there is high confidence that the Antarctic Ice Sheet is in a state of net loss”. Today I looked at the National Geographic website, at the exact trip that we took, and saw that their tour dates now start as early as November 28^th, almost a full month earlier then what was available six years ago.

I am amazed now, that in 2008, when I was just beginning to understand global warming, so was the rest of the world. The history of the discovery of global warming, although very complex, is relatively short. Spencer Weart in his book The Discovery of Global Warming” does a fantastic job showing the progress and evolution of global warming. Although he cites discoveries as early as the 1920s, the majority of discussion about global warming doesn’t begin until the 1970s and it wasn’t until the late 90s into the 2000s that these discoveries start to become accepted. Weart writes that “Business week called 2006 ‘the year global warming went from controversial to conventional for much of the corporate world”’ (Weart, 188). In every year since 2006, I think we have seen global warming becoming more and more conventional, but that isn’t to say that there aren’t still people who doubt its existence completely. The acceptance of global warming and the policies to prevent it have come along way in the very short period of time since its discovery, and hopefully will continue to evolve at such a rapid pace. However, it takes the efforts of every person and every country to combat such a global issue. As we look to what the future of climate change looks like, its important to begin to recognize the effects its already had in our very recent past and present, and you certainly don’t have to go half way around the world, like I did, to understand that.

August 27, 2014September 19, 2014

US: political agreement, not a legally binding treaty

The New York Times reported yesterday that President Obama is seeking an international agreement that would be based on voluntary pledges that would not be legally binding (Obama seeking climate accord in lieu of treaty, Aug 26, 2014). This is a critical question for the UN climate negotiations that we will attend in Lima in December, and one that we will discuss during the semester. Many Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) take the view that, for international efforts to be effective at preventing ‘dangerous’ climate change, nations must make commitments to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases that are legally binding — similar to the approach embodied in the Kyoto Protocol, but with more stringent commitments that would apply to all major emitters of GHGs, if not all nations. Other Parties have promoted a different approach in which nations make pledges to take action on climate change. The US is an important proponent of this approach, and has been for some time. Under this alternative approach, each Party would, within some agreed parameters, decide the form and stringency of its pledge. This approach is embodied in the Copenhagen Accord and Cancun Agreements of the UNFCCC. Enforcement would not be through international legal channels, but through political pressure brought to bear by other nations, and a desire on a national government to create or maintain a reputation of being true to its word. The Obama administration has referred to this as “name and shame.”

Later this semester we will read a paper by Daniel Bodansky of the University of Arizona that compares these two approaches, and recommends that Parties to the UNFCCC draw on both in seeking a way forward. See his paper The Durban Platform: Issues and Options for a 2015 Agreement, from the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions.

When you read the NY Times article, also read some of the comments. You’ll see that the ‘Merchants of Doubt’ have been effective at seeding confusion and misinformation about climate science.

August 24, 2014September 11, 2014

The Progression and Importance of GCMs

Science is always evolving. Climate science experienced great leaps forward during the 20^th century, largely due to computers and the work of many leading researchers. Before 1896 no one had proposed a theory describing a cooling or warming of the earth, thus with his 1896 publication, Svante Arrhenius was the first to propose the theory of global warming. He found nothing to explain the forcings of the glacial epochs, there was no current understood mechanism that would explain these climatic transitions, but he knew they existed and that something was causing them. However, this landmark publication set the scene for a 20^th century full of progress in understanding how the global climate fluctuates and changes.

In the 1930s, the Serbian Milutin Milankovic published about climate forcings due to changes in the earth’s relationship to the sun describing changes in the earth’s axis and elliptic orbit every twenty one thousand, forty one thousand and one hundred thousand years. Milankovic’s work provided the mechanism that Arrhenius had described to force the climate into and out of ice ages (eccentricity being the main driver over the past one million years). Milankovic was able to build on the work of James Croll and use glacial varves present in sediment deposits to correlate celestial events in relation to the earth. Milankovic’s work was crucial in advancing knowledge about paleo climates and thus allowed researchers to dive deeper into the past.

Edward Lorenz looked at much finer scale events in comparison with Milankovitch. In 1965 Lorenz used his computer model to show that small changes in one of his 28 variables in the fourth decimal place (and smaller) could have implications for future weather in as little as days, meaning that small changes in climate models have large implications. These models attempt to reconstruct nature using a computer as a predictive tool, but his observation was important nonetheless. This not only showed the importance (and need for further investigation) of computer models, but also provided a hypothesis as to how the climate could react given small (and seemingly insignificant) human inputs.

Any discussion on climate computer models is not complete without James Hansen. During his time with GISS, Hansen became the most famous climate scientists of the 20^th century. Hansen and his team were able to maintain one of the leading models of the earth’s climate systems. Among other accomplishments, Hansen was able to correctly model how the earth’s atmosphere would react in the face of the 1991 Mount Pinatubo eruption. Hansen predicted that the earth’s climate would take several years to eliminate the cooling aerosols pumped into the atmosphere by the volcano. In his 1996 publication he confirmed that his predicts had indeed come to fruition, that the earth’s global average temperature did not return to pre-Pinatubo eruptions until 1995.

Weart describes all of this and more in his book “The Discovery of Global Warming”. Over the progression of the timeline above (the Weart’s book) we moved from a vague understanding of global warming with Arrhenius to the complex computer models that have helped to produce our current understanding of future warming trends. Over time, we found smaller scale changes because better techniques and equipment were developed to measure small changes in climate, such as volcanic activity, ENSO events, and other oscillations. These methods have allowed scientists to more precisely determine climate forcings (such as a medium-sized volcanic eruption) instead of speaking in broad terms about large-scale orbital forcings.

Weart seemed to focus a great deal of his book around the importance and history of GCMs (both general circulation models and global climate models). This originally surprised me, but I came to realize the true importance of these models and how effective they can be in helping to predict the future. Current climate science relies on these models to help us understand how the world will be impacted by anthropogenic emissions decades into the future. These models are especially important as we begin to plan on climate adaptations in helping governments and the global community predict where climate change is going to impact the greatest number of people.

Some sources and further reading:

Arrhenius, Svante. “XXXI. On the influence of carbonic acid in the air upon the temperature of the ground.” The London, Edinburgh, and Dublin Philosophical Magazine and Journal of Science 41.251 (1896): 237-276.

Hansen, J., et al. “Global surface air temperature in 1995: Return to pre‐Pinatubo level.” Geophysical Research Letters 23.13 (1996): 1665-1668.

Hansen, James, et al. “Potential climate impact of Mount Pinatubo eruption.”Geophysical Research Letters 19.2 (1992): 215-218.

Lorenz, Edward N. “A study of the predictability of a 28‐variable atmospheric model.” Tellus 17.3 (1965): 321-333.

August 22, 2014September 21, 2014

Acid precipitation research at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest

In 1955 the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest (HBEF) in the White Mountains of New Hampshire was established to investigate the surrounding watershed ecosystem. In 1963 the Hubbard Brook Ecosystem Study (HBES) was started by a collaboration of colleagues, later that year they discovered acid rain. Although this area is far removed from urban areas, it’s rain recorded pH measurements that were less than 4, while ordinary rain in this setting is typically expected to be measured around a 5.6. (Oreskes)

Acidic substances such as lemon juice have low pH values and more basic substances have higher pH values; the scale ranges from 0 being the most acidic to 14 being the most basic and 7 being a neutral value. Prior to the 1963 HBES, acidic precipitation brought on by volcanoes and natural phenomena and in areas with high industrial pollution had already been discovered, but anthropogenicly induced acid rain in rural areas had not. In this case, acid rain can be defined as “precipitation that has a pH lower than 5.6 because of human influences such as the burning of fossil fuels.” (Welman)

In Merchants of Doubt by Naomi Oreskes, she addresses the uncertainties that arose in the debate over the researching and policy making process during President Ronald Reagan’s administration. She mentions the Acid Rain Peer Review Panel (ARPRP) that pushed for legislation on policy making that would set limits on nitrous oxide emissions and the opposing parties such as Bill Nierenberg, Fred Singer, and the Reagan Administration who significantly changed the panel’s final report without their knowing. (Oreskes) However, what I found most intriguing about the entire acid rain story is that it was discovered in New Hampshire, the state I grew up in. This persuaded me to look into what is currently going on at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest located just two hours North of where I live.

Once a week technicians carefully go out into the woods and collect precipitation samples that accumulate over a seven-day period. The samples are brought back to the lab, measured, and stored in a long-term database. Precipitation is collected though several funnel-shaped tools that open into a storage bottle with an overflow valve and an anti-precipitation design. Once in the lab, the samples are tested for nitrates, Carbon, Nitrogen, conductivity, and pH. Acid precipitation patterns and trends are then examined as well as its effects on animals, plants, trees, soils, streams, and the entire ecosystem as a whole. It has indeed proven to alter soils, cause stress on vegetation, and impair streams and lakes in the North East in recent decades. (Welman)

For more information on any aspects of the HBEF or the HBES, including acid precipitation research, please visit http://www.hubbardbrook.org

Works Cited:
Oreskes, Naomi, and Erik M. Conway. Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming. New York: Bloomsbury, 2010. Print.
Welman, Adam, and Marianne Krasny. “Acid Rain Research at the HBEF.” N.p., n.d. Web. 21 Aug. 2014. <http://www.hubbardbrook.org/6-12_education/Introduction/Intro13.htm>.

August 21, 2014September 21, 2014

Does the flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?

In The Discovery of Global Warming, Spencer R. Weart tells the story of the few dedicated scientists who first detected and questioned a change in climate through to the growing public awareness of warming in recent decades. Several major contributors are mentioned from Stewart Callendar, John Tyndall, and Thomas Chamberlin who first got the ball rolling, to major figures in more recent society such as James Hansen. Weart sets a heavy focus on the difficulties that arose at each step along the way; the lack of research funding, the miscommunication among scientists in early decades, the uncertainty of General Circulation Models (GCMs), ect.

With all of this information given, what I found most interesting about Weart’s work was his minimal but strikingly beneficial use of climate metaphors. The following metaphor sparked my interest, “If an inspector tells you that he has found termites in your house, and some day your roof will fall in, you would be a fool not to act at once” (Weart viii). This is way of saying the evidence is there that our climate is changing but the majority of people today are fools for not acting quickly.

Metaphors in scientific writing and news stories may often be avoided because they might create a lack of rationality. However, after further exploring some well-known climate metaphors it became clear to me that they have the potential to be an extremely powerful and fascinating form of communication. The following are two metaphors that I came across that really impressed me.

“The world we know is like the Titanic. It is grand, chic, high-powered, and it slips effortless through a frigid sea of icebergs. It does not have enough lifeboats… If we do not change course, disaster, perhaps catastrophe, is almost inevitable” John Brandenburg, Dead Mars, Dying Earth

“The currents of change are so powerful that some have long since taken their oars out of the water, having decided that it is better to surrender, enjoy the ride, and hope for the best—even as those currents sweep us along faster and faster toward the rapids ahead that are roaring so deafeningly we can hardly hear ourselves. “Rapids?” they shout above the din. “What rapids? Don’t be ridiculous; there are no rapids. Everything is fine!” There is anger in the shouting, and some who are intimidated by the anger learn never to mention the topic that triggers it. They are browbeaten into keeping the peace by avoiding any mention of the forbidden subject.” – Al Gore, Six Drivers of the Future

Check out the link below to see other popular climate metaphors and discussions regarding this indirect form of communication.

Best Metaphors for the Climate Crisis

August 20, 2014September 21, 2014

Climate Change: What’s the beef?

1497529_10152423437873804_2367167716968621669_n — Cows grazing in South America. Photo by Sabiha Madraswalla, Dickinson ’15.

By Maeve Hogel

Argentina is world renowned for being one of the largest producers and consumers of beef. I just returned from a year studying there and having been served beef at practically every meal, I can attest that it lives up to its reputation. As someone who is always looking for grass-fed meats and prefers to buy local, I was pleased both by the delectable taste and the environmental friendliness of Argentine beef. The cattle are free to roam farms freely with their diets being mainly grass, unlike the diets of corn that are common in the United States. In the rural areas, many farms are still small and feed only the local people, such as the one pictured above. However, what I failed to think about until reading Anna Lappe’s Diet for a Hot Planet was the effect that all of these cows in Argentina, and all over the world, have on climate change simply by existing.

Many are familiar with the connection between greenhouse gases and global warming. Particularly, we understand how humans can cause increases in carbon dioxide emissions. However, aside from carbon dioxide there are other greenhouse gases that are also important players in climate change that many, including myself, often forget to consider. As Lappe points out in her book, “though the livestock sector contributes only 9 percent of global carbon dioxide emissions, its responsible for 37% of methane and 65% of nitrous oxide emissions” (Lappe, 26).

As I was sitting down to enjoy a delicious argentine steak, I certainly was not considering how that cow had affected climate change. Climate change is far from most people’s minds while they are enjoying their lunch or dinner, but maybe it shouldn’t be. Lappe’s book is filled with fascinating personal stores and interesting facts about farming not only in the United States, but in many parts of the world. Yet, for me, the fourth section of her book in which she titled “Action” is a must read for everyone (Lappe, 218). I’m absolutely a meat lover, so I will never suggest that we should all become vegetarians in order to prevent more greenhouse gas emissions. However, Lappe’s 7 principals of a climate-friendly diet are important ideas to keep in mind both for personal health and for the health of our planet. We all can eat more real foods, look for organic, lean towards local, and send packaging packing as Lappe suggests (Lappe, 218). Often we let ourselves believe that we personally can not make a difference, but when it comes to food we make a conscious choice about what we eat and where it comes from and hopefully we all start fitting climate change into the equation when making those choices.

August 20, 2014September 21, 2014

When Self-Interest Trumped Truth: The Politicization of Climate Change

John Charles Polanyi, the winner of the 1986 Nobel Prize in Physics, said that “scholarship – if it is to be scholarship – requires that the truth take precedence over all sectarian interests, including self-interest.” Two years after Polanyi received his award, global warming entered into the general lexicon and public discussion after Dr. James Hansen’s testimony to the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee declaring that, with 99% certainty, that “the warming trend was not a natural variation but was caused by a buildup of carbon dioxide and other artificial gases in the atmosphere.” Climate science immediately became a “political football”, as fossil fuel and big industry scrambled to scour the truth in order to defend their self-interest. Naomi Oreskes and Erik M. Conway, in Merchants of Doubt, warned that “small numbers of people can have large, negative impacts, especially if they are organised, determined and have access to power.” And their efforts changed the global warming discussion forever for that very reason.

While a large body of climate scientists genuinely and honestly pursued impartial and unbiased research on global warming, a small critical mass of individuals, known as “merchants of doubt”, published reports to the contrary, saying that there was actually a cooling trend, and that not enough was known about the climate to act one way or the other. Backed by abounding resources from fossil fuel companies, conservative think tanks and media outlets, their efforts turned global warming from being indisputably correct scientifically to a flimsy theory to provoke fear, and even a referendum on American government itself; cap-and-trade measures to tame down carbon emissions, as they argued, were a government intrusion into the market economy, an interference in personal rights, and indicative of the burgeoning size of the government.

What lied beneath the surface of the campaign of doubt and misinformation was the preservation of the bottom line for the fossil fuel industry for another generation, not the pursuit of scientific truth or the common good. In order for any measurable mitigation or adaptation progress to be made, self-interest must be dropped for the prospects of future generations, financial gain for environmental preservation, and negligence for stewardship. Bob Inglis, former Republican Representative from South Carolina, made the following analogy:

“Your child is sick, 98 doctors say treat him this way, two say, ‘No, this other is the way to go.’ I’ll go with the two. You’re taking a big risk with those kids.”

How long are we willing to take such a big risk and pass the buck off to our children and grandchildren? For their sakes and ours, the time for decisive action is now.

Quote by John Charles Polanyi found on www.brainyquote.com.

Quote by Dr. James Hansen found in NYT article, “Global Warming Has Begun, Expert Tells Senate”, 24 June 1988.

Definition of “political football” (to cause a political football is to “thrust a social, national security, or otherwise ostensibly non-political matter into partisan politics”) found in Safire’s Political Dictionary.

Quote from Merchants of Doubt found on page 270.

Quote by former Rep. Bob Inglis found on transcript for PBS Frontline’s program titled “Climate of Doubt,” aired 23 October, 2012.