Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

Opinion

Metres of Sea-Level Rise: Climate Commissioner

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WILL Steffen is the executive director of the Australian National University Climate Change Institute and also a member of the Australian Climate Commission. This is the Climate Commission established to provide all Australians with an independent and reliable source of information about the science of climate change. This is the same Professor Steffan who, you may remember, sort of fudged hot day data for western Sydney [1].

My name is Mr Koala and I’ve been reading the latest contribution from this professor who is paid to provide me with an independent and reliable source of information on climate change.

He has a piece in today’s national newspaper, The Australian. It’s really scary! Professor Steffan tell us:

“Scientists have painted a clear picture of the risks from failing to act on climate change. The natural world would experience the sixth great extinction event in Earth’s history, coral reefs would almost completely disappear, and we would be facing metres of sea-level rise as oceans continue to warm and polar ice sheets melt and disintegrate.”

Ouch. Nemo!

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How Scientific Ideas Become Fashionable (Part 1)

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THERE is no doubt that many people are susceptible to the repetition of a single message. No matter how stupid the message, if enough people say it often enough, a large percentage of those who hear it will begin to believe it. That’s the basis of advertising and also propaganda: it’s how you make ideas fashionable, even scientific ideas. But just because an idea is fashionable doesn’t make it right and just because an idea is right, well it doesn’t mean it represents the truth.

Fashion is in fact the lowest form of ideology and I have little regard for fashionable ideas – even fashionable scientific ideas. I also have little regard for what many claim to be good and wholesome ideas. My interest is in the facts, the evidence – the truth particularly as it pertains to the natural world.

There is intrinsic good in having a deep understanding, based on truths, of aspects of the natural world. For example, it is through understanding electricity – what it is and how it can be generated – that it many of our basic physical needs are now met at the flick of a switch: the lights come on, the house warms up, the kettle boils water. But not everyone studies science to discover useful things, for some it is the chase after facts and the thrill that comes with their discovery, for others an interest in an aspect of the puzzle that is the natural world in the hope of finding order in the universe.

But to be successful at science there is a need for a particular type of discipline – a discipline that is not necessary in many other intellectual pursuits. There is a need to be honest to reality and to always test theory against reality. In this respect science is different from the modern arts.

But science has not always been so different from art. For example, Leonardo da Vinci studied anatomy to become a better artist. That was during a period in Europe when the artist’s goal was assumed to be the representation of reality – of nature. But then a time came when European artists renounced representation as their goal. Art now is about emotion, culture and fashion – few modern day artists attempt to depict the world as it really is. This may or may not be a good thing for art but it clearly makes art something very different from science.

Science is meant to be about reality – it is meant to be about discovery and understanding and truth. Science is not meant to be about emotion or culture or even fashion. But how can you tell whether a conversation about a scientific issue is based on truth or fashion?

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Activist Scientists Crying Wolf on Coral Bleaching and Climate Change

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THE propaganda from our Great Barrier Reef scientists at the 12th International Coral Reef Symposium is relentless. According to Janice Lough, Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS), the rate of change from anthropogenic global warming is unprecedented and is already having a catastrophic impact on the Great Barrier Reef. Also in front of the TV camera today, Phillip Munday, James Cook University, said the most spectacular of our coral reef fish will disappear. And John Pandolfi, University of Queensland, was begging us to do more to save the reef.[1] Australian Institute of Marine Science research director Peter Doherty told the $10 million symposium of more than 2000 marine scientists from 80 countries of an “alarming and unsustainable decline” in coral over large sections of the Great Barrier Reef in nearly three decades.[2]

But I reckon it’s all a put-on: they are crying wolf.

One of the symposium themes is ‘Climate change and bleaching’.

There have been some spectacular bleaching events in the last 15 years. The reality, however, is that most of the Great Barrier Reef has not bleached, and those areas that have bleached have almost fully recovered. The following are some interesting facts about heat and coral growth: [3]

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Really Reducing Emissions Would Mean Recession

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In Australia we now have a carbon tax, to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide. But I bet if there really was an across the board reduction in carbon emissions by industry the government would be complaining. Back in late 2008, when the price of oil plummeted, there was no celebrating the reduced energy usage anticipated by the reduction in demand. Rather everyone was complaining about the global financial crisis.

Indeed if our industries really curbed emissions it would be a sign production was slowing and the economy was going into recession.

What does the Australian Treasury really want: energy consumption or a reduction in emissions of carbon dioxide? Given current technologies, economic growth necessarily means energy consumption and carbon dioxide emissions. The two are inextricably linked.

But go to the Australian Government’s Treasury website and look under carbon price and there is a message about how modelling shows that:

“The Australian economy and the global economy both continue to grow strongly at the same time as we cut pollution to reduce the risks of dangerous climate change”.

Look at Australia’s All Ordinaries index and it shows that the Australian share market has gone nowhere since August last year while some economists suggest that the recent sharp drop in the global base price of metals is a sign of a likely drop in global industrial production and the risk of recession – not economic growth.

It’s a strange business this preoccupation with climate change and desire to save the planet by way of a carbon tax. Carbon is the chemical element with symbol C and atomic number 6. Carbon is known to form almost ten million different compounds including the hardest naturally occurring substance the diamond. But more than this, carbon compounds form the basis of all known life on Earth. Carbon should not be equated with pollution – and neither should carbon dioxide that is the stuff trees breathe in.

The carbon tax is in fact a tax on energy imposed on several hundred of Australia’s most productive enterprises. Most of these enterprises will simply pass the additional cost onto the consumer. Meanwhile the Australian Treasury has already compensated many consumers by way of a one-off payment in anticipation of the carbon tax increasing their cost of living.

If the Treasurer, Wayne Swan, was really serious about us all reducing energy consumption he would surely provide no compensation for the increased costs associated with the tax. He would simply insist ordinary Australians pay more so they consume less.

Indeed if Mr Swan was serious about reducing emissions he would be wanting a global recession, or at least one in Australia so we could do our bit – show moral authority, lead the way in reducing emission etcetera.

What the Carbon Tax and ETS will Really Cost: Peter Lang

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Tomorrow, July 1, Australia gets the carbon tax the Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, promised she would never introduce.   The nation’s 500 “biggest polluters” will start paying a $23-a-tonne carbon price.

Retired geologist and engineer, Peter Lang, calculates what this tax, and the Emissions Trading Scheme to follow, will really cost Australians:

Introduction

Popularly called the ‘Carbon Tax’, the CO2 tax and ETS will cost us more than the government claims.  Initial costs will be relatively small – a ‘honeymoon rate’ – but an accelerating rate thereafter will soon create much higher costs.  Some people will be partly compensated for a while, but after that we will all pay the full costs.

Actual costs are not easily derived – much depends on assumptions and estimates.  From Treasury estimates, for instance, the cost will be more than $13,000 per person (every man woman and child), or more than $26,000 per worker, total to 2050 (in today’s dollars).

However, the costs will most likely be much higher.  Firstly, while the ‘honey-moon rate’ includes only the 500 largest emitters, all CO2 emitters will eventually be brought into the ETS to make the scheme work as planned.

Secondly, emissions will eventually have to be measured, not just crudely estimated as is done now.  Not only CO2, but all the other twenty-three Kyoto gasses, from all sources, will have to be included.  The compliance costs are not included in Treasury’s estimates (see The ultimate compliance cost for the ETS).  Therefore, the actual costs the ETS will impose on us will inevitably be higher than we are being led to believe.

Below I explain the calculations of:

  • the benefit (total to 2050)
  • the cost (total to 2050)
  • the benefit to cost ratio
  • the cost per capita and per worker

Lastly, I list the assumptions that underpin the estimate of the benefits.

The cost and benefit analysis figures I used as inputs are chosen from sources well respected for reliability and credibility. The figures and subsequent analysis tell us, in effect, that Australia is planning to spend $10 dollars for every $1 of benefit it hopes to derive – provided the assumptions about the consequences of AGW are correct.  This suggests that our climate policies are flawed and need major change.

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Abbot and Marohasy Join Chinese Climate Science Community

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WESTERN science, along with western civilization appears to be in terminal decline.[1] China has shot into second place in terms of number of scientific articles that are published in international journals and Chinese scientists are set to take the top spot in the next few years.[2] Drs Jennifer Marohasy and John Abbot have joined the Chinese climate science community with a recent article in the journal Advances in Atmospheric Sciences.[3]

My name is Mr Koala and I’ve been studying all the papers listed in volume 29, number 4 of Advances in Atmospheric Sciences. This is a journal sponsored by the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

I asked Dr Marohasy why she didn’t have this important paper published by the American Meteorological Society’s Journal of Climate. She replied that it was sent to the Journal of Climate, amongst others, but they rejected the article, not because they had any issues with the science, but because they questioned the paper’s relevance.

Relevance!

Even a Koala, not at the top of his tree, can see the relevance.

This is a paper that shows how to forecast rainfall better than the General Circulation Models so popular with climate change scientists in the west.

That’s how relevant it is.
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