Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

Climate & Climate Change

Economist Reports on Climate Conference in New York

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SPAIN has business leakage, California has banned all coal-based electricity, cap and trade creates vested interests in property rights – these are some of the issues economist Alan Moran reports on in his summary of the recent Climate Change Conference in New York.  

Dr Moran also notes that scientists at the conference did not agree on whether there is likely to be global  warming or cooling in the near future or on the key drivers of climate. 

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Plane found Under 90 metres of Ice

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AFTER about ninety minutes of flying through dense cloud cover, the coastal mountains appeared through an opening.  But where on the west coast were they … they were back on the east coast of Greenland…  fuel would only last another twenty minutes.    They landed on top of a remote ice cap in Greenland:  Eight planes including two B-17 bombers.  
 
That was on July 15, 1942. 
 
Fifty years later a small group of aviation enthusiasts decided to locate the squadron and recover one of the planes.  According to Svend Hendriksen, a resident of Greenland, what they found can help explain why Greenland’s glaciers have been melting so rapidly.  He wrote: 

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Time for Plan B: Adaptation to Climate Change

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The United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s plan of prevention has been trialled by combining regulation under the Kyoto Protocol with the dissuasive powers of a carbon dioxide trading system, for instance in Europe.  From this trial it is apparent that the CO2 reductions agreed to under Kyoto, even were all to be achieved, will make no measurable difference to future temperature. Also, the experience of early mover countries on carbon dioxide taxation, such as Norway, is that at reasonable tax levels of $15-25/tonne no reduction in emissions is achieved, Norway’s having increased 15% since 1990. Thus Plan A doesn’t work, can’t work and won’t work; it is already a dead parrot.

Meanwhile, Nature has delivered powerful messages recently as to the danger of natural climate change, via Hurricane Katrina in 2005 in USA, and devastating bushfires and floods in Australia in 2009. It is obvious that countries need to be better prepared to understand, cope with and adapt to the damaging effects of these and other natural climatic events and trends. Just like earthquakes and volcanic eruptions, major climatic events are unpredictable long in advance and unstoppable once started.

The appropriate response – and climate policy plan B – is to adapt to such events when and as they occur.

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