By Here is yet another example that global warming legislation has nothing to do with saving the world from eternal fiery damnation:
Coal-fired power plants are the largest source of heat-trapping gases that cause global warming, but President Obama’s plan to fight climate change would result in the nation burning more coal a decade from now than it does today …
The Environmental Protection Agency projects that even if the emissions limits go into effect, the U.S. would use more carbon-dioxide-heavy coal in 2020 than it did in 2005. [LA Times via Tim Blair]
I have said it before and I will say it again, if global warming is something that has to be stopped immediately before we all die in an internal fiery hell of our own making then why are these coal power plants exempt? If there is so little time to act to stop global warming then why are these people letting political concerns influence their votes? So now along with the exemption of the largest polluters, cows now coal fired power plants are exempt.
Here is my favorite part of the article:
Under the plan, the EPA projects that after 2020, conventional coal use would begin to fall quickly. That prediction rests on a still-uncertain assumption that new nuclear power plants would begin to come on line.
The analysis also assumes scientists will master advanced technologies that could make coal more attractive from an emissions standpoint. As of now, no one has on a commercial scale.
Does anyone find it incredible that the EPA is claiming coal use will drop after 2020 after new nuclear power plants go online and clean coal technology is established? If all these nuclear power plants are supposed to come online by 2020 then why aren’t they being constructed right now? Considering President Barack Obama’s current opposition to the storage of nuclear waste, I don’t see a bunch of nuclear power plants being constructed anytime soon.
If this legislation isn’t going to save us from eternal fiery hell then what is it for?
I think it is pretty clear that this legislation has nothing to do with global warming, especially with global temperatures dropping for the past decade despite more carbon being pumped into the atmosphere then ever before. This legislation has more to do with controling the economy, bringing in more tax money for the government, and making money for Democratic Party supporters. With cap and trade being a failure in Europe, Canada, and Australia leave it to the US Congress to try and pass legislation that will surely be an equal failure.
2:02 pm on June 24th, 2009 1
GI, Global Warming is not something to be stopped immediately. It is something that needs to be mitigated as it's already happening. They have sophisticated computer models out there that give a very good indication to where we're headed, whether it be 10, 50, or a 100 years from now.
The political, technological, and financial solutions are being worked now. Over the next decade or so they will be implemented and Global Warming will be mitigated as to not cause a complete planetary catastrophe. Just don't expect to find any Polar Bears except in a zoo.
6:35 pm on June 24th, 2009 2
Parsec, Global Warming is not something to be stopped at all. Every 1,500years or so followed by global cooling. Even when there were only a handful of humans around and not an internal combustion engine to be found.
10:26 pm on June 24th, 2009 3
Actually Parsec, the "sophisticated computer models" are surprisingly unsophisticated (they have major issues with the way in which they handle water vapor and associated atmospheric "feedbacks" from cloud cover for one), but more importantly, they have not verified as being correct over a near decade now of cooling. Of course I am actually a meteorologist, so what do I know.
On a more philosophical note, who are you (i.e. we, in general) to decide what the "perfect climate" for the planet is? What makes the climate of early 1900's pre-carbon emmissions the best climate for all future generations? And why do people believe that we can somehow stabilize a cycle which has been occuring since the planet was formed?
12:09 am on June 25th, 2009 4
The previous post was brought to you by Politically Motivated Pop Science…
…makers of fine, dumbed-down, rumor-based pseudo explanations, expertly crafted with the easily-manipulated and uninformed in mind.
“Just don’t expect to find any Polar Bears except in a zoo.”
This statement defines why I am starting to hate global warming believers as people… and discount anything they say after “climate change” or “global warming” dribbles from their mouths.
They exemplify one aspect of what is wrong with modern society… so easily sold on things that are actually not in their best interests if presented with emotion rather than fact.
Normally I wouldn’t care so much… just laugh it off like American Idol watchers… but their wide-eyed ignorance is empowering the shitbags that are not only getting rich off of “climate change” but are doing their best make my lifestyle more expensive or more limited while making no real change to theirs.
Anybody who doesn’t see the funking coming deserves it.
Parsec, I’m sure, after that statement, you would like to contrast the real, perceived and misrepresented effects of climate change, Russian poaching, recovery from harvest controls and loss of habitat on polar bear populations…
…of course in a way that explains why polar bear populations are actually increasing.
12:38 am on June 25th, 2009 5
I can’t take these folks seriously until they get serious. If they TRULY want to decrease their carbon footprint, don’t half ass it. Decrease it to 0 (zero).
If enough of them do so, then the rest of us might see the light. Or, if there are enough of them, the problem might just solve it self.
In the meantime, with eco-spokespersons jetting all over the globe to attend galas and events, stuff it.
11:50 pm on June 24th, 2009 6
Do I need to go list all the scaremongering saying we are all going to die in eternally fiery damnation if we don't do something now about global warming? Here is my favorite global warming scaremonger he even wants to change the color of the sky!:
As far as polar bears the US Senate has already issued a report condemning the bogus claims:
http://rokdrop.com/2008/02/18/marathon-for-expand…
The polar bear population is actually expanding from 5,000-10,000 bears in the 1950’s to 20,000-25,000 bears now. Only the eco-loons could make an argument that polar bears are going extinct while they are currently going through a population boom.
As far as the computer models they are only as good as the information put in them and has been shown over and over again the people with these computer models care more about politics than science. They couldn't even predict the 10 year global cooling period yet we are supposed to believe they can predict in 50, 100, or even 150 years?
2:28 am on June 25th, 2009 7
The U.S. Geological Survey predicts two-thirds of the world's polar bears will disappear by 2050, based on moderate projections for the shrinking of summer sea ice caused by global warming. The bears would disappear from Europe, Asia, and Alaska, and be depleted from the Arctic archipelago of Canada and areas off the northern Greenland coast. By 2080, they would disappear from Greenland entirely and from the northern Canadian coast, leaving only dwindling numbers in the interior Arctic archipelago.[48]
5:57 am on June 25th, 2009 8
You really need to obtain accurate information if you actually think that GW is a problem.
First lets start that the infamous hockey stick graph. A utter sham based upon faulty data that has yet to be replicated by peers that were NOT part of the original study.
Second, faulty temp data. Mc Intyre's web site shows trempeture measuring equipment located in areas where the data is much higher than it should be. Sites located very near exhaust ducts, roads, blacktop, and many other instances.
Third, unrealiable solar data. The only solar data we currently have is at most 30 years old. All of the other data is from counting the number of sunspots each year.
Fourth, data from forrest fires. Each year we get on average 3 to 10 forrest fires and NO mention about the amount of CO2 they produce each year.
The issue of GW is a bunch of bunk and the data proves it when combined the utter lack of peer review process. This crap is not science, it's pure BS if people actually did some basic research they would know the truth of the matter.
11:09 am on June 25th, 2009 9
“By 2080, they would disappear from Greenland entirely and from the northern Canadian coast, leaving only dwindling numbers in the interior Arctic archipelago.”
So… if I’m 9 years old right now, I will still be able to see polar bears in a place other than a zoo when I am 80.
This is a perfect example of emotion over fact in the whole “climate change” movement.
Let’s play a science game…
There is more hard evidence which indicates _______.
a) global warming is going to end the world and polar bears will only be found in zoos.
b) polar bears, as a distinct species, survived the last interglacial optimum during the Late Pleistocene Eemian Stage where the sea level was about 8 meters higher than today and the water temperature of the North Sea was around 2°C higher than at present.