Don't they realize, can't they realize, that setting up flags on an ice floe is no more "polar defense" than flying Tibetan flag is "actually helping the Dalai Lama and his people"?

Whoever does "raise awareness", they surely feel much better afterwards. In their utter futility, they dream of the "symbolism", don't they.

Still, Tibet remains in its troubles, just like the the North Pole will. Whatever those troubles truly are.

===

Let's see what they claim on their website, having decided to turn back in front of an impassable "wall of ice" around 81N:

1. Lewis Gordon Pough is "so proud" of "the team" because they achieved the incredible feat of spending the whole day erecting 192 flags
2. They went "further north than anyone has ever kayaked before" (next year I'll rent a nuclear submarine and bring a surfing board to the North Pole)
3. "The way the team has pulled together (and this despite the individual team members not knowing each other at all prior to the trip)" (who is he kidding? hundreds of expeditions do that every year, and nobody has ever thought it could be an achievement more than being capable of eating one's food is)
4. Press coverage (well, not a lot in this Google search. And not a lot in this other Google search here either)
5. er..
6. that's it

After all, if blog entries are as important as the case of the missing flag, what should one expect? Compare that to the original aim:

Adventurer Lewis Gordon Pugh plans to become the first person to kayak to the North Pole. His journey will show how cracks in the ice have made it possible to travel through what used to be permafrost.

(and they call it permafrost!)

And yes, Lewis Gordon Pugh himself does state in an earlier video that it would be "a failure" not to be able to reach the North Pole at all (link to that video, halfway through this page).

=====

Should I admire those people for their "incredible efforts"? Not at all.

Had they paddled up by themselves, I surely would have. But all it has turned into was a very expensive way to move people up to 81N with a great boat to comfortably live in and no destination whatsoever.

With minimal danger, the Polar Defense Project is no Himalayan mountaineering on the K2. Worse, it pretends to be world-changing.

===

The above of course reminds me of the E-day fudge (or fraud).

And so it offers even more hope: if AGWers can't see their mistakes, they won't be learning from them.

Moving onwards to next gimmick!

For today, I have a few links.

Timothy A Wise, via the Working Group on Development & Environment in the Americas, has released a discussion paper titled: The Limited Promise of Agricultural Trade Liberalization.

He argues that even using the numbers generated in studies cited by proponents of global agricultural trade liberalisation, the benefits are minor, and mostly accumulate in rich countries, and to the largest and wealthiest farmers. This is persuasive for me for the short and medium-terms, but an important part of his argument is also the assumption that commodity prices will keep falling relative to prices of other items in the long-term, and I wonder if this will continue to be true as environmental constraints increasingly come to bear (e.g. water supply, top-soil erosion) and input costs rise (e.g. cost of artificial fertilisers and operating machinery increasing with peak oil).

The bottom line, regardless, is that agricultural trade liberalisation would be no economic panacea - which, since economic benefits are the largest argument for such liberalisation, and since there are significant global costs in food-security, social justice, and environmental impacts - makes the case for such liberalisation pretty shaky.

Joseph E. Aldy, Eduardo Ley, and Ian W.H. Parry offer A Tax-Based Approach to Slowing Global Climate Change. This discussion paper, via Resources for the Future compares a Carbon-Tax to a Cap & Trade system, and the authors conclude that:

A strong case can be made for taxes on uncertainty, fiscal, and distributional grounds, though this critically hinges on policy specifics and how revenues are used.

And that:

In principle, revenue-neutral CO2 taxes appear to have a number of advantages over cap-and-trade systems, but the devil lies in the details of the implementation. At the domestic level, an appropriately designed cap-and-trade system—with allowance auctions and smart
revenue recycling as well as mechanisms to contain costs, such as a safety valve or banking and borrowing—could mimic many of the benefits of a CO2 tax. Even so, at the international level, a CO2 tax might be more effective at promoting broad country participation, especially among developing countries with limited institutions for implementing a new permit-trading system.

Note the "appropriately designed" qualifier: it's not clear to me that cap & trade systems that have been implemented have in fact been "appropriately designed". (1) & (2)

Finally, just for fun: proof you can, with appropriate (?) assumptions, do a formal econometric analysis of anything. James Heckman, with tongue firmly in cheek, analyses The Effect of Prayer on God's Attitude
Toward Mankind in an Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit/Institute for the Study of Labor discussion paper. He concludes that:

A little prayer does no good and may make things worse. Much prayer helps a lot.

Weather affects every aspect of our lives.

We are aware of how cold weather drives up the price of natural gas and propane (just look at your heating bills from last winter!) and how our insurance costs are adjusted for the amount of storm damage we sustain. Changes in the weather, either real or predicted, will affect the price of everything we buy from peas to plywood. Sometimes the effect will be in our favor, sometimes it won't.

Hurricane Isabel set its course for the Atlantic coast like a Cyclops on a rampage. As Isabel grew stronger, residents of the East Coast bought up plywood, masking tape, nails, screws and other building supplies. Wood, steel and tape are the pieces of armor for buildings, shielding against hurricane winds, securing doors and covering windows.

Those lucky souls who did not return their surplus Y2K merchandise had a ready supply of canned goods and who knows what else. The less fortunate rushed to the store to buy canned goods, water and flashlight batteries for basic survival. Sump pumps and wet-dry vacuums at the ready, property owners dug in like warriors to defend the things that personal worth is made up of -- possessions and property. Meanwhile the United States Navy headed out to sea in order to protect vital ships.

Isabel came at a time when the U.S. economy had been in a slumber. Suddenly, she became the impetus for a boom at retailers like Lowe's and Home Depot. The two home improvement retailers, along with smaller lumberyards, unloaded plywood and tools by the ton. Plywood was in short supply, driving up the price from South Carolina to New Jersey. Grocers sold canned goods while inland motels and restaurants catered to refugees from the coast.

This saga played out from the Carolinas to New York because forecasters were unable to pinpoint the exact point of landfall until only hours before Isabel unleashed its soggy wrath.

One person's misery and empty wallet is another person's joy and prosperity, thanks to the weather. Actually, for homeowners with proper protection, insurance companies will cover most of the cost of cleaning up after Isabel.

In the end Isabel will help buoy up the economy. Some retailers will report a surge in September sales. By years' end, building permits will increase as renovation projects begin. Demolition contractors and tree services will make mint along with carpet cleaners.

Even though Isabel did not hit the East Coast with the ferocity she showed over the tropical Atlantic Ocean, the swirling mass of water vapor will unleash an economic windfall over the next few months. At least for some.

Our local weather affects the local economy, too. A mere change in the weather or weather forecast affects how much money local businesses make.

Lets look at a fictional Black Hills amusement park, Bison Boundaries, where you can ride a tame buffalo for $10. Bison Boundaries does not get a lot of business when it rains, but on a sunny day up to 1,000 people come through the gate. On a particular day, the owner, Bison Bob, heard a forecast for rain -- an all day cold, steady rain. Bison Bob and his manager decided to spend the day fly-fishing near Deerfield, some 20 miles away.

The rain fell all day as they cast away. Six fish and eight hours later they drive home, only to find Bison Boundaries basking in the sun just as it had been all day. A thousand people had come hoping for a bison ride. Disappointed, they moved along, spending their ten dollars somewhere else.

Bob and his manager had quite a fish story about the big one -- $10,000 -- that got away.

There may not be a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, but when you hear raindrops fall it is the sound of jingling change to someone. Golden sunshine is cash in the register for someone else. Your prosperity may be just a forecast away.

The issue of “indirect land use change” emissions was introduced early this year with the publication of papers in SciencExpress (see earlier post). Debate since the publication of those papers has focused on the lack of data to accompany the models and the assumptions inherent in the models. For instance, Searchinger and Fargione assumed that other countries would have to develop new cropland, primarily from sensitive ecosystems such as the rainforest, to replace the crops being used for biofuels in the United States. In a recent working paper, Roman Keeney and Thomas Hertel of Purdue University look at the possibility that increased crop yields would replace some of the crops being used for biofuels in the United States. They conclude that up to 30 percent of demand could be met through yield increases. Further, they show that Canada and Brazil – as the major grain trading partners for the United States – would be the countries to look at for any indirect land use change caused by U.S. biofuel production.

Keeney and Hertel do not examine the possibility that yield increases in Canada and Brazil would also help meet demand. However, researchers at the University of Wisconsin do examine that possibility. Still, according to these researchers, the shift of land use does increase emissions.

A group of researchers recently wrote to the California Air Resources Board, saying that until the uncertainties in the “indirect land use change” models had been thoroughly studies, they should not be calculated in the life cycle analysis required for biofuel producers in California. Other researchers responded that the effect certainly exists, so some calculation of it must be included under the law. They say that most calculations estimate that indirect land use change will double the greenhouse gas emissions attributable to biofuels.

The debate should not be whether land use change and cutting of rainforests releases carbon -- it does. It should be whether indirect land use change can be reliably attributed to individual biofuel producers. Bruce Dale of Michigan State University put it this way during a field hearing of the Senate Agriculture Committee in Omaha, Neb., on Aug. 18:

It seems to me that making U.S. farmers responsible for land use decisions made by others is both unfair and a terrible precedent. Are we going to make every U.S. industry responsible for greenhouse gas generation by its competitors around the world?"

In other words, there are many factors that lead to deforestation in Brazil. As Iowa State University professors Eugene Takle and Don Hofstrand put it, "The conversion of native ecosystems to agricultural production started well before the emergence of the biofuels demand."

Policy makers, civil society activists, academics, politicians, farmers, labors, and people from all segments of the society need to speak out on the issue and raise a national consensus as well as convention to find a way out to combat this upcoming disaster. It is clearer from the response of US and other industrialist countries that they are not taking the issue seriously. In addition, most of the meetings and dialogues on climate change are stressing on ‘carbon trade’, which in my opinion is ‘carbon trick’. Therefore, this ‘carbon trick’ is now the overwhelming issue rather than climate change adaptation or helping victims of climate change.

For detail see,

http://www.the-editor.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=317:climate-change-puts-millions-in-bangladesh-at-risk-how-can-we-combat-this-writes-rubayat-ahsan&catid=50:editorial

Start with West Nile virus. That's on the uptick as a result of mosquitoes breeding in abandoned swimming pools at foreclosed houses. Now we have bobcats taking over abandoned homes in the 'burbs. Check out this photo from the Los Angeles Times.

What's next? It's impossible to know what will survive the cataclysm. That's because that all depends on what form the cataclysm will take in your neighborhood. We know that cockroaches can withstand just about anything, from atomic bombs to shoe-wielding housewives. Coyotes are another likely survivor. The more we try to kill them off, the more they expand in numbers and range.

Whoever survives, they'll take over your home when you're gone. So why don't you do them a favor? Prepare your house to be a little more welcoming now to the species you'd prefer to give it to. Start by getting rid of all those deadly pesticides, home cleaners and cosmetics they might accidentally get themselves into. Then cut some pet doors of just the right size and shape.

You won't turn a profit by welcoming these friends, but your mortgage is probably upside down already anyway, so what's the loss? And who knows, maybe by giving the cataclysm survivors easy access to so much people stuff, the evolutionary process back to humans will go a little faster next time around.

The US seems to have learned much from its experience three years ago with Katrina. That is a good thing, for with three more tropical storms out there right now there's a good chance our brothers and sisters on the coasts will need our help again this hurricane season.

We all will continue to need each others help in the years to come. As the Earth continues to warm we know we can expect an increase in both the frequency and intensity of hurricanes and other severe weather events.

The presence of climate refugees in our midst puts a very personal face on the impacts of climate change. As we meet the needs of those who have had to flee their homes may we remind ourselves that we also need to address our lifestyle choices regarding energy as well as work for more sustainable energy policies in the US and beyond.

Dead zones-those nasty areas of low oxygen water that kill every critter that can't crawl, slither or swim fast enough to get away-tend to occur in coastal areas where a lot of extra nutrients (a.k.a. poop) are dumped into the water. Coastal waters are already plenty nutritious-receiving enough normal runoff for fisheries to thrive. But by adding poop and chemical fertilizers to the mix, we upset the natural balance. The sudden boost in nutrients leads to an algal bloom and when the algae eventually die, they sink to the bottom and decompose. Because decomposition robs the water of oxygen, immobile and slow-moving critters like oysters, crabs and small fish suffocate. Faster fish (like tuna) can get out before they asphyxiate, but they're still screwed-they depend on the slow pokes and the slow pokes are now dead. (You can read more about the relationship between poop and dead zones on our post about Burping Cows.)

The Gulf of Mexico dead zone, the best-known dead zone in North America, is a perfect example of this cascade effect. The authors of the paper in Science also reported that the dead zone in the Gulf removes 17,000 metric tons of carbon per year from the demersal fisheries (i.e. those that target fish that live on the bottom, like flounder and crabs) 17,000 metric tons of carbon per year. Hunh?? In other (much clearer) words, thanks to the big-ass dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico, fishermen are missing out on an extra 170,000* metric tons of fish.

Most of the dead zones around the world, like the Gulf of Mexico, are in areas that support important fisheries. One of the worst, however, was in the Black Sea. In the early ‘90s, when the Soviet Union was still going strong, fertilizer runoff from industrial farms in the Black Sea watershed caused a huge dead zone to form. With the fall of the Soviet bloc, the industrial farms shut down and the dead zone disappeared. But now farmers are starting back up in the watershed with their fertilizers and scientists say that the Black Sea dead zone could come back.

The Black Sea offers up some hope that these fertilizer-induced dead zones are fixable-even the Gulf of Mexico dead zone shrinks in years when less water flows down the Mississippi (less water means less polluted runoff). But before you go getting all "anti-farmer," there's something you should know: Some dead zones are caused by Mama Nature herself... granted, she's a little stressed these days.

Areas of low oxygen along the west coasts of North America and southern Africa and in the Bay of Bengal are caused by the forces of nature. These are all upwelling systems where cold, nutrient-rich water from the ocean depths wells up at the coastline to mix with warm, oxygenated surface water. But shifts in weather patterns (which some researchers attribute to climate change) are causing stronger upwelling, which means more nutrients are getting dumped into the system. This leads to the same outcome as we see in the fertilizer-induced dead zones-extra nutrients lead to decomposing algae on the bottom and asphyxiating fishes.

So, it looks like the bottom line here is that poop (and its chemical equivalent) and climate change can have the same effect on our fisheries. How's that for food for thought?

* By the way, 17,000 metric tons of carbon equals 170,000 metric tons of fish because the "wet weight to carbon" ratio for demersal fish is about 10 to 1. Aren't you glad you asked?

One of the more interesting books I've read lately is The Weather Makers, by the scientist and environmentalist Tim Flannery. The title refers to the ability of human beings to influence the climate by changing the composition of the atmosphere, and the book's central message is that we are now weather makers.

The most profound consequence of human influence, of course, is likely to be an increase in average global temperatures owing to emissions of carbon dioxide. Flannery does a good job of presenting the evidence for anthropogenic  global warming, and the book contains sufficient ammunition to blast gaping holes in the standard "skeptical" arguments. However, Flannery is at his most interesting when he discusses the probable consequences of global warming.

Two points struck me as particularly relevant for Canadians. First, the effects of climate change will be extremely uneven. Flannery is concerned about his own country, Australia, which is already experiencing droughts that are partly a result of global warming. Canada faces disruption to the Arctic ecosystem, but melting ice may also make Arctic resources and sea routes more accessible. Furthermore, agriculture in both Canada and Russia may actually benefit from warmer conditions. This is not to say we should welcome climate change - many of the effects on Canada will be deleterious, and after all, I like Australia. But we Canadians need to prepare realistically for the specific changes in our local climate that are likely to occur.

The second point that I found particularly thought-provoking was the role of climate change in driving conflict. The Sudan, like Australia, is already getting noticeably drier, to the detriment of local farmers and herders. This is how Flannery links the changing conditions to the fighting in Darfur:

Camel-herding nomads have been forced to drive their herds onto agricultural lands, where they have come into conflict with farmers. Although the herders are characterized as Arabs, and the farmers as Africans, with the exception of their lifestyles they are culturally and physically indistinguishable.

I might want a second opinion from an anthropologist about the differences between the two groups. However, I have no trouble believing that desperation caused by lack of rainfall is part of the problem in Darfur. Situations like this are almost guaranteed to become more common, in many parts of the world, as changing weather disrupts the agricultural activities on which all societies ultimately depend. Canada should be ready.

Corwin

Once again Ireland shows it's intelligence. First they voted down the Lisbon Treaty and now Environment Minister Sammy Wilson has come out against the fraud of man made global warming. Proud to have a bit of the Irish flowing in my veins.

Sammy Wilson's view on climate change has angered environmentalists

The Environment Minister Sammy Wilson has angered green campaigners by describing their view on climate change as a "hysterical psuedo-religion".

In an article in the News Letter, Mr Wilson said he believed it occurred naturally and was not man-made.

"Resources should be used to adapt to the consequences of climate change, rather than King Canute-style vainly trying to stop it," said the minister.

Peter Doran of the Green Party said it was a "deeply irresponsible message."

Mr Wilson said he refused to "blindly accept" the need to make significant changes to the economy to stop climate change.

"The tactic used by the "green gang" is to label anyone who dares disagree with their view of climate change as some kind of nutcase who denies scientific fact," he said.

The minister said he accepted climate change can occur, but does not believe the cause has been identified.

"Reasoned debate must replace the scaremongering of the green climate alarmists."

From the BBC

Worldwide sea levels may rise by about 2.6 to 6.6 feet by 2100 thanks to global warming, but dire predictions of larger increases seem unrealistic, U.S. scientists said on Thursday.

They examined scenarios for loss of ice from Greenland, Antarctica and the world's smaller glaciers and ice caps into the world's oceans, as well as ocean expansion simply due to rising water temperatures.

Their calculations yielded estimates for global sea level increases by the end of the century that are lower than many existing projections, but alarming nonetheless.

"If you look at the actual mechanics of how glaciers work, there doesn't seem to be a realistic way that we know about to get more than about 2 meters of sea level rise in the next century," Tad Pfeffer of the University of Colorado's Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research, whose study was published in the journal Science, said in a telephone interview.

The Article:

http://news.yahoo.com/story//nm/20080904/sc_nm/climate_oceans_dc

Harper recently announced the government would fund a $100 million project for mapping of northern oil and gas resources, something which the oil and gas industry has sufficient funds to do on their own.

He added: "As I've said before, 'use it or lose it' is the first principle of sovereignty in the Arctic.

Harper then continued to use other macho-isms such as “no pain, no gain” while Environment Minister, John Baird, held him up for a keg stand.

Later, Harper attempted to brainwash the press with overuse of the word ‘north’.

''To develop the North, we must know the North. To protect the North, we must control the North. And to accomplish all our goals for the North, we must be in the North."

University of British Columbia professor Michael Byers has commented:

"It's fine to talk about the economic potential and contribute government money toward it, but if it's premised on a kind of gold rush mentality instead of a stewardship approach - focused on sustainable development - this gold rush that Mr. Harper is stimulating could actually end up causing great harm."

photo credit

Sightline Daily | Northwest News That Matters

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