Why do you think that Rev Lusama 'knows a thing or two about climate change'? He plainly knows what is occurring in Tuvalu, but to attribute that to 'climate change', let alone to 'human-induced climate change' requires something more than a pair of eyes and a memory.

There is plenty of data about Tuvalu, and they do not support the notion that what is happening there is due to human activity elsewhere.

Unless you grapple with the real causes of what is happening there will be no useful outcome. And the IPCC did not, in its Fourth Report, highlight 'the link between extreme weather and global warming'. It asserted that there was one, but there is again plenty of data to suggest that the links are tenuous. In any case, 'weather' and 'climate' are not the same, as the IPCC itself points out (in short, climate is the average of weather).

Perhaps you could ask that poor people in developing countries get access quickly to the electrification of villages and education, as was done very well in Thailand. Oh, and educate the girls. And provide contraception. That will do a lot more good, I think, than worrying about the emptiness of the Green Climate Fund, which is likely to stay empty for a long time.

Better still, let's put a levy of say, $1000 a tonne, on emissions caused by useless hangers-on who attend climate change conferences. That would bring about a substantial reduction in carbon dioxide emissions and a 100 per cent reduction in facile juvenilia like this article.

But Clancy, we KNOW what is mooted to happen to Tuvalu, etc. We didn’t really need another article about this.

What we do need is fresh ideas on how Australia can really contribute to a meaningful legally binding agreement. Our current efforts are just pathetic:

This carbon tax business – a 5% cut to 2000 level by 2020 is so weak that it is virtually saying that we are just going to continue with business as usual, but just with a pale green veneer. If it were to be the first step in a steady tightening of fossil fuel derived emissions, then it might have some merit. But it is more likely to be the entire package, with a great deal of opposition to any further initiatives making it virtually impossible.

Meanwhile one huge factor is just being left out entirely – Australia’s very rapid population growth.

If Australia were to reduce immigration down to close to net zero, we would be doing more to reduce our emissions by 2020 than all other efforts combined.

Population growth in this country at least greatly dilutes, if not cancels out or completely overwhelms our best efforts to reduce emissions.

And it could so EASILY be addressed!

But I bet no one from Australia will be mentioning this in Durban. And I bet no one from any other country will push us on this point.

There just seems to be the most extraordinary blind spot here.

So here’s a challenge Clancy – push the population bit.

Remember this old equation from Paul Ehrlich: I = PAT. Impact = population x affluence x technology.

Well, all our efforts seem to be geared towards the T factor. The A factor might be a bit hard to do much with in Oz, but the P factor is HUGE!

Please Clancy, really push a major reduction in immigration and the achievement of a sustainable population in Australia (and globally) as a fundamental part of climate change policy. Thanks.

This horse is dead. It's time to quit flogging it.

This is exactly why I would not support Oxfam. Spending money and burning emissions to such meetings is a joke. A couple of weeks ago I got told by a young pretty girl from WWF that if we did not do something about climate change that in 30 years time the only place we could see a kangaroo would be in a zoo. And this is suppose to be the educated period. Is Government funding for these organisations tied to repeating the mantra?

The whole “climate change” fiasco is nothing more than a religion as presided over by the high priests of pettifoggery who are serving at the willing behest of politicians looking for the “next big thing” that can be taxed.

“As with religion, it is presided over by a caste of spectacularly unattractive people pretending to an obscure form of knowledge that promises to make the seas retreat and the winds abate. As with religion, it comes with an elaborate list of virtues, vices and indulgences. As with religion, its claims are often non-falsifiable, hence the convenience of the term "climate change" when thermometers don't oblige the expected trend lines. As with religion, it is harsh toward skeptics, heretics and other "deniers." And as with religion, it is susceptible to the earthly temptations of money, power, politics, arrogance and deceit. “ (http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203935604577066183761315576.html?mod=opinion_newsreel)

As the traits of a religion have shown – this church of climate change will continue for many decades as the hangers on are unwilling to admit that there may be another god more interesting or maybe no god at all which would require these useful idiots to think, form their own opinions and take responsibility for their own actions.

Clancy, I note that the case that you make that Tuvalu needs help is not made on the rising sea level meme (clearly because that has been effectively disproven), but on the issue of seawater contamination of the fresh water lens.

You probably know a lot about that issue. If you do, you will know that the typical Pacific Island built on a coral atoll has a freshwater "lens" that is surrounded by seawater. Overdraw fresh water, and you will begin to draw seawater. Or if the fresh water is not replenished by sufficient rainfall. That says that the problem could be either or both a land-management issue, and a precipitation issue.

You might want to point out to us the research that proves that increased anthropogenic CO2 emissions are causing less rainfall on Pacific Islands. I would have thought it had a lot more to do with ENSO cycles, La Nina and El Nino. But I'm listening.

The effects attributed to climate change by the writer are in fact due to climate cycles. For example, the back to back La Ninas we've had have caused floods in eastern Australia, but also cause droughts in Africa - the La Ninas in turn, may be due to the Pacific Decadal Osciallation flipping from warm to cool.

Climate is proving to be very complicated, and even if any of the suggestions linking global temperatures to industrial emissions turn out to be true, it is not clear what the effects will be..

It is all very real, Pacific islands will become inundated, Polar ice is melting at an alarming rate. Warmth in the northern hemisphere is likely highest for 1300 years. Breeds of fish that have never before been in certain areas, are now being caught, due to warmer waters. Increases in extreme temperatures and extreme cold temperatures. More intense cyclones. Oceans more acidic. Oceans giving up co2 with warmer water temps. Shifts in plant and animal locations and behaviour. This has gone beyond the norm.

Who really believes this Man made global warming jungle juice any more outside the public service and their agencies who seek rent from this expensive waste of public resources as the lefts fictional bedtime stories took center stage to avoid any real productive gains outside nefarious regulations.

Sorry Clancy but climate change does not matter. Why? Because the economy is everything.

Stopping or slowing emissions would require us to shrink the economy. Why? Because modern industrial economies require lots of energy to function. As the economy grows, energy consumption grows. Unless we have alternative renewable sources of energy that scale to the levels required to support a growing global economy, we must shrink that economy to reduce emissions. At present, and in the foreseeable future, those viable energy alternatives do not or very likely will not exist.

Nobody is going to buy off on the idea that we must shrink the economy, get back to 350ppm, which is proposed by most climate scientists. We would have to tear down industrial civilization.

Even if an alternative energy miracle occurs, it would take decades to replace oil, natural gas and coal with wind, solar, hydropower etc. All that time the economy would need to be growing, because that's what human beings want.

If the economy grows, energy flows must increase. It is naive to believe that we wouldn't have to burn even more fossil fuels in the future. But where are those going to come from? Even if viable alternatives to fossil fuels appear, the possibility that GDP growth will continue year-after-year in the 21st century seems very remote there are all sorts of constraints on that growth, not just cheap energy.

So this ongoing climate debate madness just doesn't matter, whether it comes from deniers or environmentalists. Why?
1. For humans, the economy is everything, trying to grow the economy is everything, regardless of the consequences of the expansion. This has become the purpose of life in the 21st century.
2. To expand human economies, you must increase energy consumption.
3. To increase energy consumption humans will have to burn more fossil fuels. But the question then becomes where is all that oil, natural gas and coal going to come from?

So go ahead, argue about climate change until you're blue in the face. It won't make any difference in the end.

579 - how does anyone know what the norm is.. and this reference..

"Warmth in the northern hemisphere is likely highest for 1300 years"

destroys your own case.

Its actually about 1,000 years as that's when the medieval warming period occured .. but whatever the date, why was it so warm back then? There were no factories generating CO2.. In fact it was part of a natural cycle.. temperatures also known to have peaked in Roman and Minoan times?

So how do we know we aren't in the warm part of another cycle? How can you separate natural warming from induced warming? Perhaps you should ask your sources those inconvenient questions.

Herbert Stencil,

It's amazing how easily you cast aside any impact of sea level rise on Tuvalu, particularly when according to Wikipedia there has been a general sea level rise of about 20cm during the last 100 years, and when we have seen recent documentary footage of farmland and houses on Tuvalu which have been reclaimed by the sea in only the last 20 years or so. More amazing still when we consider where the water from the receding sea-ice, glaciers and Antarctic ice-cap may have been going. Up in the sky perhaps?

AGW sceptics point to natural cycles and 'natural' phenomena (volcanic activity, earthquakes, tectonic plate shift, solar/cosmic radiation) being largely, if not almost totally, responsible for all recent reduction in Earth's ice cover volumes, virtually discounting any significant contribution from human activities, even from the massive burning of fossil fuels during these last 100 years.

Have the sceptics then identified any other possible influences on the Earth's 'natural' climate cycles, anything else influencing the Earth's 'natural' oscillation between ice-ages and inter-glacials?

May we surmise that we are, and for far longer than the past 100 years have been, in a relatively stable inter-glacial period. Further, might we recognise that there has been a relative absence of major ongoing 'natural' upheavals during this latter 100 year period. If we can accept the latter (which I expect will be difficult for some) then it appears more likely than not that some human activities will have contributed to a measure of the environmental change seen as being responsible for the observed ice-cover loss and sea-level rise.

Can it be logical then, that burning of fossil fuels, land clearing, civil construction, deforestation, and the metabolism and respiration of many billions of humans (and of their even immensely greater numbers of livestock), could not have contributed to a meaningful extent to these (and potentially other) observed environmental results of climate balance change?

If the latter is not accepted, then irrespective of the difficulties with and possible deficiencies in 'the science', we do indeed have a problem.

The warmth of the northern hemisphere in the past 50 years is likely the highest in the past 1,300 years.
We do indeed have a problem, and accelerating, The top 700 meters of ocean are warming, and this is causing more severe weather. The bad news is if we stop the supply of carbon into the atmosphere now, it is going to take 30 years before significant reversal takes place.
Best dig in, and put an extra nail in the roof.

Saltpetre. Like so many issues in the so-called climate "debate", there are conflicting views on each side of the argument. For my part, I take the advice of Nils Axel Morner - an accepted expert - rather than the IPCC crew, especially following the exposure of their militant advocacy rather than science in the Climategate e:mails.

Morner's views are summarised here: http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com/Articles_2011/Winter-2010/Morner.pdf

And lets say the IPCC crew are correct. Where do they show that rising anthropogenic CO2 is a certain cause of rising sea level? And even if they had shown that, what can possibly be done about it?

There is much flummery in this area of climate discussion, partly advanced by the aptly named Flannery.

Curmudgeon... You know your ENSO cycles..... What is so complicated about this known and well documented climatic event? What other 'unknown' factors are at play I wonder? Where does the Indian ocean Dipole effect fit?.. Solar activity? ... Perhaps governance issues could explain the impact of famine on 'poor people'... The level of both innocence and ignorance evidenced in Clanceys well written and constructed piece is disheartening.
Don Aitkin hits the mark with observation regarding access to energy and power for those in the developing countries, as does observations by Herbert Stencil..
579?... Oh dear, do not know where to begin.....

Bad luck, Clancy, but as in every other aspect of the AGW scam, the science is against you.

New Scientist published a study last year, which forestalls the rubbish you write in this article.

“AGAINST all the odds, a number of shape-shifting islands in the middle of the Pacific Ocean are standing up to the effects of climate change.

For years, people have warned that the smallest nations on the planet - island states that barely rise out of the ocean - face being wiped off the map by rising sea levels.

Now the first analysis of the data broadly suggests the opposite: most have remained stable over the last 60 years, while some have even grown”.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20627633.700-shapeshifting-islands-defy-sealevel-rise.html

Apart from that, the sea levels are not rising, despite the greenies attempt to disguise the fact by ripping out an old tree, comparison with a photo of which, taken 50 years ago, showed that there had been no sea level rise.

I know you had to have the article published in time for the upcoming hot air AGW lie fest in Durban, but why inflict it on OLO? Nothing can give your article respectability, it is too obviously false.

How stupid does it make the Tuvalu Council look when they held a pretend underwater meeting to draw attention to the sea level rise which never happened.

Your article is deficient in facts as well as science, so you should not present your work as non fiction. It might make the grade in "tall stories".

Sea level is rising at 3.27 mm / yr
co2 concentrations highest in 650,000 yrs
co2 391 parts / mill
1.5 f temp rise since 1880
Global temp 2,000 to 2,009 warmest on record
Greenland ice loss doubled between 1996 to 2005 100 bil tons / yr
arctic ice decrease 11.5 % last decade.
NASA

Leo Lane and curmudgeon, could you please spell it out for poor 579 pleeeeez!
Perhaps he/she could get beyond 1970's science? Even 'Real Climate' blog, the voice of CRU at UEA has acknowledged discrepancies in 579's submission. Love your passion tho 579! Is there somehere you could redirect it I wonder.... Like maybe the repeal of legislation requiring the mandatory biofuel quota using corn and other protein producing broad acre cropping in third world countries?

Prompete - quite right..

579 - you keep on destroying your own case. You cite an increase in sea levels of 3.1 mm a year.. quite right.. been about the same for nearly 20 years on the satellite measurements. You do realise that works out an increase of just 0.31 metres over a century or around a foot in the old Imperial measure?

Sure temperatures have increased recently - have you really cited farenheit to make the increase look bigger? - but you've left out the vital point that they haven't budged in the past 13 years or so, or for the vast majority of the time the IPCC has been screaming that they should be increasing..

You seem to think the figures are trivial. 1.5f is .9 c That .9 is enough for ice to melt like never before. That is where the rise in temperature is having its worst effect. The ice melt is increasing as that .9 c is evening out in arctic waters. Adverse weather is a consequence of that trivial .9 c rise in temp.
You forgot to add the co2 is at an all time high, hence the temp rise of late. Trivial figures where nature is concerned, are of gigantic consequences.

Over the past few months, I have been travelling on and off, in Europe and Asia. Also, briefly, in the USA.
I observed a - at least to me - curious thing.
The only two countries where I saw active debate on whether or not human induced climate change is real were the USA and here in Australia.
In Asia and Europe, it seemed to me that the debate all over the media was about how to fix it and what to do about fairness between developed and developing countries. I didn't hear or see any debate in the media about whether or not climate change is real or human induced, and when I asked, the response was mostly words to the effect, We've had that argument; we've moved on.
It seems to me that only here and in America, (of the countries I visited), was the debate still stuck at the - is it or isn't it real and human induced level.
The other thing I noticed was that in most of the other countries, (i.e. excluding Australia and the USA), although many of them didn't appear to be doing much yet, the national position, (whatever it was in a particular country), was a fairly bipartisan one
I admit that my observations were just that, and hardly a study of their literature, but nevertheless, the different levels of public discourse did seem striking.
It got me wondering if perhaps - at least to some extent - the level of debate here and in the USA is a reflection of the politicisation of the issue in these two countries.
Cheers,
Anthony
http://www.observationpoint.com.a

579... The avarege temperature in both arctic and antarctic regions is minus ... Um. How many degrees?... An increase of .9c will increase the temperature by.... Um how many degrees below zero?... What is the melting point of ice.....um.... Do the sums.... (I acknowledge being a little simplistic here).
CO2 'at an all time high?.. Gee, all that proxy data must be wrong! Perhaps you could let the IPCC know that they have had it wrong all this time and that you could correct them.. 579, mate, get up to speed here ok?.

"I acknowledge being a little simplistic here"

Yep

579
The science can speak for itself so don't put your own spin on it - that is the domain of the "sceptics".

579, every time I read your contributions I am reminded of a church choir.

Blind belief just doesn't cut it any more.

In case you haven't noticed the following is in the public domain: the Climategate scam has been exposed in all its venal ugliness - twice now; the hockey stick was a fraud; the IPCC has been exposed as a playground for activists - correction, incompetent activists - who masqueraded as "lead authors"; sea level rise is either non-existent or inconsequential; the earth hasn't warmed in more than a decade.

KenH
You obviously read things out of context too - twice now and nothing new.

>>Australia needs to be proactive in tackling climate change at the UN Climate Summit.>>

No it doesn't.

To think Australia can "punch above its weight" on this matter is to have ideas above one's station in life. No serious decision maker is interested in anything Australia does in this matter.

Get real.

Clancy, if you were not so misinformed and you were really serious about acting in the national interest, you would call for:
. an Australian boycott of the Durban climate conference;
. the carbon tax legislation to be rescinded immediately;
. abolition of the climate change department and all its hangers-on , which help Wayne Swan plug his budget great hole.

We have stopped believing in the AGW rubbish.It is just another derivative scam.The boss of the NAB wants it and so does Wall St.

I suppose some of you must have noticed some clown, a professor I think, making a fool of himself, & the MSM on TV tonight.

Apparently this global warming, which even the IPCC has now admitted will not occur in the next 3 decades, is going to make us all sick, by next week too, I think it was.

We even got a rerun of the mosquito scare again. The fool things have been watching the ABC, & think it is hot apparently.

They really are getting desperate. We may have that silly red head trying to take the lead on something, it appears our academics have not yet heard that the global warming thing is over, so are trailing everyone.

I wonder how long they will be saber rattling, after the rest of the world has moved on?

The author says that fish stocks are worst ever. Crap! The fishing up in north QLD is the best it's been for ten years, thanks to the floods.

Poor countries need help! Yep, they sure do.

They need help to STOP BREEDING!

This mentality, even her at home, of " have your kids cause someone else will pay for them, is th main problem.

If you can't afford them, don't have them.

Two problems will be solved, less strain on welfare and a reduction in population.

Food shortage is a major problem as we are fighting a growing population and bio fuel production.

Tax, tax, tax.

When are people going to realize that the big polluters are only polluting to service the demands of the people.

As for wanting to raise taxes for climate change funds, good luck. Most other countries are fighting just to put food on the table. We would be no different if not for our mines.

Australia is the only one stupid enough to think we can save the planet and hope and pray that others follow.

They may do if we pay the bill.
As for a transaction tax, this should be a given, but not just to tackle climate change.

Best dig in, and put an extra nail in the roof

579, smartest idea yet. Lern to deal with it,.cause unless we want to go back to the stone age, we have little choice.

The skeptics were happy talking among themselves until some competition came along. The well ran dry.
If you do not believe NASA you have no hope, Their info is credible. You rather believe a heap of rerun emails, 3 days before a un meeting.
Where these emails supposed originated from, say there has been no intrusion. They did not even make the news, just the front page of utube.

Bonmot. Your responce to my 'admit to being a little simplistic'. - "yep"... Pithy and accurate. Liked that, verbosity can be as tiresome as overly prolix (Kim Beasly). Let the science decide. But surely a degree of scepticism (as opposed to 'denial) is a whorthwhile position?
Cheers.

"surely a degree of scepticism (as opposed to 'denial') is a whorthwhile position?"

Real scepticism (as opposed to fake scepticism) - I agree absolutely.
Sadly Prompete, real scepticism is sadly lacking here.

bonmot, the first 1000 emails were damning enough, but the fraud backers complained that they were taken out of context. The current 5000 emails give all the context anyone could want.

I presume that your truncated and unclear post replying to Ken is an attempt to sneak in some support for the Climategate miscreants.

Forbes has a nice article on the situation. This is an extract:

“As if the first round of e-mails purloined from the U.K.’s East Anglia University Climate Research Unit (CRU) network weren’t damning enough, the new batch of about 5,000 more obtained through an anonymous source identified as “FOIA” are truly stunning.

Many clearly confirm that top IPCC scientists consciously misrepresented and actively withheld important information…then attempted to prevent discovery.

Included are CRU’s Director of Research, Phil Jones, the U.S. National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) climate’s analysis section head, Kevin Trenberth; and beleaguered Penn State University “hockey stick” originator, Michael Mann.

….the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is an organized conspiracy dedicated to tricking the world into believing that global warming is a crisis that requires a drastic response.”

http://www.forbes.com/sites/larrybell/2011/11/29/climategate-ii-more-smoking-guns-from-the-global-warming-establishment/

You will not win any supporters for the AGW fraud, bonmot. You and your like are a dwindling and weak anomaly, now that people have access to the truth.

Leo Lane,

Given the inherent and extraordinary complexity of climate science, it is not surprising that those involved would become frustrated at the failure of their models and investigation to confirm the hypothesis that a superabundance of atmospheric greenhouse gases, plus increased planetary heat absorption capacity due to land clearing, deforestation, civil construction, etc, should logically cause increased heat retention, and therefore general climatic warming. Hence, it is also not surprising that emminent scientists would not wish to reveal their failure. However, the failure of the science, of the measurements and models does Not automatically disprove the hypothesis, but rather that more research, and improved models taking more accurate and comprehensive account of all the significant variables needs to be perfected. Not bludged, but improved.

No-one wants 'drastic' action, but responsible caution. Macro weather patterns have changed - but whether part of a natural cycle or possibly stimulated or exacerbated by human activity, remains in question. Ignoring changing phenomena is not a particularly wise or sober course, particularly when the stakes are arguably rather high, and potentially life-altering.

Saltpetre: If you're arguing for more research into the relative importance of anthropogenic and 'natural' factors in effecting climate, then I'm with you.

But isn't the problem that governments, responding to what 'some scientists' say, have decided that they already know what the problem is, and are now dealing with it? It seems to me that the carbon tax is almost certainly going to be ineffective at any level in dealing with greenhouse gas emissions, will reduce productivity, and serve only to deliver the Government's promise to Bob Brown. And we don't even know whether any increase in temperature will be good or bad for us.

How is the public good advanced?

I love carbon.It is the basic building block of all life on the planet and the source of energy which has enabled our present freedoms.Carbon also makes beautiful diamonds to wear and for industry.Carbon fibre has revolutionised our entire lives.

CO2 is a plant food and historically raises in concentartions 800 yrs after temp increases.It is temp increases which makes the earth and oceans release CO2,not the reverse.

CO2 is a minor warming gas.H2O has a far larger influence.We have been sold an enormous lie.It is time to expose it and shut down the lying bureaucracy/cleptocracy which succors breath from it.

I would just like to be clear about what is being suggested in these recent posts.
Am I to understand that what is being asserted is that, NASA, the Academies of science of the world's leading nations, most of the world's meterological bureaus, most of the leading universities, the meteorological researchers of most of the industrialised nation's, the world;s largest militaries, including the US Joint Chiefs of Staff who are actively preparing for global warming consequences, that all these organisations are either
a. part of a global conspiracy designed to deceive us; or
b. Incompetent
Is that what is being suggested? It does rather sound like it.
And that, moreover, this grand nefarious scheme, (or the biggest stuff up in human history, it has to be one of the other), has however, failed to deceive the brilliant minds contributing to this thread.
Don't you think, I'm just suggesting and with the greatest of respect to all, but don't you think that to swallow either of these hypothesese is rather a big ask?
Just sayin'
Cheers,
Anthony
http://www.observationpoint.com.au

Anthonyve

Strange as it may seem, there is an UN political organisation that has influenced the ones you mention, to believe in anthropogenic global warming. It has a scientific working group that has been known to draft its advisory report conclusions to comply with the political message that the political lead group delivered to the Conference of Parties.

The climate computer models that this UN organisation uses to project alarmist climate outcomes, are invalid, as they fail to represent the complexity of natural climate behaviour.

It is surprising that after 20 years of supposed research, the strongest endorsement that the organisation can give, is the assertion: "Most of the observed increase in globally averaged temperature since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations."

Given the above clues, you should be able to deduce the name of the organisation at your first attempt.

Don Aitkin,

"Saltpetre: If you're arguing for more research into the relative importance of anthropogenic and 'natural' factors in effecting climate, then I'm with you."

Yes I am. It would be in no-one's interest to leave these questions unanswered, especially considering the resources already expended in this quest, the knowledge already acquired, and the potential impacts of inappropriate action. Of course, the science is obviously extremely complex, and it is possible that a global practical experiment may ultimately be required to provide the necessary proof - and by that I mean a concerted effort over a limited period to reduce or capture greenhouse emissions, whilst using every recording device imaginable to record the results. An international compact for a limited period, in the ultimate interest of all of humanity. Possible? We won't know unless we try. The polar bears, ice caps and coral reefs will be waiting.

Of course there will be many naysayers, but they too can only benefit from puting this one to bed once and for all.

As for the carbon tax, I agree with you, Don, but I consider it primarily a socialist agenda wealth re-distribution mechanism, in guise of action to invest in alternatives development, whilst also appeasing the Greens as part of the strategy to retain power.

Arjay,

You have it wrong - although an increase in mean ocean temperature will decrease the concentration of dissolved CO2 at surface level, the higher partial pressure of CO2 in the atmosphere due to emissions means that more CO2 is dissolved in the first place, much of which will remain captured at lower ocean depths, in solution and as carbonic acid. This increased CO2 concentration increases ocean acidity due to the carbonic acid produced, thereby having impact on all calcium carbonate employing life in the ocean, such as crustaceans (including krill), corals, shellfish, even cuttle-fish cephalopods, and who knows what else. A Wikipedia article on Ocean Acidification reports a 28.8% increase in ocean acidification since pre-industrial times.

Anthonyve,

You put forward a helluva good argument, and I'm with you.

Hi Raycom,
Sorry, your confidence is sadly misplaced as I'm unable to figure out what organisation you're referring to.
If you are referring to the UN or a UN body, then I have another question.
How can it be, when the US despises the UN and regularly fails to pay its UN dues, that the UN could influence the US Joint Chiefs to cooperate with their scam?
That, on the face of it would be impossible.
So, if it cannot be the UN you're referring to, then I'm at a loss.
Sorry to be so obtuse.
Cheers,
Anthony
http://www.observationpoint.com.au

Anthonyve

Your response is surprising. Surely, you would have heard of the IPCC, which is the abbreviation for Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Hi Raycom,
Okay, got it.
I discounted IPCC as I understood it to be a UN body and therefore hardly likely to be in a position to influence many key bodies who support AGW, especially, as I mentioned earlier the US Joint Chiefs, who are taking AGW very seriously, even though COngress is not.
I have no doubt that the US, and other militaries use IPCC data and are in regular close communication with panel members.
In any case, that the IPCC could either scam, trick or coerse these other bodies into participating in a global deceipt, I would say is impossible.
I give particular credence to what the US military is doing because they are going ahead and planning for resource driven conflicts as a result of Global Warming even though Congress hardly acknowledges that it is happening.
Also, the US military is beginning to come under tighter budgetary constraints than has been the case over the past couple of decades yet is still spending vast amounts on anti global warming technologies.
So, they seem to take it pretty seriously, even if their government does not.
Okay, as a twenty year veteran I admit to being biased, but I tend to trust generals more than I trust politicians.
Cheers,
Anthony
http://www.observationpoint.com.au

The IPCC gets info from NASA, So go straight to the butcher instead of listening to the block. Climate nasa.gov/evidence. IPCC put in additions that they think they read. NASA puts it in silly mans language. Climate change is real and ongoing, and gaining pace like never before. Skeptics trivialize saying .9c degree rise won't do any thing. well it has as we can see in arctic ice melt. And gaining pace. Carbon particles is the culprit, coal and oil.

HI 579,
I am in complete agreement.
Just looking at the reduction in polar ice caps this past summer is enough to be convincing to say nothing of the acidification going on in our oceans.
What I'm trying to understand is how this huge conspiracy that many of these comments refer to is supposed to work.
Raycom and others appear to be positing that just about every scientific body along with all of the world's meteorlogical establishments along with NASA and most of the world's militaries including the US Joint Chiefs have either gotten together to trick us mere mortals or they're all incompetent.
It seems to me to be frankly an absurd proposition but these folk evidently are thoroughly convinced.
To suggest that all these people and organisations are incompetent is inconceivable, so I would just like to know how they think a conspiracy like that could be organised.
And, even more difficult, how is being kept a secret.
Cheers,
Anthony
http://www.observationpoint.com.au

Anthonyve:

I am not one of the conspiracy-mongers you refer to, and I know no-one of any consequence who is. It is all much more complicated than that. There is so much odd stuff in what you say (let alone 529) that I all I can suggest is that you visit a website like 'Climate etc.' which has received several million visits since it was set up fifteen months ago. There are three or four new threads each week, and it offers a continuing seminar in the science and politics of 'climate change'. Warmists and sceptics debate with each other there, and the standard is often very high. Sometimes it is not, I would have to agree, and you encounter the kind of name-calling that too often goes on here. But give it a go. I have learned a great deal from going there. It is balanced and generally polite.

579: ´Climate change is real and ongoing, and gaining pace like never before."

Climate change is indeed real, as it is a natural process that has been going on since Earth's beginning. On the other hand, climate alarmists assert that climate change is driven predominantly by anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions, especially CO2 emissions, as these emissions have been rising steadily for some 50 years. Yet, try as they might, they have not been able to detect and measure with much confidence the climate variability , if any, attributed to anthropogenic causes.

Don Aitkin's suggested reference to Climate Etc. is very timely, as it has an 18th November 2011 post by Judith Curry on the just- released IPCC Special Report on Extreme Events. See:

http://judithcurry.com/2011/11/18/ipcc-special-report-on-extreme-events/

Not surprisingly, the report reluctantly admits that not much confidence can be placed on projections produced with climate models that the IPCC uses.

Anthonyve: "that the IPCC could either scam, trick or coerse these other bodies into participating in a global deceipt, I would say is impossible".

The IPCC was set up circa 1988 to "assess the scientific, technical and socio-economic information relevant for the understanding of the risk of human-induced climate change". Climate alarmists, including the organisations you refer to, unquestionably accept the IPCC reports. So much so, that it is not politically correct to do otherwise

Follow the money trail.Who creates all the money for the US and our economies to function? The US federal reserve (privet banks)+ the commercial banks.Who funds the UN? Mostly the US Tax payer and member countries. Who funds the IPCC ? The UN.Who controls our Govts? The banking system which creates from nothing the money to equal increases in GDP + inflation.Corporates rule the planet and they buy the science to suit their agenda.

I'm laughing with the typo, Arjay, not at it…

Do those privet banks control the hedge fund's?

Hi Arjay,
I hate to spoil a theory with facts, but the US Congress, and a large part of the US population despises the UN.
The US is forever behind on paying its dues to the UN and is always looking for reasons not to.
So, to say that the US taxpayer funds the UN is just plain wrong.
Cheers,
Anthony
http://www.observationpoint.com.au

AnthonyV,

I hate to spoil your grandstanding but on this issue Arjay is--just plain right.

The US contributes 22% of the UN budget (see chart, midway down).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations

And that is before we factor in the donated land & buildings which form its HQ
http://www.aviewoncities.com/nyc/unitednations.htm

And frankly, if I were contributing that much to an organization with a track record like the UN, I'd be wanting to withhold my money too!

Raycom I do not go by IPCC i go by NASA, Co2 in the atmosphere is at an all time high, it has been rising since 1950 and has not deviated in its upward spiral. The level is 380 parts / million in 1950 it was 280 parts / million. Nasa has all the measuring gear and the appropriate scientists, i would not know what others say. NASA says the highest level for 650,000 years.

Absolute rubbish by someone who relies on the gullible public - and its purse - to subsidise his very existence.

Trash like this makes me fear for Australia's future.