If this is the standard of scientific enquiry in this country, we should all be concerned. Global warming is occuring - trust us. We had more storms this year than in the 50's...blah blah.

Other gems of note "What is causing climate to change? The answer, in large part, is us. Most of the global warming of the past 50 years is due to human activities. "

This begs the question - what is causing global warming in small part that IS NOT US?

Even before the Industrial revolution, thriving societies, Carthage springs to mind, were destroyed by the effects now attributed to global warming. 6000 years ago, much of Northern England was heavily forested, but global warminging has changed the landscape and reduced the forestation in that part of the world.

Perhaps the question the CSIRO (wasn't there a scandal about them talking about this in public not long ago?) should be raising is why is the earth so cold during this period. 20 Million years ago, Antarctica was covered in vegetation (http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200607/s1685513.htm), and it's movement has been minimal. For carbon to be deposited in oil and coal it must at one time been free.

There is more to this than we are being told.

I'm in two minds about global warming - not that its occurring of course, but whether it is such a bad thing. Great climate fluctuations in the past have casued the extinction and rise of species and perhaps this is just more of the same. If it is being caused by us (and our plague-like numbers) then perhaps it is time the eath became far less hospitable to the human race, which may go down in the fossil record as one of the most short-lived and destructive species to have inhabited our planet.

It is impossible to educate people who are already convinced they know it all. Economic fundamentalists and their well rewarded apologists will continue to resurrect long dead red herrings (see Narcisist, Bob Carter, IPA etc), and with fat-arsed Australia continuing to vote for Thatcher-lite its obvious who they choose to believe.

The immortal faith that progressives have in reason and dialogue is just another rationalisation for doing sweet f. all as they too benefit from wars for oil and sh*tting all over the future. Relax, you're soaking in it.

I don’t think were ever going to be wiped out, short of a complete global catastrophe which wipes out all life on this planet (except for maybe the cockroaches and bacteria).

There is evidence to suggest that yes, we are causing global warming, and that yes, it is a bad thing. However, there is also evidence to the contrary, suggesting that the earth has fluctuations in its mean temperature and that the temperature rises and falls like the tides.

We are about 10,000 years over due for another ice age, which ironically will be one of the first major noticeable effects of global warming (since the gulf stream will stop, thus warm waters from the tropics / equatorial regions will cease to warm the north Atlantic)... so this could in fact be evidence that we have minimal effect on the planet as a whole.

Should we cut down on our carbon emissions? Of course we should.
Should we stop using so much fossil fuel? yes.
Do these factors contribute to the rise of global temperatures? There isn’t enough evidence either way to make assumptions

Paul,
We have the technology we know what should be done, the only thing lacking is the political will.

Well, on the lighter side, if we have global warming - how come it's so darned cold today!
Seriously, the world is now overpopulated. We all pollute- just by being here. We all need to realise that, and stop further increases (wordwide!) before the whole world is living in poverty - then what use was all that 'economic growth', or all those statistics mentioned in the article above!
An example is farming marginal land in Australia, such as the Mallee. Fantastic returns for a few years, but it couldn't be sustained.

“Numerous species of plants and animals have moved towards the poles, or to higher altitudes …” Why? “to escape the heat”, as claimed? Or to take advantage of the new opportunities afforded to them? Migration to more favourable environments is a viable alternative to adapting to change in situ. Climate change is an opportunity as well as a threat. It is also a planetary constant, a given throughout the earth’s life, granted that there is a strong case (still with many unresolved uncertainties) that human activity has accelerated warming in recent times.

Yep, rightio, its all good. I have no real problem with this article. Climate change is definitely happening and we need to both do something about it and be prepared for the changes that will happen even if we do our utmost to prevent it.

Yes there are lots of significant ways to reduce GHG emissions in order to limit climate change. But here in Oz there really is scant motivation for doing so, what with the scale of emissions in the US and China. We also have rapid population growth, which serves to greatly dilute any efforts we may make towards reducing our share – something that Paul Holper didn’t mention.

However, we have a huge motivation for reducing liquid fossil fuel consumption and developing alternatives due to the looming peak oil crisis. This is where the efforts of people like Paul should be directed, as this issue is vastly more important and immediate than climate change….and encompasses most of the same subissues.

The climate change issue is likely to very largely be dealt with by the looming peak oil issue, or at least dealt to a level of significance greater than we could collectively manage by way of improved efficiencies worldwide. GHG emissions will fall, and a progressively larger share of those emissions will be from renewable sources that don’t lead to a net GHG increase in the atmosphere. There will still be coal, and increasing per-capita consumption in China and perhaps India, and there will still be a continuously increasing number of consumers overall, but all considered, climate change will be dealt a severe blow.

So I don’t think we should be worrying too much about it climate change. What we need to concentrate on is peak oil, which is much more immediate and has much more power to severely disrupt our society in Australia, and most oil-dependent societies around the world.

I'd like to respond to Candide, who made a most interesting point:

She said: "If [Global Warming] is being caused by us (and our plague-like numbers) then perhaps it is time the earth became far less hospitable to the human race, which may go down in the fossil record as one of the most short-lived and destructive species to have inhabited our planet."

Gulp!

In the ultimate rationalisation, we either live sustainably or we do not.
(ie we do not live).

Narcissist "There is more to this than we are being told" - a conspiracy perhaps? More like a loss of faith in the incomplete science surrounding global warming. Trends measured over decades ain't going to convince people accustomed to getting their answers on demand. Got a dissenting point of view? You can rely on our vast ignorance every time. There is little scientific doubt climate change is taking place; most debate now is along the lines of "It wasn't me I'm not listening la la la la la la la"

There are many with vested interests in the status quo, and doubt is easy to manufacture. What was it Dick Cheney said after his inauguration? Ah, yes. Conservation of the natural environment was 'a quaint idea.' Candide has a point - "perhaps it is time the eath became far less hospitable to the human race". Should it come to that? Not a pleasant thought but how else to rein in our incredibly wasteful lifestyles?

Candide
Maybe the planet would be better off without humans,I am sure a lot of other life forms will survive after we are gone.

We may have the distinction of being the first species known to have have been given the option of surviving and not exercised that option.

I seem to agree with "CANDIDE"; Who said "If it is being caused by us (and our plague-like numbers) then perhaps it is time the earth became far less hospitable to the human race, which may go down in the fossil record as one of the most short-lived and destructive species to have inhabited our planet".
.
So, If there weren't so many of us, then the pollution "We" have caused wouldn't be enough to cause "Global Warming", etc.
.
We either have to cease, or restrict, polluting; or cut our numbers - maybe a combination of both?
.
A lady, (well a female), last week on Calback Radio stated "We (her family) can afford to have a large family, so why shouldn't we?"

Answer - because we (Humanity) CANT AFFORD IT!

Cheers all.

Biofuel-people need-to-understand that biofuels-don't-have the-Power-density-or-online-Capacity to avoid-PEAK-OIL-world-population-collapses. We HAVE to use the US High tech coal approach for this reason and also because we must be in line with US-industrial-strategy-to-SURVIVE-the-next-difficult-10-years.

As-for-the-politics, the point of voting OUT Iemma's-NSW-Italian-Labor and Howard's coalition of "root-out-the-Aussie-deadwood-with-laser-focused-inmmigration-into-SYDSEQ", is to FIND the other choices. You won't find them by sitting-on-bums, complaining-and-ultimately-being-handed-your 'notice-to-quit-life' letter complete with white-feathers. And if the next lot are no good then vote them out. This is why Costello should be given a go NOW. The more we change corrupted and lazy politicians the harder they'll think about the workplace-immigration-monopoly crimes they are perpetrating-on-average-Australians in the false name of "future-prosperity". They will then realise we KNOW Australia is-already-LOCKED-INTO-a-very-wealthy-MINERALS-future. It's not their bloody secret. In-the-meantime we no longer want to-be-subjugated-into-submission-by-corrupt-half-witted-politicians seuling ethnic-developers (minorities-might-add) with big dollars onto us . They build over our rights, privileges and quiet enjoyment of our major cities, while taking future-wealth off us like-lollies-from-a-baby and sucking-their-thumbs-in-victory to-prove-it. Wake up Australia it's OBVIOUS what's goin' on. If we stop development in SYDSEQ, immigration will cease and Westfields, Macbank and PBL will find other places to make obscene profits and other peoples to cheat out of their heritage.

After a 10 year hiatus from immigration I am sure we will be strong enopugh again to cope with further developments. We all want to be the New York of the Pacific in SYDSEQ, but on OUR TERMS, on a timeline that puts profits out of the reach of specific individuals. We must refuse to dance into oblivion to the turn of some fat overpaid executive's wet dreams. and the same argument applies to Australia as a republic. The longer the transition time the less the motib=vation for opportunism, corruption and injustice.

March 7, vote for Debenham and let HIM know WE want development halted in SYDNEY and our portion of SEQ - the NSW-Nth-Coast. If not, let-him-know-he's-out-as-well.

And anyone who thinks this approach is infantile-or-regressive needs to understand, we'll only get one chance from here. The STAKES ARE SO INCREDIBLY HIGH.

OOPS, I got the wrong forum thread with that previous post!

Global Warming and EDUCATION - indeed!

The 2006 US hurricane season has been unusually Quiet.
The amount of heat built up in the tropical west Atlantic at May this year promised a season of hurricanes in excess of the 2005 record buster.

The reason for this is in some interventions I believe are taking place with wastewater management programs around the Gulf of Mexico, the US east coast and the Caribbean.

I will have more to say on this matter in early September when, if I am correct, the US will have had zero 2006 season hurricanes.

Suffice it to say that this eventuality will be the death knell for the Global Warming and CO2 Greenhouse Gas debate.

IOW, if Climate Change CAN in fact be halted by human intervention then Greenhouse Warming can clearly not be a causal factor.

Till September!

The basis of the IPCC’s claims on global warming is work by Dr Michael Mann, a paleoclimatologist. This work has been investigated by an expert group of statisticians led by leading US statistician Edward Wegman. The Wegman Report finds that “Dr Mann’s assessments that the decade of the 1990s was the hottest decade of the millennium and that 1988 was the hottest year of the millennium cannot be supported by his analysis.” The group found that Mann et al had misused statistics, and in producing a “hockey stick” graph showing rapid warming after a long period of stable temperatures removed the cycle of the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age from the record.

The group found that the Mann work reflected a small group of like-minded people who circulated and per reviewed work amongst themselves, with a “paucity of data”. The Report “calls into question” the independence of peer-review and temperature reconstructions. It found that although the researchers rely heavily on statistical methods, they do not interact with the statistical community.

I haven’t yet read the full report, but a fact sheet includes further serious criticisms of the validity of the work used by the IPCC. You might recall also that the IPCC’s climate change scenarios are all based on economic modelling which has been totally discredited by the statistics and economics communities, which were not consulted. Do I detect a pattern here?

Sorry, I don’t have the links at the moment, Google “wegman report”.

A new ABARE report also casts doubt on the alleged nature of climate change and the IPCC’s warming scenarios (www.abare.gov.au).

Global warming is happening – it is 0.17 degrees centigrade/decade at most and on a falling trend since 1998.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/a/af/Short_Instrumental_Temperature_Record.png

The Earth’s climate system is highly nonlinear: inputs and outputs are not proportional, change is often episodic and abrupt, rather than slow and gradual, and multiple equilibria are the norm. While this is widely accepted, there is a relatively poor understanding of the different types of nonlinearities, how they manifest under various conditions, and whether they reflect a climate system driven by astronomical forcings, by internal feedbacks, or by a combination of both." (Rial, J. et. al., Nonlinearities, feedbacks and critical thresholds within the Earth's climate system/, Climatic Change /65: 11–38, 2004.)

It is a fact that global temperatures have been down in every year since their peak in 1998. This may be a temporary reprieve over a short term, but it is at least consistent with a cool phase of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation. “The Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) is a long-term ocean fluctuation of the Pacific Ocean. The PDO waxes and wanes approximately every 20 to 30 years. From TOPEX/Poseidon data, together with other oceans and atmospheres data, scientists think we have just entered the 'cool' phase. The 'cool' phase is characterised by a cool wedge of lower than normal sea-surface heights/ocean temperatures in the eastern equatorial Pacific and a warm horseshoe pattern of higher than normal sea-surface heights connecting the north, west and southern Pacific.” (NASA/JPL http://www.earthscape.org/t1/pdo01/) Although there is some thinking that global warming intensified the PDO over the past century, there is no convincing explanation for the phenomenon itself.

A cool phase of the PDO results in a pattern of persistent La Nina events over a couple of decades and, consequently, lower global temperatures. In Australia, the cool phase of a PDO leads to warmer winters, more storms, more cyclones and much more summer rainfall.

Work done in Australia on secular rainfall regimes over nearly a century suggests an increase in summer rainfall of up to 65% in the next few decades.

Clobal warming is happening. It is 0.17 degrees centrigrade per decade and the trend is approximately linear.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instrumental_temperature_record

At least some of this warming is due to other factors of which little is understood.

"The Earth’s climate system is highly nonlinear: inputs and outputs are not proportional, change is often episodic and abrupt, rather than slow and gradual, and multiple equilibria are the norm. While this is widely accepted, there is a relatively poor understanding of the different types of nonlinearities, how they manifest under various conditions, and whether they reflect a climate system driven by astronomical forcings, by internal feedbacks, or by a combination of both." (Rial, J. et. al., Nonlinearities, feedbacks and critical thresholds within the Earth's climate system/, Climatic Change /65: 11–38, 2004.)

It is a fact that global temperatures have been down in every year since their peak in 1998 consistent with a cool phase of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation.

“The Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) is a long-term ocean fluctuation of the Pacific Ocean. The PDO waxes and wanes approximately every 20 to 30 years. From TOPEX/Poseidon data, together with other oceans and atmospheres data, scientists think we have just entered the 'cool' phase. The 'cool' phase is characterised by a cool wedge of lower than normal sea-surface heights/ocean temperatures in the eastern equatorial Pacific and a warm horseshoe pattern of higher than normal sea-surface heights connecting the north, west and southern Pacific.

(NASA/JPL http://www.earthscape.org/t1/pdo01/).

A cool phase of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation results in a pattern of persistent La Nina events over a couple of decades and, consequently, lower global temperatures. In Australia, the cool phase of a PDO leads to warmer winters, more storms, more cyclones and much more summer rainfall.

Even a small decrease in global productivity has the potential to result in very much harder lives for billions of people. It is a high price to pay if the extreme amd imminent catastrophic claims of climate change do not eventuaute. The very promising technological route seems a much more humane path to the future of the human race.

I agree with the author, and i do not wish to demean his knowledge and observations.
I am coming from a less lofty position, ie,. grass roots level.
It is hightime that Local Government got involved in addressing the problem of global warning, by encouraging householders, and the making of new building regulations, for change.
Many Australians seem to have a fear of "poo", even though we produce it, and decades ago when sedimintation tanks were used for sewerage processing, resulting in sanitization, and the dispersel of the finished product into creeks and rivers, people were not alarmed and did not suffer from poor health.
A positive way to save bad energy and save water at the same time, would be for all houses to have compost toilets, i know there may be an outbreak of miasma fear, but people had no fear when dunny cans were used.
Many people do building additions, and a compost toilet would not require much space or cost, and grey water recycling could also be incorporated, in the system, as well many other additions, such as drip watering irrigation of the garden.
I realise that there would be fear coming from the water corporates, but no fear of poo from the consumers