The Thermohaline and the Bay of Bengal Island

The BBC reports (here and here) that research published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters has found no apparent long term slowing of the Gulf Stream. This may be one major dodged bullet; the Gulf Stream is essential to bringing heat north from the tropics and keeping Europe 4 - 6ᵒC warmer than it would otherwise be. The Gulf Stream is part of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation which itself is part of the global thermohaline system of currents.

On the other hand, and across Africa, the island known as New Moore Island to the Indians and South Talpatti Island to the Bangladeshis has now become nothing more than a hazard to navigation. The island itself has slipped beneath the waves of a rising ocean. The School of Oceanographic Studies (Calcutta) says that satellite imagery shows that the entire island is under water. So on the plus side of the global climate chaos ledger, rising sea levels have removed one source of international friction.

Tiger and the decline of Canadian Journalism

Okay, someone explain this one to me.

I turn on the CTV nightly news and the lead story is Tiger Woods has decided to play golf. Not that he had won anything yet, you understand, but simply that he had shown up in public. I might even get this being an item on the sports news, but the nightly news news? Why is this news? Why is this an item that every Canadian urgently needs to know?

Then we are presented with a parade of experts (mostly other news media staffers -- remember when news reporters used to interview people other than themselves?) who pronounced that American had seen fit to forgive Tiger for his past indiscretions -- which then had to be detailed in case anyone in the country hadn't already heard them ad nausem, which is obviously redundant given that Canadians have to all know this story or why would any of us supposedly be interested enough in it for it to be the lead story? But having established once again that Tiger has been a bad boy, we get to hear that American has forgiven him.

Two things wrong here. First, since when is it up to America to forgive Tiger? Isn't that like his wife's prerogative? Come to that, what does any of his private life have to do with anyone? If it wasn't affecting his golf game, why should any of us -- even actual golf fans -- poke their noses into his family business?

Second and more sociologically significant, who says America has forgiven him? Was there a poll? Because a poll was not referenced here. Just a bunch of sound bites from Tiger's publicists. And it is this very news cast saying how America has forgiven him that gets the word out that it is time to forgive him.

I personally do not feel a couple of months qualifies as the statute of limitations on being an ass, but then I never thought this was my business in the first place. But it is fascinating to see the power of some publicist somewhere to get this wealthy ass a clean slate after only a couple of other months. Clearly the interests of the corporations who had invested in Tiger advertising, and Tiger's own financial interests, out weigh the interests of well, actual natural news reporting.

That this item made the news, let alone positioning as the lead story, seriously undermines the credibility of our national news outlets. This is a more important story than, say, the economic implications of the Canadian dollar reaching par with the American dollar? Clearly this is yet another example of appealing to lowest celebrity scandal-sheet style reporting to raise ratings rather than responsible reporting. That the non-story of this non-event -- a more blatant PR managed newsfeed I cannot imagine -- appeared on our news at all reveals a complete abdication of journalistic responsibilities. Bloggers give more objective reporting and take PR handouts less blatantly than this. I am embarrassed for the stat of Canadian journalism.

The best we can hope for is that someone at CTV took a massive bribe, or thought to curry favor with the corporations that employ Tiger to advertise their products in hopes that some of those advertising dollars would come their way -- because if they were too stupid to figure out they were part of a managed PR exercise, then we are truly on our own....

Canada and the World

Even 20 months ago, no one knew what 350 meant, nor why it mattered. That's less than 2 years back. Then 10,000 year old ice sheets disappeared in the Arctic, Stephen Harper got a north of 60 hard-on, the IPCC released a report based on data that was already out of date (some of it a decade out of date), and a book detailing how James Hansen's work was censored came out. We shook our collective head, and some of us began to realize that we had entered what James Kunstler has called The Long Emergency.
It didn't take long to realize that 350 was the upper limit of atmospheric CO2 that could be considered "safe" (meaning that we might be able to keep global warming to 2°C and we might be able to live with the consequences of that rise), and here we are today looking at 390 ppm of carbon dioxide, no significant efforts being made to reduce carbon emissions, and a future that's looking at a minimum of 4°C warming and 6 metres of sea level rise--meanwhile emissions continue to increase and atmospheric CO2 rises at about 2ppm/year.
Here in Canada, we've got a Conservative government that is lead by a Prime Minister who still yet to convince anyone that he actually believes global warming may be a problem. Stephen "American Corporate Lackey" Harper is busy fiddling while the globe--including the nation of which he is nominally a member--burns. All our divorced-from-reality leader can see is the NorthWest Passage opening up and all that lovely ocean open to commercial exploitation.
Last week, the British Meteorological Office released a map of what we can expect to happen when we hit 4°C. The equatorial countries will get hotter, true, but the further you get from the equator, the more extreme the changes. But even now, Environment Minister Jim Prentice wants special treatment for Canada, allowing us--well, really just Alberta and the oil sands--to continue increasing our GHG emissions, while insisting that developing nations like China and India agree to hard caps that we ourselves will not accept. And the Canadian Government still refuses to release specifics of its plan to reduce our GHG emissions by 20% from our 2006 levels--which is light-years from our commitment under Kyoto.
Today comes the release of a new report. Quite unlike anything released in Canada before, it was financed by the Toronto Dominion Bank, produced by the Pembina Institute and the David Suzuki Foundation, with economic modeling by the well-respected economic consultants, M.K. Jaccard and Associates Inc. As John Ibbitson writes in the Globe and Mail; "A major bank has paid two environmental organizations to produce a groundbreaking report that, for the first time, calculates the costs of both the Harper government's modest plans to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions and the much more ambitious targets set by the environmental community, nationally and regionally."
The report offers a regional breakdown of economic impacts based on both the Harper government's vague commitment to 20% by 2020 (from 2006 levels) and  the impact from the deeper and harder cuts that environmentalists are calling for and that would put Canada in line with our international obligations. And guess what? Neither scenario would kill us!
According to the report,"The Conservative government's goal of reducing greenhouse-gas emissions by 20 per cent by 2020 can be achieved, but only by limiting growth in Alberta and Saskatchewan." Alberta's growth would be 8.5% less in 2020 than it would be under a BAU (Business As Usual) approach, the report concludes. Under the  same scenario, Saskatchewan would lose 2.8% of its projected growth. Central Canada, on the other hand, might well see some additional growth added to its projection. To quote Shawn McCarthy's article in the G&M; "Despite the steep costs involved in meeting targets, the analysis concludes the Canadian economy would continue to grow, albeit at a slower pace, and that investment in renewable energy and efficiency measures would result in an overall increase in employment compared to a “business-as-usual” scenario.
And even with the significant reduction in Alberta's potential growth and employment prospects, the province would still lead the country economically over the next 10 years."
So our economy would continue to grow AND there would probably be an increase in employment as well. And the cost? A reduction in projected growth an Alberta and Saskatchewan, and a significant out-migration from both provinces back to central Canada.
To further quote Shawn McCarthy's article: "TD's chief economist, Don Drummond, said the bank has not endorsed any targets, though it has supported a policy of a national emissions cap. He said the bank's interest was to shed light on an area where there has been little informed debate: the likely cost of imposing regulations."
I'm actually not seeing any real downside here. The Globe and Mail editorial board does though. In today's editorial, we read: "[T]he study acknowledges that what is proposed is no less than an economic upheaval: “There is a migration of capital and labour out of carbon and trade exposed sectors (e.g., fossil fuels) to sectors that are less carbon and trade exposed (e.g., manufacturing, services and renewable electricity).”
Canada cannot take its national unity for granted and must not, in the service of international obligations, allow itself to be immolated by a government policy of such wrenching dislocation." And the editorial concludes: "[T]he target [of carbon dioxide emission reduction] may be unreachable without unacceptable damage to Canada's economy and national unity. In which case, it is time for new targets, and new policies."
I can't help but think that no-one raised much of a stink about the "wrenching dislocation" caused by the development of the oil sands on the communities of Atlantic Canada. And even Jeffrey Simpson concludes that the Harper government's targets are just so much smoke being blown up our collective asses.
And so we have serious economic modelling of the potential and problems with trying to meet our international obligations regarding global warming and CO2 emissions. And we can now point to the report and say, "Tough, yes. But it won't kill us, and will probably make us stronger." And what of the complaints sure to come from the political and ruling classes of Alberta and Saskatchewan? Well, both provinces have had a great decade, with both provinces posting significant surpluses in their budgets, and neither has done a damn thing to prepare for the inevitable crash (particularly Alberta under Ralph Klein). For Alberta, that's two oil-based booms they've pissed away under Conservative governments. So honestly, I have no great sympathy for the Alberta government. And regardless of any future whining, we can look at the economic model contained in the M.K. Jaccard and Associates Inc. report, and read again the conclusion that "even with the significant reduction in Alberta's potential growth and employment prospects, the province would still lead the country economically over the next 10 years." And the planet (well, the human part of it) would thank us for facing up to our responsibilities.

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Copenhagen, Canada, and the End of the World

The Globe and Mail is reporting on an interview with Environment Minister Jim Prentice, saying that the chance of an agreement on climate change in Copenhagen is pretty much non-existent.
The world wants a climate change agreement in Copenhagen. The US is even onside, with President Obama actually understanding both the science and political realities of global warming. The EU wants an agreement, with Germany busy poaching Canadian alternative energy companies and the Brits launching the 10-10 campaign. China is even pursuing lower carbon emissions. So what's the problem?
The problem is the Canadian government. Canada has become the biggest roadblock to an international agreement to lower carbon emissions. According the the G&M article (23 October 2009, p A1 Ottawa dashes hope for treaty in Copenhagen) Canada is continuing to "insist that it should have a less aggressive target for emission reductions[...] because of its faster-growing population and energy-intensive industrial structure". The Harper government is also going to insist that any cap on industrial emissions will not be applied uniformly across the country, but will allow the Alberta oil sands to continue expanding. To quote the Environment Minister; "The Canadian approach has to reflect the diversity of the country and the sheer size of the country, and the very different economic characteristics and industrial structure across the country." The Harper government has also demanded that emerging economies (like China and India) agree to binding caps on carbon emissions, and has refused to release its own plan for carbon reduction until there is clarity on what the Americans are planning to do.
The New Democratic Party has a bill currently in committee that would commit Canada to an emission reduction of 25% from 1990 levels by 2020--a target that would meet our commitment under Kyoto and would be consistent with the EU's approach in the next round of negotiations. Ottawa has proposed a reduction of 20% from 2006 levels of emissions by 2020--our obligation under Kyoto was a cut of 6% from 1990 levels by 2012. The plan proposed by the Harper government would result in a 3% reduction from 1990 levels by 2020. Chief climate negotiator Michael Martin said to the committee considering the NDP bill that the Harper government's targets are "comparable" because they will be just as costly to achieve as the more aggressive NDP targets.
What becomes clear, as we follow the progress towards significant carbon emission reductions, is that the Harper government has no intention of ever reducing carbon emissions. Harper simply does not consider carbon emissions to be a problem (how can I say that? By simply looking at his record).
And our Prime Minister is dragging a lot of sceptics along with him. World-wide, temperatures maxed out in 1998, leading deniers to claim that temperatures have levelled off or are even declining. But new research to be published in Geophysical Research Letters, was carried out by Judith Lean, of the US Naval Research Laboratory, and David Rind, of Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies. The research, "is the first to assess the combined impact on global temperature of four factors: human influences such as CO₂ and aerosol emissions; heating from the sun; volcanic activity and the El Niño southern oscillation, the phenomenon by which the Pacific Ocean flips between warmer and cooler states every few years.

The analysis shows the relative stability in global temperatures in the last seven years is explained primarily by the decline in incoming sunlight associated with the downward phase of the 11-year solar cycle, together with a lack of strong El Niño events. These trends have masked the warming caused by CO₂ and other greenhouse gases.

As solar activity picks up again in the coming years, the research suggests, temperatures will shoot up at 150% of the rate predicted by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Lean and Rind's research also sheds light on the extreme average temperature in 1998. The paper confirms that the temperature spike that year was caused primarily by a very strong El Niño episode. A future episode could be expected to create a spike of equivalent magnitude on top of an even higher baseline, thus shattering the 1998 record.

The study comes within days of announcements from climatologists that the world is entering a new El Niño warm spell. This suggests that temperature rises in the next year could be even more marked than Lean and Rind's paper suggests." (The Guardian Online).

The British Meteorological Office released a new map of the world (below) showing the current thinking on what the world will look like with a 4°C rise in the average global temperature. The 4°C rise mostly happens at the equator--the further you move away from the equator, the greater the changes. Here on Vancouver Island, we may only see an average 5°C rise, but up in Hudson's Bay, its looking more like 16°C. What this doesn't indicate is just how this will affect global weather patterns. If it was just going to get warmer, that wouldn't be the end of the world.But all that extra energy is going to change things in ways we can't imagine yet, much less model.

The Met Office says that climate researchers have discovered that:

• levels of CO2 have risen 40% since the Industrial Revolution
• Global sea levels have risen 10cm in the last 50 years [and that's a hell of a lot of water]
• temperatures in the Arctic have risen at twice the global average [which suits our Prime Minister just fine]
• snow cover in the northern hemisphere has dropped 5% in the last 2 decades

And researchers figure that extreme temperatures will affect eastern North America, with Toronto and Ottawa seeing the temperatures of their hottest days jumping by up to 10°C to 12°C. Anyone having suffered through a GTA summer will be white with fear about now....

Explain it to me....

I'm becoming increasingly frustrated watching the massive bailouts to the auto industry etc. It just so damned wrong-headed. Forget the basic tenants of the free market which these same corporations preach whenever environmentalists or etc complain about their rapacious capitalism; forget about the fact that we're using tax payer money for private profit; forget that these welfare bums are demanding gobs of cash in return for nothing -- I'd be much more okay with handing over the cash to preserve a national presence in auto manufacturing IF in return the citizens get a couple of billion shares in the corporation (wasn't American built on the principle of 'no taxation without representation'?) -- forget all that. My problem is that we're propping up an industry whose time is over.

Why are we throwing gazillions into industry when we're a post-industrial society. John Bell explained this back in the 1970s, for heaven's sake. They're worried about saving jobs in a manufacturing industry, but the number of workers in the arts is significantly higher, and the jobs are more enjoyable, self-fulling, life-affirming, non-polluting, renewable resource -- why is no one trying to bail out the arts? Why do we think we need people to buy cars (polluting, global warming, road building tax drains that kill or maim thousands of drivers and pedestrians each month) but buying theater tickets or building art galleries is somehow wasteful. And talk about (as Harper did) art gallas -- but the car execs don't have galas, they have private jets; bankers have to have their salaries capped at $500,000 (not counting, if you read the fine print, stock options). We can't afford $10,000 grant to a Canadian magazine but we can give billions to auto manufacturing? To save a dying industry? The backwards looking boobies who have no vision and no leadership are trying to drive the ship of state in reverse. Let's go back to 1950, they seem to say, instead of figuring out how to aim for 2050. Might as well try to bail out blacksmiths and wheelwrights.

And wasn't the whole point of the exercise to save jobs? So how is it that these companies can lay off 35,000 workers at a go, AND still take the bailout money. If they aren't even going to preserve jobs (other than the execs who created the problems) what was the point of forking over the cash?

Let us instead look to Sweden. When GM went had in hand and demanded huge bailouts for Saab, the governments response was, why? If you're in trouble, it's because your cars suck. We can let you access some funds for R&D to design the transport of the future, but building more of the current model, not so much. Furthermore, what money we have is going into nursery schools, because that is our future competitive edge; and into elder care, because that is a massive growth industry, and because those citizens built what we have to day. In contrast to your executives, who screwed up a perfectly good car company when you bought it out. So get out.

The Sweds are putting their bailout money into the non-profit sector because it is the largest employer - many many times larger in Sweden and Canada than industry. And since most people in the non-profit sector work for a LOT less than autoworkers we can hire two or three nonprofit people for every autoworker laid off. And they are more interesting, rewarding, and socially necessary jobs. Hell, for the price of one executive, we could fund an entire town's worth of programs! The Sweds get this, and they are not going to have recession or unemployment to the same extent because there's tons of room to expand nonprofit -- no contracting market there.

Who do you think will be ahead economically in ten years? 50 years? Sweden or... will there even been a Canada in 50 years?

Oliver North Rides Again

An American raid on the Afghan village of Nawabad on August killed only 7 civilians, according to the US Army. However, both Afghan and UN officials say that 92 civilians were killed, including 60 children, making it one the biggest losses of civilian life in the war.
The US military continued to insist until September 7 that only seven civilians had been killed. They reconsidered their count when the video came out.
Why was the US count so low? According to the TimesOnline:

The US military said that its findings were corroborated by an independent journalist embedded with the US force. He was named as the Fox News correspondent Oliver North, who came to prominence in the 1980s Iran-Contra affair, when he was an army colonel.

Yes, Oliver North. Yes, that Oliver North.

Politically Canuck

According to this CBC story, a prosecutor in Texas is accused of using the word "Canadian" as a racial slur in a 2003 email. The prosecutor wrote in an email, "He overcame a subversively good defense by Matt Hennessey that had some Canadians on the jury feeling sorry for the defendant and forced them to do the right thing."
There were no Canadians on the jury. But there were some African-Americans, and some are claiming the lawyer used the word "Canadian" as a racial slur against them.
The prosecutor defended himself by saying he had been led to believe that were actual Canadians on the jury, suggesting that somehow some Canadian nationals had slipped through the system designed to eliminate non-U.S. citizens as prospective jurors. He also said that other lawyers use the word "Canadians" to describe "liberals."

Falwell Meets His Maker

I note that Jerry Falwell met his maker yesterday. Of course, Falwell's maker was the guy with the red complexion, the horns, pitchfork, pointed ears and the fire fetish.
It is ironic that Falwell, who blamed the 9/11 terrorist attacks on "pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians," should pass away yesterday, the National Day Against Homophobia.
The Lord works in mysterious ways.