Perpetual Innovation

Category: denier

  • Those Sneaky Climate Alarmists

    A video came cycling around to me that provided gleeful evidence that the Climate Alarmists use sneaky methods to distort the information and make everyone shake in their boots because the world will end in less than 12 years. This guy, Tony Heller (aka Steven Goddard), even went so far as to create a tool to find the best point in any trend graph for best (mis)representing data.
    As with many such reports, I would always like to find myself wrong, and to discover that I’ve become a Climate Alarmist for nothing. All that lost sleep, spending time developing business ideas and models that are both sustainable, politically viable, and profitable.
    Sadly, Heller is simply a fraud. He used his own tool to make fun of activists, and to distract people from facts. Here is a great video by Mallan Baker that takes on a couple of Heller’s debunk graphs to debunks the junk.
    Why is Heller talking Continental US and pointing at specific US cities when we are talking GLOBAL warming. The US had some wicked hot years during the Dust Bowl, for example.

    Wikipedia can be the best overview source for highly active and rapidly updated pages like these: Global Warming, Climate Change, Sustainability in general, and Climate Change Denial.
    By now you know that everyone knows that there’s global warming. Thermometers tend not to lie.
    But I keep finding people who have been convinced that warming is not very much, or that it is a natural cycle to earth, or that humans are only responsible for a fraction of the warming we are experiencing.
    Even the oil companies now acknowledge that there’s global warming, but their business model is not conducive to any of the logical approaches to deal with the issue aggressively. In fact, according to internal documents, the oil companies have know for half a century that global warming was a byproduct of their product and hidden this from the public in order to protect their business-as-usual profits.

    With current technology, we can easily measure the energy that comes from the sun, and the amount that is reflected back into space. All evidence shows global warming is happening, and at an accelerating pace. You can use lots of good data sources related to land, ocean, air, ice coverage, etc. Statistically, solar flares, volcanoes, El Nino and other major factors can be isolated; warming can easily be primarily attributed to human factors.

    We don’t have time to debunk the deniers, people and lobbyists who are paid by deep fossil interests. We need to go about becoming more sustainable, like as if our collective lives depend on it. Business-as-usual (oil, gas, coal) is unsustainable. Being unsustainable is something that must change, sooner or later. Being unsustainable has a way of becoming more and more expensive, and coming to an ungraceful end.

    Fortunately, we will actually save money (i.e., more profits) from doing smart and sustainable things. Solar and Wind are now far cheaper than fossil fuels in most locations (even when combined with battery). Renewable energy is especially cheaper when considering all the externality costs of fossil fuels (pollution, health, national security).

    Energy efficiency offers a perpetuity of savings. The greenest gallon of gas is the one never pumped, refined, shipped and burned. The greenest electricity is the negawatt. We also like Teleworking, the greenest commute is zero-distance which consumes no time.

    Let’s all start with those things that can be done immediately (within weeks or a few months) and those that offer a perpetuity of savings. We need to start putting the magic of compounding to our advantage, not toward more non-sustainable practices.

    < * Notes & References * >
    Wikipedia is a great source on Climate Change. Start with the Global Warming Book.
    An excellent source for fact/fiction/myth is: SkepticalScience.com (I’ve never seen anything there that was not supported with sources and provable with current data.)

    The log entry for Baker video:
    A few days ago, noted Climate Change commentator Tony Heller released a
    new video with some killer facts that completely exposes the conspiracy
    over climate change.

    Or does it?

    Let’s discuss.

    The Mallen Baker Show is aimed at all people who see themselves as
    change makers, with commentary on issues and change movements with a
    particular focus on climate change and environment, social issues, free
    speech and corporate social responsibility.
    References in this video:
    Tony Heller’s original video
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8455K…
    The National Climate Assessment Report
    https://nca2018.globalchange.gov/down…
    Extreme heat and cold graphs
    https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicator…
    Wildfires analysis
    https://andthentheresphysics.wordpres…
    Interview with Dr Ottmar Endenhofer, IPCC (in German)
    https://www.nzz.ch/klimapolitik_verte…

    Integrated sea ice graph
    https://web.archive.org/web/201905241…
    Piecing together the arctic sea ice history
    https://www.carbonbrief.org/guest-pos…

  • Climate Leadership | Climate Leadership Plan | Alberta.ca

    Climate Leadership | Climate Leadership Plan | Alberta.ca:

    WOW.

    On the eve of the humongous climate meetings in Paris next week (week after Thanksgiving in USA), Canada has stepped up to the plate on addressing climate changes.

    Alberta is the home of Coal and Oil Sands: two of the great game changers in addressing pollution in general and Greenhouse Gas emissions (GHG).

    There are several reports, but one is to simply charge a tax per metric tonne (yes, I know that’s the colourful way to spell ton) of CO2. The price will move up from $15 to $30 per ton of CO2 by 2019.

    In electric generation, the big game changer is to switch away from coal in general.

    By 2030 in Alberta, “There will be no pollution from coal-fired

    electricity generation.” The focus will be on reduce electrical needs and switching to NatGas and Renewables.

    But for Alberta, capping and steadily reversing the oil sands is a very big game changer.

    With the oil glut keeping oil prices down below $50 per barrel for the foreseeable future, Alberta should be ramping down oil production anyway. (I think oil sands requires $70 to $80 to be profitable.).

    The Carbon Taxes will be used: to offset increased living costs for poorer people, to assist with transition to renewables and other research.

    For those still skeptical about Global Warming: Look at the pix of Athabasca Glacier over 100 years (well 98 really). Or look at any pictures over 40 years related to Glacier Bay in Alaska. Or, just a little south from Alberta, give a look at Glacier National Park in Montana (soon to be renamed Glacier-Less National Park).
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  • Why are so many Americans skeptical about climate change? A study offers a surprising answer. – The Washington Post

    Why are so many Americans skeptical about climate change? A study offers a surprising answer. – The Washington Post:

    So lots of money used to confuse and misinform can go a long way if you want to make sure that no one knows the truth and no meaningful action is taken.

    That brings us to Super PACs. They mostly lie, and always obfuscate the issues. Since there’s no one responsible, they are free to throw mud and tar at will and at random.

    Don’t see how anything could go wrong with the political engines. Do you?

    Misinform and misdirection works.
    We all need to realize that and start propagating truths, not lies. The tools are at our fingertips (and keyboards).

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  • More than three in four Americans believe in global warming – UPI.com

    More than three in four Americans believe in global warming – UPI.com:

    Finally. Even republicans have shifted to a majority accepting climate change. This is not a party thing; this is a human thing.

    Once people start to realize that the earth is warming. And that people are generally responsible.

    There tends to be a some obvious actions that we all must do, soon or later.

    Sustainability is a law of nature that it is hard to break. Ignore it at your own risk, and everyone else’s risk at well.

    We promote doing smarter things now to bend the curve on the human impact on the earth. It is a compounding (geometric or exponential) kind of thing. Small(er) changes now make a BIG difference over time. Business as usual (BAS) simply compounds the issues and the problems.

    Currently, this is a year of El Nino, so the record temperatures for 2015 are on path to exceed last year’s record “by a mile”.

    Related to global warming and El Nino, check out Hurricane Patricia, the strongest hurricane ever recorded. Ouch!..

    So lest start a call to action doing those actions that will save consumers, businesses, governments money while simultaneously making us all more sustainable.

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  • Why science is so hard to believe… It’s in the Kool-Aid – The Washington Post

    Why science is so hard to believe – The Washington Post:


    Joel Achenbach hit the nail on the head with this article.

    Ever wonder why you can talk with otherwise intelligent people and you suddenly drop into the twilight zone.  They suddenly are totally convinced that the earth is flat, and there’s no arguing with them.Or they are totally convinced the fluoride in water is a horrible government conspiracy to … 

    It is in the water. Or the Kool-Aid. Each group, tribe if you will, is drinking a different flavor. And you drink enough of it, the facts get a little wacky.!!!

    This is a wonderful opinion letter. 


    Here also is a great article as well on the distrust of science by Americans. It includes Pew Research on the topic. 

    Hmmm….


    Achenback argues against the idea of scientist taking a more proactive stance. He argues that when scientist step off of the ivory tower to wrestle in the mud of politics and public policy they get dirty-ugly like the rest of us. (Well, something kind of like that argument anyway.)


    So, it appears, that many people only want to hear what they want to hear. If it doesn’t match with their world view, then they switch to a channel that matches…

    And so we have the world’s most information rich environment, with exponentially more information available each decade, yet ignorance runs rampant. It is almost impossible to believe that such is possible. But it is.

    For several years now I keep returning to the wise axioms of Rotary International. In the 4-way test, of all we say and do… “First, is it the truth?” 


    Ignoring the truth (ignoring the facts) has a nasty way of coming back around and biting you in the butt if/when you get it wrong.


    We like to focus on sustainability. Things that are sustainable rather easy to view mathematically. Eating 4,000 calories per day, and burn only 2000, you are apt to gain weight. Burn 9m barrels of oil per day (42 gals each) pumping the hydro & carbons into the atmosphere and you are changing all kinds of things in the atmosphere (and environment). [These carbons have been sequestered in the earth for some 5 to 50 million years.] The resulting imbalances  will have effects and side-effects. Guaranteed. Predicting them accurately may not be easy. Assuming that doing non-sustainable things won’t cause a problem because they never caused a problem before, has some very serious logic flaws. 


    So, let’s all move away from the flavored waters and start seeking out the crystal clear true of the facts and the issues. We’ll all have a healthier outlook, and healthier teeth as well.


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