Weather, Water, Energy 7-25-07

Big Al, bringing more inconvenience, this time in CO. I wish we had that much sense, Al. Seriously, I’d like to see those a—holes condemning “doomers” in the comments at Grist bet their entire life savings that we’ll get our act together on any of this within the next 10 years? Not one substantial piece of evidence to support their “optimistic” vision they insist is realism for the next decade, but they knee-jerk to people who understand human history, ignorance, and self-absorption. What tools. (Let's not tell them that new studies show smog and ozone levels may cripple tree and vegetation ability to capture carbon as "sinks" and may mean that, once again, existing models are underestimating the speed of greenhouse gas buildup and its effects. They might lose their smiley faces.) . . . Speaking of tools, a really, really nice takedown at RealClimate of the latest “deniers” who believe their position on top of a completely different mountain qualifies them to add to the obfuscation that the “optimists” above don’t believe have any influence and won’t obstruct any meaningful action in the next decade. . . . The extreme weather news around the globe—like this piece on Europe generally, this one about SE Europe, this one about Eastern Europe, this one about Britain’s flooding woes—has gotten so common that I’m having a hard time deciding whether I should even keep saying anything about it. (Not to mention the record temps in US cities this year.) But if I don’t, will it make a sound? . . . If one of the leading nations on global warming prevention like Japan can’t make its targets, what does that say about the rest of us non-leaders? . . . Reindeer not doing well, but they can go swimming in their rivers in Northern Russia so even trade-off, right? . . . Big Oil making record profits again, and since we didn’t require anything major of them 3 decades ago when all this started hitting the fan and now the refineries are all “breaking down” for real or not, I’m betting they’ll set another record profit next year. The Free Market serving us all. Isn’t it wonderful? . . . Here’s one of those ideas that sounds great and super-wonkish on paper or around the peak point of a really good bull session but will just open the door for massive game-playing and harmful effects if we really tried it—letting companies “borrow” credits for gas emissions with the promise they’ll pay them back later. You know, like what Congress is doing “borrowing” Social Security surpluses. Bwahahahahaha. . . .