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Monday, November 20, 2017

Climate Change


My biggest problem with climate change deniers is, if they are wrong and we continue to pollute and abuse the environment, we may be doomed. If on the other hand, those who embrace climate change are wrong, there is no longterm harm done. Their programs to slow, halt, or reverse the effects of man on the climate have no real downsides.

Some of us are old enough to remember when air pollution, especially in major cities, was pretty common. Los Angeles actually did have a "brown LA haze". My hometown of Jacksonville often had a terrible stink from the paper mills. The DFW area still has ozone alert days but not as many. I'm sure many of you can remember other areas where air pollution was a problem. 

The climate change deniers claim that the measures needed to reduce carbon emissions are financially crippling. That financial strain will be more severe for the US than others, particularly China and India. In fact, the renewable power industries create thousands of jobs. The technology research also has benefits in other industries. Solar, wind, hydro, nuclear, thermal, and other energy sources are already competitive with most fossil fuels. Coal is no longer financially viable for new plants and most older coal plants have been or are being shuttered. The biggest problem with the new energy sources is the lack of infrastructure to get the energy from where it is produced to where it is consumed. We have been building pipelines and railroads to deliver coal, oil, and gas for decades. Our solar and wind generation sites are new and not as well connected. 

The scientists and climate change believers have mostly done a terrible job of convincing the populace of the real dangers. The main problem is that it is complicated and slow moving. The raw data is solid and mostly undisputed. The problems arise when the historic and current data are put into the numerous models. It is almost impossible to precisely predict when, where or how much that the climate change will affect the Earth in general and specific locations. It is also difficult or impossible to determine what percentage of our current warming is due to mankind and what percentage is normal climate fluctuations. It is not impossible to measure and predict trends.

We also have the alarmists and doomsday faction who think the world will end next week if we don't stop all carbon emissions immediately. They are no more useful to the discussion than the climate change deniers. Hyperbole is very rarely useful or convincing in the long run.

As usual, those in the middle of the discussion have the best chance to come to a workable agreement. Those who question (not deny) climate change must be willing to accept that the data indicates our global temperatures are rising. They must also be willing to accept that the polar ice caps are shrinking and the oceans are rising. Those are provable facts from measurements and photographs. The debate might be about what caused this and is it a trend or a climatic cycle. It can also be debated what part man played in this. 

Neither side can continue to summarily deny science that does not fully support their views. Any study funded by a person, group or institution that has a financial or political stake in how we deal with climate change must be taken with many grains of salt and skepticism. That goes for studies funded by the fossil fuel industry, by alternative energy companies, and even by the Sierra Club. Claims about the benefits of "clean coal" by the coal industry are suspect, just as the benefits of wind power by a wind turbine company are. 

As I've mentioned in other opinion pieces about current behavior and its effect on the future. Except for maybe nuclear war, none of these issues will directly affect me. I'm too old for climate change to destroy the planet before I'm gone. I do have children and grandchildren. I would like them to have a long, healthy, and happy life. I hope they don't look back on our generation and blame us for ruining the environment and wonder what in the hell we were thinking.

Let's give cleaner energy and other anti-pollution measures a chance. What could it hurt?

wjh

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