# Global Warming



## CapitalConserv (May 25, 2006)

There's a new website specifically for hunters and anglers on global warming: www.targetglobalwarming.org .

It has the results of a national poll of sportsmen (and sportswomen) and their opinions on global warming. I was surprised by the results - Hunters seem really concerned about habitat loss from global warming, and many are already saying they see it.

There's a forum on the website to spout off on you thoughts on global warming - post what you think. Is global warming happening? Are you concerned? Or is it a huge hoax?

There's a lot of good information at www.targetglobalwarming.org, no matter what you think.


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## Gohon (Feb 14, 2005)

Fox had a special on this last Sunday. Seems a lot of scientist are having second thoughts and some have completely reversed themselves. Funny thing is they say Mars has a polar ice cap and it has been retreating for the last 6 years but they haven't spotted a single SUV running around up there yet. Appears, at least by the report on Fox that solar radiation is the biggest single contributor to melting ice caps and climate heat and cold swings. I still remember in the mid seventies that we were all being warned about a coming ice age.


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## boondocks (Jan 27, 2006)

I sure ain't gonna lose any sleep over global warming.


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## honkbuster3 (Jan 11, 2006)

I did a report in school on Global Warming and I had charts, graphs and a 5 page report all about how global warming was not happening and how the earth goes through cycles of warm and then cool , there is really nothing that we could do to stop this. We could all trash our diesel Pick-ups and buy hybrids but it still wouldn't effect this warming, or cooling trend. The left wing media is just trying to give us something to be scared about. :eyeroll:


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## CapitalConserv (May 25, 2006)

Ok, so I'm not Al Gore. Sorry to disappoint.

I do work for a wildlife conservation organization. But I'm genuinely very concerned about the effects of global warming on all wildlife. Prarie Potholes are drying up. Where the duck gonna go? Rivers in the Northwest are warming, salmon are already endangered with limited fishing because of Dams.

I was interested to see other sportsmen witnessing the effects of and being concerned about global warming. The skeptics do talk louder (honkbuster3), but it seems as though the majority are coming around to the reality of global warming being human caused.

But isn't that a good thing that its human caused? Means we can do something about it, right? Any thoughts on the website itself: www.targetglobalwarming.org?


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## Bobm (Aug 26, 2003)

> But isn't that a good thing that its human caused?


 :roll: says who you and Al Gore?? uke:



> Means we can do something about it, right?


Yeah, wear more sunblock :lol:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jh ... wstop.html

Gee thats a surprise the suns brighter so its hotter outside.....


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## MossyMO (Feb 12, 2004)

Letterman just announced because of global warming scientist believe that Hillary Clinton should be fully defrosted in about 10 years.... :jammin:


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## 4CurlRedleg (Aug 31, 2003)

MossyMO said:


> Hillary Clinton should be fully defrosted in about 10 years.... :jammin:


 :lol: :lol:


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## Sasha and Abby (May 11, 2004)

Bwaaaaa

But just think about how much more ocean front property will be available... more area for you to play on your jet ski. :wink:


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## SnakeyJake1 (Mar 22, 2005)

Prairie Potholes are drying up? Tell that to anyone in Eastern ND. I've never seen so many nesting ducks and geese. I really don't have all the facts on global warming, but I have my doubts that it's all caused by pollution. Last I heard the supposed shrinking ozone layer has recovered on it's own, even though there are more gas guzzlers on the roads.


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## Niles Short (Mar 18, 2004)

Posted 6/12/2005 7:31 PM Updated 6/13/2005 6:15 PM

The debate's over: Globe is warming
By Dan Vergano, USA TODAY
Don't look now, but the ground has shifted on global warming. After decades of debate over whether the planet is heating and, if so, whose fault it is, divergent groups are joining hands with little fanfare to deal with a problem they say people can no longer avoid.

The Larsen B ice shelf, on the eastern side of the Antarctic Peninsula, has shattered and separated from the continent as a result of warming.	
National Snow and Ice Data Center
General Electric is the latest big corporate convert; politicians at the state and national level are looking for solutions; and religious groups are taking philosophical and financial stands to slow the progression of climate change.

They agree that the problem is real. A recent study led by James Hansen of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies confirms that, because of carbon dioxide emissions and other greenhouse gases, Earth is trapping more energy from the sun than it is releasing back into space.

The U.N. International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) estimates that global temperatures will rise 2 to 10 degrees by 2100. A "middle of the road" projection is for an average 5-degree increase by the end of the century, says Caspar Amman of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo.

What the various factions don't necessarily agree on is what to do about it. The heart of the discussion is "really about how to deal with climate change, not whether it's happening," says energy technology expert James Dooley of the Battelle Joint Global Change Research Institute in College Park, Md. "What are my company's options for reducing greenhouse gas emissions? Are there new business opportunities associated with addressing climate change? Those are the questions many businesses are asking today."

The players

GE Chairman Jeffrey Immelt recently announced that his company, which reports $135 billion in annual revenue, will spend $1.5 billion a year to research conservation, pollution and the emission of greenhouse gases. Joining him for the announcement were executives from such mainline corporations as American Electric Power, Boeing and Cinergy.

Religious groups, such as the United States Catholic Conference of Bishops, National Association of Evangelicals and National Council of Churches, have joined with scientists to call for action on climate change under the National Religious Partnership for the Environment. "Global warming is a universal moral challenge," the partnership's statement says.

And high-profile politicians from both parties are getting into the act. For example, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has called for a reduction of more than 80% over the next five decades in his state's emission of greenhouse gases that heat in the atmosphere.

To be sure, many companies - most notably oil industry leader ExxonMobil - still express skepticism about the effects of global warming. And the Bush administration has supported research and voluntary initiatives but has pulled back from a multi-nation pact on environmental constraints.

The administration was on the defensive last week when The New York Times reported that a staff lawyer has been softening scientific assessments of global warming. White House spokesman Scott McClellan defended such action as a routine part of a multi-agency review process.

Nonetheless, the tides of change appear to be moving on.

"As big companies fall off the 'I don't believe in climate change' bandwagon, people will start to take this more seriously," says environmental scientist Don Kennedy, editor in chief of the journal Science. Companies aren't changing because of a sudden love for the environment, Kennedy says, but because they see change as an opportunity to protect their investments.

"On the business side, it just looks like climate change is not going away," says Kevin Leahy of Cinergy, a Cincinnati-based utility that reports $4.7 billion in annual revenue and provides electricity, mostly generated from coal, to 1.5 million customers. Most firms see global warming as a problem whose risks have to be managed, he says.

Power companies want to know what sort of carbon constraints they face - carbon dioxide is the chief greenhouse gas - so they can plan long term and avoid being hit with dramatic emission limits or penalties in the future, he says.

Science and solutions

Climate scientists say this acceptance comes none too soon. "All the time we should have been moving forward ... has been wasted by arguing if the problem even exists," says Michael Mann of the University of Virginia.

The IPCC estimates that rainfall will increase up to 20% in wet regions, causing floods, while decreasing 20% in arid areas, causing droughts. The Environmental Protection Agency says melting glaciers and warmer ocean waters will likely cause an average 2-foot rise in sea level on all U.S. coasts by 2100.

Carbon dioxide is the byproduct of burning fossil fuels such as coal, natural gas or oil. There are now about 1 trillion tons of carbon from carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. By the end of the century, atmos-pheric carbon projections range from 1.2 trillion tons if stringent corrective steps are taken to 2.8 trillion tons if little is done.

Moving ahead with solutions looks like the hardest part of the equation for the United States. The Bush administration's stance has frustrated advocates of a more aggressive response.

Bush explained in a 2001 speech why he opposed joining the Kyoto Protocol, a global agreement to curb greenhouse gases: "The (Kyoto) targets themselves were arbitrary and not based upon science. For America, complying with those mandates would have a negative economic impact, with layoffs of workers and price increases."

Instead, the administration "harnesses the power of markets and technological innovation, maintains economic growth, and encourages global participation," former Energy Department head Spencer Abraham wrote last year in Science. He pointed to tax incentive programs, climate research and technologies such as "FutureGen," the Energy Department's 10-year,$1 billion attempt at creating a coal-fired power plant that emits no greenhouse gases.

Other administration efforts:

• The $1.7 billion hydrogen fuel-cell car initiative announced two years ago in Bush's State of the Union address.

• A $49 million carbon "sequestration" initiative with 65 projects to see whether carbon dioxide can be stripped from emissions.

• Participation in the international ITER program to develop nuclear fusion as an energy source.

The administration has encouraged voluntary efforts. Fourteen trade groups representing industrial, energy, transportation and forest companies have signed up for a program aimed at cutting greenhouse-gas emissions 18% by 2012.

So why isn't this enough to assuage critics?

Rick Piltz, a science policy expert who resigned in protest from the administration's Climate Change Science Program in March, says the reliance on voluntary measures and long-term technology breakthroughs is a roadblock against simple conservation steps that could curb emissions now. Piltz provided the edited documents that were the subject of last week's story in The New York Times.

Commonly cited examples of the conservation steps Piltz mentions:

• Incentives for emission controls on the oldest and least efficient power plants.

• More stringent mileage and tailpipe requirements on vehicles.

• Expanded tax credits for more efficient air conditioners, hybrid cars and appliances.

Political leaders will support such measures only if the benefits come at a low cost to the economy, says William Reilly, co-chair of the bipartisan National Commission on Energy Policy and former head of the EPA under President George H.W. Bush. "But there is a lot going on, and I think we will be seeing some movement on this."

Away from the political arena, other irons are in the fire:

• More people are advocating nuclear power. Greenpeace co-founder Patrick Moore told a congressional panel in April that "nuclear energy is the only non-greenhouse gas-emitting energy source that can effectively replace fossil fuels and satisfy global demand."

• Immelt called for the United States to adopt an emissions-trading plan for greenhouse gases. Taking a cue from the EPA's policy of having companies buy and sell permits to release sulfur dioxide, which is responsible for acid rain, economists suggest that such a scheme would limit carbon dioxide by making emissions economically less feasible. In Congress, the Climate Stewardship Act proposed by Sens. Joseph Lieberman, D-Conn., and John McCain, R-Ariz., would commit the country to such a plan.

No 'silver bullet' solution

Pressure for reforms may come most strongly from "socially responsible" investors. "We make bottom-line arguments to companies to make decisions in the interests of their shareholders," says John Wilson of Christian Brothers Investment Services, which manages $3.5 billion in investor funds. The firm advises 1,000 Catholic institutions, such as churches, schools and hospitals.

A Christian Brothers resolution in May asked ExxonMobil "to explain the scientific basis for its ongoing denial of the broad scientific consensus that the burning of fossil fuels contributes to global climate change." The resolution garnered 10.3% of shareholders' votes, representing 665 million shares worth more than $36 billion, despite the opposition of management.

"The future of energy is plainly moving away from fossil fuels and we want the companies (that) we invest in to explain how they plan to adjust," Wilson says.

Dooley, of the Battelle Institute, says: "We need a whole series of 'home runs' and maybe even a couple of 'grand slams' to successfully address this problem. More efficient refrigerators, better and cheaper solar cells, hybrid automobiles, fuel cells, power plants that capture and store their (carbon dioxide) deep below the surface and nuclear power. They all have important roles to play."

"No one seriously talks about trying to address climate change with one technology," Dooley says. "Everyone understands that there isn't a 'silver bullet' out there waiting to be discovered."


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## HUNTNFISHND (Mar 16, 2004)

The earth has been warming ever since the last ice age! :eyeroll:

I am getting sick of hearing about all these doomsday events:

Y2K, Mad Cow, CWD, Bird Flu, Global Warming

Get over it!!! :beer:


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## tsodak (Sep 7, 2002)

I will be the first to say that most things we hear about on the news today that we need to worry about are hogwash..... but the fact of global warming is real. I was at a conference not long ago where the whole idea of a "debate" about if the planet is warming was completely debunked. Every credible scientist out there says without qualification that it is. the argument comes as to if it is human induced.

I have to tell you that the research I have done says to me it is. CO2 levels are 50% above historic levels, and that does not include more efficient greenhouse gases like methane and NO2. Our planet has a huge capacity to buffer some of this, but never think that the climate is not changing. It is irrefutable.....

Tom


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## HUNTNFISHND (Mar 16, 2004)

So how long do we have before it's curtains? :roll:

I for one am not going to lose any sleep over it.


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## John M (Oct 24, 2005)

Who cares about global warming we are all dieing on 6-6-06 :lol: Oh nevermind I forgot, We will all be attacked and killed by flying giraffes on 6-3-06.
I believe the people who make end of the world theorys up should get shot :sniper: several times up the poop shoot just for making bullsh*t like this and stirring up the retards who actualy believe this crap. :lol:


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## MossyMO (Feb 12, 2004)

If there is any truth to the global warming theory, pheasant populations should thrive well in the upper northwest for the next few years !!! :jammin:


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## John M (Oct 24, 2005)

Everyones going to die in 3 days by flying giraffes and your still talking about global warming?

:toofunny:


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## Gohon (Feb 14, 2005)

> Every credible scientist out there says without qualification that it is


I guess that means any scientist that has a different opinion is not credible...

Here is a quote by Dr. Robert C. Balling, Jr in 1998. His entire comment is available here....

http://www.evworld.com/archives/interviews/balling.html

"According to Balling, the core of the debate really centers around the issue of climate models. Based on sophisticated computer algorithms, these computer models of climate have been predicting for some time that increased CO2 production, especially from the burning of fossil fuels, will lead to higher global temperatures, and higher temperatures will result in potentially disastrous climate shifts, destructive weather patterns and coastal flooding as a result of polar ice pack melting".

"The problem is the climate models haven't matched up with worldwide observations, especially from orbiting satellites and weather balloons (radiosondes). While it is true that surface temperature readings in the last 150 years show a steady increase in average temperature, Balling believes this can be accounted for, at least partially, by increased urbanization".

"I really have a big problem with the thermometers," Balling responded. "Close your eyes for a moment and think about where the thermometers are in 1890. There weren't many of them and there certainly weren't many in the oceans, none in the deserts, none in these remote areas of the world." Balling points out that many of the long term weather records are based on readings obtained at local airports in the developed world. "I can't think of a place in central Arizona that is least representative of central Arizona then Sky Harbor Airport."


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## fireball (Oct 3, 2003)

1998, might as well be 98 B.C., alot of scientists have woken up since then with new evidence. How hard is it to realize one fact, we are pouring more carbon into the air than any natural disaster has in the last millenium. We are putting more on top of the natural reasons. It doesn't take a load of short busers to realize we are causing a huge climatic change. You can address it or you can pretend like you are a macho man and deny it, it is your choice. I see we have alot of real men in here.


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## Longshot (Feb 9, 2004)

Here is another one fireball. It's good that you are so much smarter than everyone else to show us the error of our ways. It wasn't that long ago that the scare was that a new ice age was coming. Most global warming data IMHO looks at too short a time period. I think there are too many new scientist that have found that a scare tactic gets them more grant money than anything else. Here is some interesting reading.

http://www.clearlight.com/~mhieb/WVFossils/ice_ages.html


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## Gohon (Feb 14, 2005)

fireball, read the last paragraph and then think. Really think about what it says. That may be difficult but give it your best shot. You cannot come to any concrete scientific conclusion by using data gathered in or used from periods of unknown equipment or resources. The only way to be certain is to have a controlled study and that means only one set of parameters used in a controlled study throughout the country or world for that matter. Everything so far is nothing more than computer generated scenarios and if you just watch your local weather each night you'll see just how good that stuff really is. Down town Tulsa tonight at 6:00 p.m. was 81 degrees. Four miles away at the airport it was 86 degrees. Do you get the picture.

No one is saying there is not a problem and no one is saying man is not contributing to that problem, but no one is able to prove either way at this point just what is the single most contributing factor. You want to jump off a bridge before finding out how deep the water is then be my guest. BTW, the article written by Dan Vergano, of USA TODAY and posted by Niles is relying on data gathered over the last couple hundred years. Guess 1998 isn't so long ago after all.


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## hoosier dhr (Jul 24, 2003)

The Y2K theory was off by

6 years

6 months &

6 days!!!!!

:rollin: :stirpot: :fiddle: :drunk:  oke:

6/6/06


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## fireball (Oct 3, 2003)

Thermometers aren't even in the discussion in the scientifiic community. Carbon levels from ice caps, and earth core samples from tens of thousands of years ago do not show near the levels of carbon in the atmosphere that exists now. Not even after massive volcanic occurances. It isn't about current tempuratures, it is about the amount of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere. At the level they are now, the highest in the history of the planet, our planet will warm up more than it ever has. It isn't rocket science it is simple. So, get back on the short bus and pound your chests. :sniper:

Your buddies article doesn't address the collection of greenhouse gasses, he focus' on temperatures.....ohhhh, that is scientific. The average temperature globaly is rising, has nothing to do with Pheonix or Tulsa or Minot, ND. Do you deny that we put more greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere than nature puts there on its own? Do you realize that by more than doubling the rate, we are exponentially increasing the rate and level to which the warming will occur. Its a big place, but when we f*ck it up, we won't be able to fix it. It will fix us. :sniper: :withstupid:

As far as jumping off the bridge, lets not and just walk, eyes closed onto a freeway during rush hour. All those drivers will see us and avoid us, right....right????


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## fireball (Oct 3, 2003)

Here is a simple high school science fair test for you guys. Take a simple round fridge thermometer, place it under a large glass bowl. Take another and set it up the same way. Now, take one bowl, light a match and place it under the bowl, blowing it out just before you set the bowl all the way down. Take a simple 120 watt lamp, and place it over these "clear" glass bowls for the next 2 hours. Come back and check. The one with the carbon from the match, should be warmer. It has nothing to do with water vapor, as some "politcally" motivated sites would have your believe, it is about carbon. We add carbon, more than nature can. We add that to natures output. The more carbon, the greater the heat retention. The sunlight can come in, but can't go out. Simple high school science. The President can't understand it, but that figures. Maybe you can. Please, walk around the back of the bus as you board. :sniper:


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## Gohon (Feb 14, 2005)

> It isn't about current tempuratures


Really...............



> Brussels, 15 July 2004
> Greenhouse gas emissions in EU15 declining
> 
> Greenhouse gas emissions in the EU15 are now moving in the right direction. Data issued today by the European Commission and the European Environment Agency show that after an increase in earlier years, emissions of the six greenhouse gases addressed by the Kyoto Protocol dropped by 0.5% in 2002. The main reason for the decrease is a shift from coal to gas and reduced emissions from manufacturing industries and households. The reduction takes the EU a small step closer to its target of an 8% cut within the next eight years. New initiatives to reduce emissions, such as the Emission Trading Scheme, have been taken since 2002. This will speed up the reduction in the coming years.


oops.............



> Global Halt To Major Greenhouse Gas Growth
> 
> Nov. 25, 2003 -- The greenhouse gas, methane, has stopped growing in the global background atmosphere and could begin to decrease, CSIRO researchers announced today.
> 
> "Methane is the second most important gas after carbon dioxide. It is responsible for a fifth of the enhanced greenhouse effect over the past 200 years," says Dr Paul Fraser, a chief research scientist at CSIRO Atmospheric Research.


oops again.......



> M. A. K. Khalil, Department of Physics, Portland State University, Portland, Oregon
> 
> A gas can increase in the atmosphere if the emissions increase or the removal processes slow down. Increases or decreases in CO affect only the part of the world where they occur. The atmospheric lifetime of CO is short, an average of 2 months, so what happens in one part of the atmosphere does not greatly affect concentrations at distant locations. For instance emissions from automobiles in the northern middle latitudes have a minor effect on the CO concentrations in the Southern Hemisphere because CO does not survive the 1 to 2 year period it takes for air to mix between hemispheres. Also, because of the short lifetime, changes in sources or sinks are rapidly reflected in the atmospheric concentrations. Because of these properties, the trends observed at each location represent the imbalances of sources, which produce CO, and sinks, which use up CO, in regions surrounding the site but not necessarily global-scale processes. Consequently, there is probably no single explanation for the trends observed worldwide.
> 
> Various lines of reasoning suggest that the rising concentrations during the early 1980s were caused mostly by increases in worldwide emissions. The recent rapid decreases in the concentration of carbon monoxide have come as a surprise. One idea is that, as the stratospheric ozone layer thins due to chlorofluorocarbons, more UV can reach the lower atmosphere where it can stimulate the production of hydroxyl radicals. The increased OH would then consume more CO, causing decreases in the concentrations. This explanation is feasible in some regions over which significant ozone depletion has occurred, namely the high latitudes of both hemispheres. There has been no significant ozone depletion over the tropics. Wherever a significant fraction of CO comes from methane oxidation, more rapid oxidation of methane will increase the production rate of CO. The faster loss of CO from increased OH would be canceled by the greater production of CO from methane oxidation, thus resulting in a steady CO concentration.


Another oops...... but then if they disagree with you then they are not credible right.........well chew on this...............................

# A Gallup poll found that only 17 percent of the members of the Meteorological Society and the American Geophysical Society think that the warming of the 20th century has been a result of greenhouse gas emissions - principally CO2 from burning fossil fuels. 
# Only 13 percent of the scientists responding to a survey conducted by the environmental organization Greenpeace believe catastrophic climate change will result from continuing current patterns of energy use.

# More than 100 noted scientists, including the former president of the National Academy of Sciences, signed a letter declaring that costly actions to reduce greenhouse gases are not justified by the best available evidence.

how deep is the water under the bridge now.......


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## Longshot (Feb 9, 2004)

fireball, you obviously didn't read the article I posted. It does not just address temperature.



> The idea that man-made pollution is responsible for global warming is not supported by historical fact. The period known as the Holocene Maximum is a good example-- so-named because it was the hottest period in human history. The interesting thing is this period occurred approximately 7500 to 4000 years B.P. (before present)-- long before human's invented industrial pollution.
> 
> CO2 in our atmosphere has been increasing steadily for the last 18,000 years-- long before humans invented smokestacks ( Figure 1). Unless you count campfires and intestinal gas, man played no role in the pre-industrial increases.
> 
> ...





fireball said:


> Your buddies article doesn't address the collection of greenhouse gasses, he focus' on temperatures.....ohhhh, that is scientific. The average temperature globaly is rising, has nothing to do with Pheonix or Tulsa or Minot, ND.


You dismiss this article because it only addresses temperature? Yet your immediate comment after is about average temperatures globally. You obviously will discredit any scientific articles that don't agree with you. There seem to be more data to debunk global warming all the time. Unfortunately politicians and some scientist have made it the politically correct belief regardless of new research.


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## indsport (Aug 29, 2003)

Regardless of whether you think global warming is real or not, business, in particular the insurance business, is taking it seriously and believes it.

By David J. Lynch, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON - Corporate leaders don't normally invite the federal 
government to raise their taxes. But that's exactly what Paul 
Anderson is doing.
Anderson, the chairman of Charlotte-based Duke Energy, wants the 
federal government to fight global warming by taxing companies 
based on the "greenhouse gases" they pump into the atmosphere - 
just the sort of big-government remedy the Bush administration 
says would hobble the economy.

For his efforts, Anderson has been excoriated by conservative 
talk radio host Rush Limbaugh and threatened with an "exorcism" 
by an industry peer.

But Anderson, 61, is no closet left-winger. He's a registered 
Republican, Bush backer and member of the president's Council of 
Advisors on Science and Technology. That such a Big Business 
stalwart is demanding federal action on climate change 
illustrates an unmistakable evolution in corporate thinking, 
motivated both by evidence that global warming already is 
affecting the economy and by the prospect of fat profits from new 
environment-friendly products.

"If we approach this rationally, it will not be disruptive to the 
economy and will not turn the world upside down and will, at the 
same time, address the problem," says Anderson.

Corporate America, which once regarded cries of "global warming" 
about as favorably as The Communist Manifesto, increasingly is 
embracing the need for reducing human contributions to the 
planet's rising temperatures. Forty companies - including Boeing, 
IBM, John Hancock and Whirlpool - have publicly endorsed the 
notion that climate change is real by joining a business council 
organized by the Pew Center on Global Climate Change.

Electric power companies are the single largest industrial 
emitter of carbon dioxide, the chief chemical culprit in "global 
warming." But Duke Energy on the East Coast, California's PG&E on 
the West Coast, and other utilities see mandatory federal 
emission caps as preferable to the current patchwork of state 
regulations they confront. A uniform national standard would 
eliminate costly uncertainties hanging over investment decisions 
on new multibillion-dollar power plants, they say.

It's not just power companies that are agitating for action. 
Institutional investors are demanding that companies disclose 
their financial exposure to future climate changes. Insurers are 
abandoning underwriting in coastal areas threatened by costly 
Hurricane Katrina clones, and companies such as General Electric 
and DuPont are gearing up to prosper from the transition to a 
carbon-constrained world. Last year, Goldman Sachs Chairman Henry 
Paulson, now Treasury secretary-designate, warned that the time 
needed to address climate change was running out.

"There's a sea change underway in American business," says Al 
Gore, the former vice president. "What's different in business 
audiences in the past year or so is a new and widespread 
receptivity, a keen awareness, an eagerness on the part of large 
numbers to find out how they can take a leadership position. And 
a recognition, too, that there are profits to be made."

Insurers may prove to be the canaries in the coal mine of climate 
change. As global temperatures rise, instances of severe 
weather - hurricanes, tornadoes, even hailstorms - are expected 
to become more intense and more damaging. Though no single event 
can be definitively linked to long-term warming of the 
atmosphere, Mother Nature is getting more costly for insurers.

Annual weather-related insured losses rose from $1 billion in the 
1970s to an inflation-adjusted average $15 billion in the past 
decade, according to Ceres, a coalition of institutional 
investors and environmental groups. The group said soaring 
weather-related insurance claims, which it linked to the warming 
climate, are leading to higher premiums and greater coverage 
restrictions for policyholders. As private insurers flee 
vulnerable areas, state and local government "insurers of last 
resort" are being left with the bill, Ceres said.

After being battered by losses from four Florida hurricanes in 
2004, Allstate last year refused to renew policies with 95,000 
homeowners and 16,000 commercial property owners in the state.

"We are girding for the onslaught of the next hurricane season," 
Allstate CEO Ed Liddy said last month. "What's new is the 
intensity of this (storm) cycle could be a lot worse than things 
that we've seen before."

Well before climate change turns Iowa into oceanfront property, 
its financial impact on insurers could affect everything from 
building codes to land-use policy, says Tim Wagner, director of 
the Nebraska Department of Insurance, who chairs a National 
Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC) climate-change task 
force.

The panel was scheduled to kick off its deliberations last year 
at a September conference in New Orleans, which was washed out by 
Hurricane Katrina.

In Nebraska, several years of unusually severe hailstorms have 
prompted insurers to raise deductibles and encourage a shift to 
hail-resistant roofing - which costs about twice as much as a 
conventional asphalt roof.

The potential financial impact on insurers is so great that it 
threatens to paralyze policy-writing in the most vulnerable 
geographic areas. To ensure the industry has the financial 
resources to weather repeated catastrophic events, a federal 
reserve fund financed by a new tax on all insurance policies 
might be needed, Wagner says.

"Climate change is so big, it's very hard for the 
man-on-the-street to understand what's taking place. The plain 
truth of the matter is it's here and it's going to be costly," 
Wagner says.

Search for answers

A clear sign that climate concerns have moved into the financial 
mainstream is the growing activism of institutional shareholders. 
Over the past few years, investors have become increasingly 
worried about insufficient disclosure about the risks companies 
face from global warming. Under existing regulations, publicly 
traded companies are required to disclose to investors any 
information that could have a "material" impact on their 
financial results. There are no additional requirements governing 
climate-change issues.

A changing climate threatens companies throughout the economy 
with costs from future regulations, the physical effects of a 
changing landscape, even the danger of massive lawsuits, such as 
the claims filed against tobacco companies. In 2004, eight states 
and New York City sued five power companies seeking to force them 
to cut carbon dioxide emissions. (Last year, a federal district 
judge dismissed the lawsuit, saying Congress, not the courts, 
should set environmental policy. The plaintiffs are appealing 
that decision.)

A recent Mercer Investment Consulting survey of 183 institutional 
investors found that 44% thought climate change was "very" or 
"somewhat important" in economic terms. An additional 14% said it 
would become important within five years.

1. In February, a London-based investor coalition called the 
Carbon Disclosure Project sent its fourth annual request for 
information on greenhouse-gas emissions to 1,800 of the largest 
publicly traded companies in the world. A total of 211 
institutional investors with a collective $31 trillion under 
management signed the letter up from the 35 investors 
representing $4.5 trillion worth of capital who signed the first 
report.

Among the U.S. signatories: Merrill Lynch, Franklin Templeton, 
Dreyfus, State Street Global Advisors, New York state and city 
employee pension funds, and the state treasurers of Maine, 
Vermont and Oregon.

The nation's largest public pension fund, the $182 billion 
California Public Employees' Retirement System (Calpers), also 
signed and has backed shareholder resolutions at Ford Motor and 
General Motors. "Our focus is to get companies to expand and to 
improve the disclosure and transparency of environmental data," 
says Dennis Johnson, Calpers' senior portfolio manager for 
corporate governance.

Johnson says the pension fund doesn't plan to sell any of its 
holdings to force greater disclosure, preferring instead to work 
with the companies in which it owns shares.

Each year, about 30 corporations confront shareholder resolutions 
seeking greater disclosure of the potential impact of climate 
change, according to Mindy Lubbers of Ceres. The past two years, 
climate change has been the leading source of non-financial 
shareholder resolutions, according to Gary Guzy of Marsh & 
McClennan.

In April, a Ceres-backed shareholder resolution requiring 
Dominion Resources, a Richmond, Va.-based utility, to report on 
its exposure to climate change was defeated with 22.5% of the 
votes. But that was almost three times the 8% support a similar 
measure garnered at last year's annual meeting.

Dominion's management opposed the resolutions, arguing that its 
environmental officer regularly updated its board and that 
information on its policies was available to shareholders on the 
company website. The past two years, more than one dozen electric 
power companies have issued such reports, according to Ceres.

A very good thing

The Bush administration stirred global controversy by refusing in 
2001 to sign the 1997 Kyoto treaty, which would have required the 
U.S. to sharply reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 2010.

President Bush has repeatedly insisted that mandatory emissions 
curbs like those contained in the treaty would cost the U.S. 
economy too much. "I walked away from Kyoto because it would have 
damaged the American economy, it would have destroyed the 
American economy, it was a lousy deal for the American economy," 
he said in a July interview with British TV network ITV.

Government and private estimates of the annual cost to the $13 
trillion U.S. economy of implementing the Kyoto restrictions 
range from $125 billion to $400 billion.

Yet, the leaders of major U.S. corporations such as General 
Electric and DuPont say addressing climate change offers the 
technology-rich USA a chance to make - not lose - big money.

One year ago, Jeff Immelt, GE's chief executive, unveiled a plan 
to cut his company's greenhouse-gas emissions by more than 40% by 
2012. At the same time, Immelt said GE would double its annual 
revenue from a broad portfolio of environmentally sound products 
to $20 billion by 2010.

GE identified an opportunity to boost profit by concentrating on 
environmental technologies after customers in many industries and 
many countries began demanding help meeting tougher regulations, 
says Lorraine Bolsinger, the executive in charge of GE's 
Ecomagination initiative. "I don't see the downside. I know folks 
say there will be some kind of economic tax. ... I'm not sure 
anyone who worries about that has done the full analysis," adds 
Bolsinger.

At DuPont, a previous brush with environmental controversy shaped 
an early embrace of the climate-change issue. In the late 1980s, 
the company came under pressure to stop producing chemicals 
called chlorofluorocarbons, which were blamed for depleting the 
ozone layer. In 1988, DuPont agreed to do so. That experience 
helped shape DuPont's response to calls for action to combat 
climate change, says Linda Fisher, the company's vice president 
of environment, health and safety. DuPont set its first goal for 
reducing greenhouse gases in 1991. By 2003, it had trimmed its 
emissions by 72%.

Along the way, it racked up savings of $3 billion through energy 
conservation. Example: In plants in Alabama, Tennessee and 
Missouri, DuPont is replacing natural gas with methane from 
landfills in its industrial boilers. Elsewhere, the company 
redesigned scores of industrial processes to squeeze efficiencies 
from every step of chemicals manufacturing.

"What started as an effort to address our carbon footprint has 
turned out to be financially a very good thing," says Fisher.

This fall, DuPont expects to start using corn to produce a 
chemical called PDO, which is used to make clothing. The Loudon, 
Tenn., plant will use 40% less energy than traditional oil-based 
processes, the company says. The resulting reduction in 
greenhouse-gas emissions is equivalent to removing 22,000 cars 
from the roads.

The inevitable

Executives say such examples are representative of the 
environmental gains that could be achieved throughout the 
economy - if there were federal action. With Europe and Japan 
having embraced Kyoto, many business leaders in the United States 
say it is inevitable that the U.S. will eventually adopt similar 
emission limits. The Senate last year approved a non-binding 
resolution that called for such action.

The choice for business, they say, is between trying to block the 
inevitable or trying to shape whatever climate-change policy the 
government ultimately adopts. The financial stakes are enormous: 
The wrong policy, no matter how well-intentioned, could cripple 
the economy in a quest for environmental improvement.

"If we get out and shape it, we can craft a result that works for 
us and moderates the (economic) impact," says Peter Darbee, CEO 
of PG&E. "One can always say, 'We won't do it until everybody 
does it.' But leadership isn't about waiting for everybody to 
agree. ... Leadership is about doing the right thing and doing it 
early."


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## fireball (Oct 3, 2003)

So, you guys are saying we don't add to what nature already puts into the atmosphere? Carbon will go away in two years, if we quit using it right now, but we don't, we use more every day. If we have a processed fuel shortage, as the gas company's would have us believe, we have to be using more. China is at a stage in the next 3 years, where they will become the biggest fossil fuel user in the world. You know why the pheonix airport is higher temp. than the dessert? Have you ever seen the smog hang over Phoenix? I have, many times. The CO2 keeps the heat in, simple. Lets keep pretending, that is what this country has been doing for the last 6 years anyway. :sniper:


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## John M (Oct 24, 2005)

Fireball are you even a hunter? I looked over your posts and all of them are in the open forum politics or hot topics. I think your an anti who only came here to argue about politics and global warming.

By the way, just for you fireball im going to purchase a ford F350 diseal tommorow and park by your house and let it idle there because I know how much you like the smell of exhaust :wink:


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## joespiek (Nov 25, 2003)

You've got it all wrong Global warming was caused by Aliens

http://www.crichton-official.com/speeches/index.html read the speach called Aliens Cause Global Warming

Have you ever watched the news when they were reporting on a topic you are very knowledgeble about, and noticed how many facts they get wrong and how many they plainly make up to make the "story" better? Do you believe that they only did this on the particular day and topic which you know more than they do? DON'T believe everything, if anything, you hear on the news, those people know less about important topics than your average high schooler, they're just good at making it seem like they have all the answers and putting a nice story behind otherwise boring ideas to get people to watch.


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## John M (Oct 24, 2005)

No No No, Global warming is caused by the flying giraffes that will end the world in 3 days! :laugh:


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## Gohon (Feb 14, 2005)

> So, you guys are saying we don't add to what nature already puts into the atmosphere?


No, and no one is making that claim. But you on the other had seem to be saying the entire problem is man made and has nothing to do with solar radiation and natural cycles.......... If we truly do have a problem, don't you think it prudent we make damn sure what that problem really is before making changes that affect everyone's lives.

BTW, the Phoenix airport is not in downtown Phoenix&#8230;&#8230;. It's on the outskirts of the city like all airports. Most of the time you can look from any airport and see the smog cloud over major cities that have a smog problem. Ever think about the millions and millions of tones of concrete there is at a airport? Ever try to walk barefoot on concrete on a hot day? That concrete is just like a solar cell collector. That's why airport records are lousy sources for knowing the average temperature in a given area.


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## fireball (Oct 3, 2003)

I never said it was entirely man made, but the man made part is the only part we can control, it is as simple as that. The solar radiation is a given, that is what heats the planet. Green house gases don't make it warmer, they trap the radiation, keeping the heat in the atmosphere. The more dense the gas, the more radiation stays in the atmosphere. By raising the level at twice the rate, we are creating an exponential factor in the tempurature increase. It is like holding a piece of plywood in the wind. If a 4x8 piece of plywood has X amount of force pushing it in a 10 mph wind, that amount increase exponentially in a 20 mph wind. It doesn't double, it is multiplied hundreds of times. That is what we are adding to this equation. It is that simple. So, yes, what is happening is man made, the excessive temp. increases are. Normal temperature increases would be in the tenths of a degree, not degrees. This is simple science, if you need to try to hard to disprove it, you are reaching. :sniper:


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## fireball (Oct 3, 2003)

John, I am a hunter, fisher and camper. You can park you 350 next to my 150 supercrew and we'll hook up my 5th wheel with my 19 ft crestliner. I ride my bike to my business every day in the spring, summer and fall. I don't drive my pickup unless I use it for my hunting, fishing and camping. I respond to alot of short busers on these forms, because someone has to guide the less fortunate. I am a member of the NRA and DU. I give large donations through myself and my business to both. So, being you are not educated about me, please don't make an ASSumption, it make you look silly.


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## John M (Oct 24, 2005)

No your making yourself look silly fireball. You joined the forums just to rant on about politics and take sides with this anti hunter "CapitalConserv" saying yes we are the cause of global warming.
Stop whining fireball, who really cares theres nothing we can do about it anyway, the only transportation that can get us to work 100 miles away is a vehicle that runs on fossil fuels. Until there is a car that runs on water or something else we still will continue using gas and emmiting the exhaust into the air FACE IT whether we are the cause or not. :******: :eyeroll:


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## tsodak (Sep 7, 2002)

THis is a topic that unless you are open to being convinced there is a problem, you can certainly choose not to be. This is not a black and white question, and like many such questions in history, the idea of whether there was ever a problem will not be resolved until A) it is to late or B) the problem is solved by those who are impacted or choose to give a rip. Even then there are those who will claim there was never a holocaust.

As fast as the scientific world is moving today 1998 is really last century. I was quoting work done in January 2006.

I will never convince you, and that is fine. But dont convince yourself there is no problem by ignoring the dialogue or other viewpoints.

And by the way, I hope like hell I am wrong. Nothing in this world would make me happier. All it will cost us then is som eresearch capital and some more efficient ways of doing things.


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## BigDaddy (Mar 4, 2002)

I agree with tsodak on this one. There is widespread consensus among scientists that we are getting warmer. The data is extremely compelling.

The fact is that we have a very narrow window (less than 10 years) to act to try and stem the problem. In other words, any changes after that time will almost certainly be irreversible. Between now and then, we can take real steps to curb greenhouse gas emissions and change attitudes. If we do, we may be able to curb the trend of increasing global temperatures. The trade-off is that we don't know if our efforts will do a darn thing.

The other option is to continue with our current levels of greenhouse gas emissions and gather more data to prove to everybody that human activities are a cause of the problem. However, waiting much longer will likely put us past the point where we can correct the problem.

I understand concerns that we can't afford to pump money and resource toward a problem that we don't know we can fix. Howevever, withing a very short time, we won't be able to reverse the trends anyway. I would rather spend the money and resources now in hopes that we can affect a change than to wait longer until we hit the point of no return.

Maybe the climatologists are wrong, but can we afford to wait to prove this out?


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## Longshot (Feb 9, 2004)

fireball said:


> You know why the pheonix airport is higher temp. than the dessert? Have you ever seen the smog hang over Phoenix?


fireball I lived and worked all over Phoenix for 5 years. The increase in temp. is not entirely due to smog. A large reason for the higher temp. at Sky Harbor compared to the desert is the fact that the ground is primarily covered with concrete of asphalt. This also caused higher temps. due to these materials absorbing heat and retaining it. This is also one of the reasons that the temps. never cool down at night as much as it does in the desert. I agree with tsodak that this is not a black and white issue. I believe that temp. levels will change no matter what we do. More time should be spent preparing for any type of change be it hotter or colder.


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## Gohon (Feb 14, 2005)

Fireball let me try again ........ global warming is occurring..... global warming is happening....... global warming is real........ did you get it this time. Why you want to spin that I am trying to disprove anything only means you really don't want to discuss the issue.... and that issue is we do not know for sure what is causing global warming. Seems to me your only interest is to simply cram your theory down everyone throat. You claim you know and I simply say we don't know for sure if it is a natural cycle or something not natural so why not try to find out what is really going on before we take steps that could be disastrous for everyone. A prime example was the Kyoto treaty which was the dumbest thing to come down the pike in the last decade.

I don't know for a fact what is going on and with all due respect you damn sure don't either.

BigDaddy, where is this ten year irreversible window coming from? And these increases in temperature by degrees from man? Scientist are still arguing as to whether the earth's surface temperature has increased by .5 degree or a full 1.0 degree in the last 100 years though there was one report that claimed 1.4 degrees Fahrenheit. They can't even agree on that but still we are talking about 1 degree Fahrenheit in the last 100 years.

Anyway, on the subject I found this interesting. Kind of explains why there is so much confusion ........

The Ottawa Citizen
Monday, December 12, 2005

Byline: Professor Tad Murty

Over the last 15 years more than $40 billion has been spent worldwide on climate change research, yet the role of humans in the past century's modest warming remains controversial. In fact, the mysteries of climate change have deepened, if anything.

How can the science behind global warming still be so unsettled? The scientific question is deceptively simple. Do rising levels of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide (CO2) explain global warming, or is it a natural phenomenon?

To read newspapers or listen to TV and radio, you would think it was all very straightforward -- CO2 levels have risen and so has the global temperature. But this simple story is clearly false.

While it is true that atmospheric CO2 has risen steadily for the last 100 years or so, temperature has not. In fact, as best we can determine, global temperatures fell during the middle half of the last century, while CO2 climbed steadily. Even worse, some parts of the Earth have cooled over the entire last century. So the simple theory -- CO2 up, temperature up -- is unsubstantiated.

The necessary correlation is not there. Other factors must be involved, and it is the search for these causes that has turned climate-change science into a $40-billion puzzle. As always in unsettled science, there are many theories, with much controversy.

Those who believe that humans are causing significant global warming argue that volcanoes may have masked the warming during the 20th-century's cooling period, while natural regional variability explains local cooling.

Those who disagree argue that natural variability has caused both the warming and the cooling. They say the Earth was warm several hundred years ago, then generally cooled for several centuries until around 1850, then started warming again, not smoothly, mind you, but in fits and starts. Variability in the sun's energy is often cited as the cause, and there are some very good correlations to back this up.

Changes in ocean circulation is another prominent theory. But nothing is settled and each new study pulls in another direction.

However, there is one thing we know for certain as a result of all this research, and that is that climate is never constant. We also know that it is extremely complicated, far more so than we imagined just 15 years ago. It is this natural variability and complexity that has made it so difficult to figure out what role humans play, if any.

What started out as a simple question has turned into one of the biggest scientific puzzles of all time. While this is frustrating to people who want easy answers, it is great science.

Adding to the confusion are the computer models. These are basically enormous computer games, called simulations. Each game, and there are many, starts with a version of the Earth's climate system. This may include the atmosphere, clouds, oceans, polar ice caps, sun, forests and humans, each represented in myriad different ways.

Each model of climate is like a fortress within which an endless series of scenarios can be played out. Given a basic game, one can try different factors to see what happens. People use these climate games to try to figure out why the temperature has gone up and down, and up again, and what it might do in the future. Extreme scenarios are often used, to try to make the effect of a given factor stand out.

For example, in the last 150 years the CO2 level has increased by about 30 per cent, but modellers look at future increases of 300 per cent or more, 10 times reality.

Unfortunately the results of playing these climate computer games with extreme scenarios are often reported in the media as facts about the Earth and our future climate. The reality is that, as with any computer game, a great deal is possible that is not realistic. This is especially true given that we really do not understand why the climate is behaving as it is. We do not know why the Earth has warmed and cooled, so we cannot predict the future. We do not know which game to believe.

For example, some extreme scenarios have the vast Greenland and Antarctic ice caps melting, flooding the world's coastal cities. Many people believe this is actually happening, based on alarmist headlines.

The reality, determined by extensive measurements, suggests that both ice caps are growing in volume, not shrinking. In a paper titled "Snowfall-driven growth in East Antarctic ice sheet mitigates recent sea-level rise," published in May 2005 in the prestigious journal Science, researchers Davis et al used satellite measurements to show that parts of the East Antarctic ice sheet increased in mass by about 45 billion tons per year from 1992 to 2003. Also not appreciated by the general public is the fact that the South Pole itself is colder now than at any time since record keeping began in the International Geophysical Year, 1957.

It turns out that our planet -- and therefore the science that attempts to describe it -- is immensely more complicated than Kyoto supporters suggest. Forty billion dollars buys a lot of science, and that science is paying off. We now understand the complexity and natural variability of climate in ways that were unimaginable just 10 years ago.

But the price of this understanding is that we now know that we do not know why the Earth is warming. We do not know if humans have anything to do with it, and they may well not. The scientific assumption behind the Kyoto protocol, namely that humans are known to be significantly interfering with an otherwise unchanging climate, is simply false. A new era of climate science lies before us.


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## BigDaddy (Mar 4, 2002)

Gohon: The ten-year window I discussed is linked to significant loss of artic ice sheets that will occur in the next decade if the current warming trends continue. Scientists estimate that an atmospheric CO2 concentration of 400 ppm will raise the world temperature two degrees C. When that happens, there will likely be widespread, irreversible melting of the ice caps. At the current rate of CO2 concentration increases, we will likely reach the 400 ppm threshold within 10 years. This means that we have 10 years to slow the buildup of CO2 to prevent us from reaching the 400 ppm threshold, or somehow invent a means of removing large concentrations of greenhouse gases from the atmosphere.

Scientists have been discussing this 400ppm CO2 threshold for quite some time. It was re-energized a year or so ago when a report titled "Meeting the Global Challenge" was released by an international climate task force. The threshold was also the subject of a report on ABC's Nightline a few weeks ago. I did a quick Google and came up with a few hits:

http://www.smh.com.au/news/Science/...o-return-report/2005/01/24/1106415510153.html

http://www.americanprogress.org/site/pp.asp?c=biJRJ8OVF&b=306503

I will tell you that I am an environmental scientists, and I recall many predictions from scientists that were originally viewed as "doomsday"-type predictions from nay-sayers and folks sitting at the local bar over a few beers. Around 30 years ago, scientists predicted problems with acid deposition in the northern Ohio River valley... eventually it came to be. Shortly thereafter, scientists predicted problems with the ozone layer if we didn't curb use of CFCs too.... eventually it came to be. Later still, scientists raised concern with global warming. The vast majority of scientists believe that global warming has already occurred. The only question is whether we will act in time to slow or reverse it.

With issues like this, I always ask myself who I should believe..... experts in the field, or nay-saying guys sitting at the bar?


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## zogman (Mar 20, 2002)

June 2006 Dakota Country page 38. Tony Dean convinced me :rollin:


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## fireball (Oct 3, 2003)

My guess is good ole boys John and Gohan leave their hunting field in worse condition than it was before they used it. They are the people who use the logic, "I don't believe the liberal media when they tell me these plastic bottles, bags and other garbage will last forever." It is alot harder to be responsible than it is to be lazy. You choose lazy, I choose to make an effort. :sniper:


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## Gohon (Feb 14, 2005)

fireball said:


> My guess is good ole boys John and Gohan leave their hunting field in worse condition than it was before they used it. They are the people who use the logic, "I don't believe the liberal media when they tell me these plastic bottles, bags and other garbage will last forever." It is alot harder to be responsible than it is to be lazy. You choose lazy, I choose to make an effort.


No fireball, what you choose is to be a smart *** instead of discussing the issue in a civil manner. But I pretty much figured that was the direction you were headed in after your second post. No surprise there.

BigDaddy, thanks for the links. I agree with you that more faith should be put in the reports by scientist than the local bar nay-sayers, that is a given however you have to admit that there are just as many scientist that claim nay as there are that claim yea. If that were not true then we wouldn't be having this discussion and instead would all be on the same page.


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## always_outdoors (Dec 17, 2002)

That coming from the guy who said this down in the politics forum.

Gohon said


> DecoyDummy, why don't you just stick your smart a$$ comment where the sun don't shine.


Once again a double standard for you Gohon. You can do it, but others can't.


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## Jiffy (Apr 22, 2005)

Live2hunt, that is Gohon's SOP (standard operating procedure). He thinks he is clever.....I cant wait to see what he says to me about this comment. :lol:


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## Gohon (Feb 14, 2005)

> Once again a double standard for you Gohon. You can do it, but others can't.


No....... two different subjects and two different smart *** remarks from two different people. But since you already knew that....... oh well....... you're just being you I guess. Now, did you or Jiffy have anything constructive to say about the subject or was that your best effort?????? I thought so......OOP's multiple ? again.


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## John M (Oct 24, 2005)

fireball said:


> My guess is good ole boys John and Gohan leave their hunting field in worse condition than it was before they used it. They are the people who use the logic, "I don't believe the liberal media when they tell me these plastic bottles, bags and other garbage will last forever." It is alot harder to be responsible than it is to be lazy. You choose lazy, I choose to make an effort. :sniper:


Now _your_ assuming things, I never said littering is ok, your getting off topic because you know what im saying is the truth, *THERE IS NOTHING WE CAN DO PERIOD WE HAVE TO GET TO WORK USING SOMETHING RIGHT? I WILL NOT RIDE MY BIKE 100 MILES AWAY. NOW UNLESS YOUR THE PRESIDENT OF THE USA THEN YOU CAN DO SOMETHING CIVILAINS CANNOT.* I never chose lazy I chose smart your not making no effort, telling people to ride bikes 100 miles to work is NOT an effort. If you want to put forth an effort fireball get a job somewhere that is looking to find an alternative in car fuel dont whine on a hunting forum. The only thing WE as humans can actualy do is stop making gas guzzlers and just make hybrid cars or some other form of power. UNTIL that happens fireball we are going to go about our lives driving fossil fuel powered cars and people like you will whine and waste your time. So if you want to help prevent global warming join some kind of group please dont whine on a outdoors forum.

:eyeroll:


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## fireball (Oct 3, 2003)

The topic started by someone posting the FACT that humans have a major effect on global warming and are speeding the process, as well as magnifying the results. This is leading to situations we wouldn't experience without burning fossil fuels. You two genius' said it doesn't exist, this is a natural cycle, we can't do anything about it. That is the topic, you are wrong, you guys spend 10x more time and effort on the politcal topics than anyone here. I don't know that I have ever posted on the political forum, if I have, it is a thread that started here and been moved there. I have never opened that link, don't care to, I don't want to hear what 25% of the people who think all is well think, it scares me that our education system has failed us at that large a rate.

You say man doesn't have an effect on global warming, it is a natural cycle. I think we are all aware of earths natural cycles. That is not new science. Core samples from the earth and ice packs on the poles tell us that carbon has never been at these levels. That is our imput. The worse the level, the worse the results. Simple. If you can't understand that, you are stupid, simple. Call me what you want, I don't care. I am calling you stupid. It has nothing to do with your efforts to curtail the results, it has to do with your desire to try and hide from it to make yourself feel better. I am done with this post, I may as well be talking to bunch of tribal people in the Amazon jungle, telling them the world is round and the sun is the center of our solar system, they may actually understand. The earth is round guys, just incase I missed it when G. W. told you guys it wasn't, so it has to be true. :sniper: :withstupid:


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## Plainsman (Jul 30, 2003)

> I am calling you stupid.


Speaking of uncivilized did you pick up that attitude in graduate school or charm school?

I don't think anyone thinks global warming doesn't exist. Scientists are currently studying it because they don't have all the answers. I guess they should have asked some of you guys. I remember in the early 70's when they argued about global warming vs. global cooling. Slowly the global warming theory gained more followers, but there is still contention.

Personally I am sure we have an effect, but like most am unsure of the magnitude. I think it goes without saying that ours is miniscule compared to the natural components of the phenomenon. That said of course we should try to cut emissions, just to be on the safe side. Do it through better mileage vehicles. It's a moot point we need to lower dependence on fossil fuels period, and reducing the rate of CO2 would be a fringe benefit.

There are many other things we can do like restore wetland which will store many tons of carbon per acre. Keep CRP which stores about five tons per acre. Reduce emissions from coal fired generators. Look for safer nuclear power. On, no nuclear. The liberals don't want global warming, but they are against most things that solve it also. Horses want do, we would be up to our eyeballs in horse exhaust.

There are agricultural programs that will help, and I am far happier with paying for conservation practices than I am support prices for grain produced.



> I may as well be talking to bunch of tribal people in the Amazon jungle,


Condescension has never won an argument.



> The earth is round guys, just incase I missed it when G. W. told you guys it wasn't, so it has to be true


There in lies another problem. Take a serious subject and turn it partisan. That way half the people are againt you to begin with and nothing is accomplished. Lets let science take the lead and temper it with a little skepticism. Remember when doctors told us how much better margarine was for us than butter only to find out 30 years later that hydrogenated vegetable oil is worse than butter. I have great respect for science, but I also realize that they are sometimes so impressed with themselves that they make mistakes. Speaking of the earth being flat, that is what leading intellectuals thought long ago. In the not to distant future they may look at today's brightest as not much advanced beyond that.

Talking down to people simply means your very impressed with yourself, or your frustrated with your inability to convince others. Let's play nice.


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## MossyMO (Feb 12, 2004)

What schooling?


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## Niles Short (Mar 18, 2004)

Alaska the 'poster state' for climate concerns
By Elizabeth Weise, USA TODAY
FAIRBANKS, Alaska - To the untrained eye, Bonanza Creek forest is breathtaking, a vibrant place alive with butterflies and birds, with evidence of moose and bear at every turn.
But look through forest ecologist Glenn Juday's eyes, and you see a dying landscape.

Since the 1970s, climate change has doubled the growing season in some places. Since 1950, the overall state temperature has risen by 3.5°F, while wintertime temperatures have risen by 6°F, says Juday, a professor at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks. Drought is stressing and killing spruce, aspen and birch trees.

Alaska has emerged as the poster state for global warming, the climate effect attributed to higher concentrations of "greenhouse" gases - mostly carbon dioxide created by burning fossil fuels - that capture the sun's heat in the atmosphere.

Global warming is a hot topic, especially now. Hurricane season begins Thursday, and climate researchers warn that rising ocean temperatures may bring more intense storms.

Former vice president Al Gore is back in the news with the release of his acclaimed documentary on warming, An Inconvenient Truth. And President Bush - who has been criticized by environmental groups that say he has been slow to acknowledge the dangers posed by warming - said last week that "people in our country are rightly concerned about greenhouse gases and the environment."

Alaska is important in measuring the effect of global warming on the USA because what happens here soon will be felt in the Lower 48 states, say experts such as Robert Corell, a senior fellow at the American Meteorological Society.

The spruce budworm, aspen leaf miner and the spruce bark beetle, pests once kept in check by winter cold, are flourishing here. Statewide, insect outbreaks have killed more than 4 million acres of forest in a decade and a half, says John Morton, a biologist at the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge in Soldotna.

Fires, long an integral part of the forest ecology here, are burning millions of acres as summers get longer and hotter, says Scott Rupp, a University of Alaska-Fairbanks professor of forestry. And with each wave of fires, trees have a harder time coming back in the increasingly warm and dry landscape.

This great northern forest may end up a grassland. "Soon, people will be coming to the great plains of Alaska," Juday says.

Alaska is ahead of the climate-change curve because polar regions warm the fastest. They had long been kept frigid by vast regions of snow and ice that reflect 70% of the sun's energy back out to space.

But higher temperatures are shrinking that snow and ice cover. In the Arctic, summer sea ice has shrunk 15% to 20% in the past 30 years, according to 2005's Arctic Climate Impact Assessment report.

And as the snow and ice recede, the sun's rays are hitting more dark ground and water, which absorb most of the heat, reflecting just 20% of the energy away, says Matthew Sturm, a research scientist with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory in Fairbanks.

Lakes and ponds are disappearing as the permafrost, permanently frozen ground that underlies much of Alaska north of Fairbanks, melts.

"It's like pulling the plug in a bathtub," says Peter Schweitzer, an anthropologist who works with the Arctic peoples in Alaska and Russia.

In some areas, as much as 40% of surface water has disappeared, taking with it vital habitat for ducks and other waterfowl, says Juday.

The permafrost that underlies much of the central and north of the state is a relic of the last Ice Age. Some of the frozen ground under Fairbanks is 100,000 years old, says Vladimir Romanovsky, a permafrost expert at Fairbanks. And it's now starting to get "slushy."

For Ruth Macchione, that meant a more expensive design to her new home after the cabin her husband built in the 1950s sank into the ground. The permafrost under the cabin thawed because the structure wasn't built to keep the ground cold - a key trick in building in cold regions.

Her new home incorporates piers to allow cold air to circulate underneath it.

"Local engineers are getting worried about higher ground temperatures, so they're specifying more pilings to combat that," says Billy Connor, director of the Alaska University Transportation Center. That will mean higher construction costs across the state, Sturm says.

Long summers, early spring

More heat means longer summers. The growing season in Fairbanks has gone from 80 to 120 days since records were first kept in the 1900s, says John Walsh, director of the Center for Global Change and Arctic System Research at the University of Alaska-Fairbanks.

But those summer days haven't come with any more rain, so plants and trees adapted to short, cool summers grow quickly but then dry out while it's still warm. That's one reason forest fires have become such a problem, he says.

Hotter summers aren't just a problem here. In the Midwest and East, a few extra degrees can bring on higher milk prices. That's because cows don't like it hot. When the mercury gets over 80°F, milk production drops.

"Last year, we had herds that were down 5 to 15 pounds of milk per cow, and they'll usually be making 65 to 75 pounds" a day, says Larry Chase, a professor of animal science at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y.

In the Midwest, the corn belt is shrinking, says S. Elwynn Taylor, a professor of agricultural meteorology at Iowa State University in Ames. Especially at the western edges in Nebraska and the Dakotas, areas that were marginal for corn and soybeans are now unable to economically grow them.

David Lobell, an environmental scientist at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, Calif., says that for every 2°F increase in growing-season temperature, farmers can expect a 17% decline in yield for both corn and soybeans.

Taylor isn't convinced that the warming isn't simply part of a larger climate pattern that has been seen in the Midwest since about 1850. He is not alone. Other scientists see warming as part of a cyclical climate change, but they are outnumbered by colleagues who say the planet is warming steadily because human activity is adding to the greenhouse gases.

A landmark 2001 report by the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change forecast that the average global surface temperature will increase 2.5 to 10°F above 1990 levels by 2100.

In White Mountain, a village of 200 on the western coast of Alaska near Nome, stocking up the larder is harder now for Rita Buck, a native Alaska Inupiaq and health practitioner at the town clinic.

Buck's year used to be a steady flow of work. First came salmon fishing, then harvesting berries. Salmonberries, a type of raspberry, would arrive first, then blueberries, blackberries and finally cranberries. Berries make up an important part of the subsistence diet.

But now, she says, the berries are blooming too early, when frost is still a danger. "It freezes all the berry blossoms and stops them growing," she says.

Cherry growers in Michigan, the nation's primary grower of tart cherries for pies, are having much the same problem. Spring now arrives seven to 10 days earlier there than in the 1970s, but cold snaps still come when they always have.

The commonly grown cherry variety isn't cold-hardy, so once it comes out of dormancy, it has no resistance to freezing, says Jeffrey Andresen, an agricultural meteorologist with Michigan State University in East Lansing.

"In 2002, early warming brought the tart cherry crop out of dormancy, and then a two-day freeze in April resulted in an almost complete loss for the year," he says.

Growers may have to plant new, more cold-hardy varieties, which won't be cheap, Andresen says. "You can't just pick up the trees and move them somewhere else."

Milder winters a problem

In Alaska, the sea ice that armors the coastline against winter storms is forming a week later than it used to, says David Atkinson, a Fairbanks professor of atmospheric science.

The state accounting office, worried about the cost of moving at-risk communities, estimates that more than 100 coastal villages potentially face danger as winter storms erode their once-protected shorelines. The open water makes for stronger storms. Some areas have lost 30 to 40 feet of beach in a single storm, Atkinson says.

Warmer winters also are creating problems for California farmers of high-value crops such as peaches, plums, nectarines, almonds, pistachios and walnuts, which need a period of cold in the winter to bloom properly.

A series of warm winters has played havoc with fruit production, says Theodore DeJong, a professor of plant science at the University of California-Davis. Farmers may have to switch out their current trees with low-chill varieties, expensive but at least a solution.

But for the trees that grow plums for prunes, that's simply not an option. It would take 10 to 20 years to develop low-chill varieties of these trees, DeJong says.

Packers already are moving some production to Chile. There could soon come a day when California, which grows 95% to 98% of all plums in the USA, is out of the business entirely.

The health element

The huge fires that have hit Alaska in the past few summers filled the air with so much smoke and ash that people in Fairbanks at times wore dust masks and doctors told asthmatic patients to leave town until the fires were out.

But it doesn't take a fire to make air unhealthy, says Paul Epstein, associate director of the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School.

U.S. asthma and allergy rates are increasing in part because more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is supercharging the production of pollen that can trigger them, he says. When carbon dioxide is doubled, ragweed stems grow 10% more but pollen increases by 60%.

"Pollen counts of 120 used to be cause for alert. We're seeing counts like 6,000 now," Epstein says.

Warmer winters also mean insects can survive and thrive in places where the cold used to keep them in check. Lyme disease is spreading beyond the former winter confines of the tick that carries it. And West Nile virus is spreading farther because spring drought amplifies the bird-biting mosquito cycle, Epstein says.

Looking forward

Ten years of change in the Arctic region is a preview of 25 years of change in the rest of the world, says Corell of the American Meteorological Society.

But that's not to say that path is cast in stone. Even researchers such as University of New Hampshire earth science professor Cameron Wake, who tracks such phenomena as the earlier arrival of spring, see a silver lining in this cloud.

"This country is at its best when it has a grand challenge, whether it's World War II or going to the moon," Wake says. "This is the next grand challenge."


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## Old Hunter (Mar 8, 2002)

Its the bacterial curve. The earth is the host and humans are the bacteria. The numbers rise until the host is overwhelmed, then crash. You can run but you cant hide. Have a nice day.


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## Habitat Hugger (Jan 19, 2005)

Whoa - Fireball and everybody else has a right to his opinion. Thats one of the things that makes this country great! The worst someone should do is agree to disagree with him, or anyone else. And why should someone have to be a hunter or fisherman to have an opinion on global warming??? As only 5% of Americans are hunters, are they the only ones affected?? 
BUT yes, scientists on both sides of the argument totally agree that the earth is warming, and the warming appears to corellate 100% with C02 levels. No arguments there..........
The problem is that the geopaleantologists point out that in the past, CO2 levels have gone up dramatically, sometimes to much higher levels than even currently predicted by "experts" like Al Gore (YUK!), and the earth has warmed up accordingly, ultimately cooling down and the situation reversed. Conversely there have been periods of relative cooling (excluding the ice ages!) such as during the middle ages, with no apparent causes. The Global warming THEORY people dismiss this as a "local abberation" and the anti warming people counter that the current warming is a "local abberation" too! 
Seems both sides are using the SAME DATA and using it to support their own figures. So who is correct?? And I don't think it is necessarily a case of "Figures never lie, only liars figure" either. It's data that can be interpreted different ways. Is the current Global warming totally a natural phenomenon, or totally man made, or some of both?? Unfortunately there seems to be NO hard data to absolutely prove it one way or another. 
Too many news stories and lectures by scientists that should know better seem to take a bit of truth (yes the world is warming) and immediately degenerate in to phrases like - We will see -we will experience - Expect this - Expect that - This will happen - etc!) That sensationalism irritates the heck out of me and loses credibility with me real fast.
As an open minded scientist I've researched and read just about everything written about it, and I still don't know, and wouldn't even venture an opinion! The fact that there are very sincere, credible, extremely bright scientists on BOTH sides of the argument tells me that the argument is far from settled. Time will tell, but we may have to wait a few hundred years to prove or disprove the GW THEORY! 
Unfortunately if the final answer is positive, and we don't start doing something about it now, we may be in deep crap by the time everyone agrees on the answers and solutions.
I personally think there are at least a thousand reasons to reduce burning fossil fuels (and stop screwing up the world in general - not to mention MASSIVE GLOBAL BIRTH CONTROL - and not just for third world countries, either - but that's a different subject!) Global warming may or not be be one of those reasons. 
I definitely have noticed that most people aren't very open minded about the THEORY of global warming, either 100% one way or the other. In my opinion those who absolutely discount it or accept it absolutely without question are simply showing me that they haven't done their homework.


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## Habitat Hugger (Jan 19, 2005)

Should have mentioned the article pasted by Niles Short is a good example of things that are happening, WITHOUT A DOUBT! This stuff is all secondary to global warming, again, without a doubt! Sure! Absolutely! 100% Correct! Unquestionably! No Arguments at all!!!

BUT, the ONLY important question is WHAT"S THE HECK IS CAUSING THE WARMING?

1) Natural Phenomena?
2) Man Made, primarily by burning too much fossil fuels??
3) A mixture of natural and man made??

The Solution - if it's totally natural and totally out of our control, then there's nothing we can do!

But - if any part of it is produced or contributed to by human activity then we should change that to the best of our ability. There's lots of other good reasons to reduce burning fossil fuels, so new technology, smaller vehicles, less driving, smaller homes, global population control. etc. are good starting points.


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## Gohon (Feb 14, 2005)

Good post Habitat Hugger. And I agree that some measures of change should be undertaken now. I do have reservations about allowing Congress to jump in with some of the drastic changes that are being proposed without at least a little unbiased study being done. However when I see comments like "You two genius' said it doesn't exist, this is a natural cycle, we can't do anything about it" and "You say man doesn't have an effect on global warming, it is a natural cycle", I see fabricated comments that were never said and are totally made up by the person making them who in my opinion has no wish to discus the issue but simply force feed their personal views.

This causes concern on my part as to changes that may or should be made, especially if done by congress who seems to screw up most of what they touch. I get so irritated when I hear the usual spin about we must switch to alternative fuels, we must reduce our dependency on imported oil and so on and so on. But these same people will not tell us what are the alternative fuels and how to get off imported oil. The only thing that is being pushed is ethanol and in my opinion anything that is dependent on mother nature is not a reliable source. We know we can use nuclear power, hydro electric, solar generators, wind generators and a host of others but no one will touch these topics because of the not in my back yard crowd. Seems to me we are just running around in a circle with nothing being accomplished.


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