There is even an appeal to End Days and Rapture Ready Survivalists without scaring anybody with Al Gore or CO2: Solar IS Civil Defense. A few square inches of solar electric panel can power the flashlight (LED), radio, cell phone, and extra set of batteries we’re supposed to have on hand in case of emergency or disaster. Solar flashlight, radio, and cell phone chargers (add a battery tray and you can charge rechargeable batteries) are available, off the shelf, from a variety of sources for about $30 or less. There are also solar/dynamo versions for about the same price. That combination of sunlight and muscle power is a source of survival electricity day or night as long as the sun keeps shining, there is strength to turn the crank of the dynamo, and the batteries can hold a charge. This makes a fine survival tool and a real advantage in a civil defense situation or Armageddon.
Such a solar/dynamo light, radio, and cell phone charger is also a significant rise in the standard of living for the billion or two people now in the world who do not have access to electricity. Include the bicycle (one of our most efficient machines) as a power source and there is the possibility of a real leapfrog technology around the world for the poorest of the poor.
Take it a step farther. Since before the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan, US and NATO forces have distributed at least 700,000 solar/dynamo am/fm/sw radios throughout that country. These solar/dynamos do not presently charge anything but the radio battery sealed inside the case. With a simple modification, the addition of some wiring, they could charge AA and other standard size rechargeable batteries and help power other devices like an LED light or a cell phone (there is cell phone service in parts of Afghanistan). This would magnify their utility as tools for economic and social development. US AID plans to send 250,000 solar/dynamo radios to Sudan over the next few years as part of an educational project. Same problem, no battery charging capability, and another example of an under-utilized, installed solar capacity.
I’m tired of talking about the footnotes in IPCC reports. I want to do something that improves my life today and the survival of my children and grandchildren tomorrow. Standard maintenance is not as glamorous as stolen emails, but the Republicans’ laughter during the campaign didn’t change the fact that keeping your tires properly inflated saves gas and money while reducing tire wear. Obama missed a step when he didn’t double down by talking about other car and truck energy saving tips. People who believe in climate change could take the hint and protest the inaction of their elected representatives on energy, the environment, and jobs by running roadside tune-ups for more miles per gallon. They might even introduce their neighbors to the concept of hypermiling while helping anybody and everybody save money and energy, even the people who confuse climate with weather, listen to Rush, and watch Glenn. Maybe one demand of such positive protests could be that Obama host a weatherization barnraising on the White House with “This Old House,” “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition,” and all the other TV home improvement shows recording the event. That is, if any reporters were interested in reporting something other than hockey stick graphs and Senatorial igloos.
We aren’t even really talking about climate change now. We are talking about the science of climate change as reflected through a funhouse mirror. The solutions work whether the science is faulty or correct and those solutions (efficiency and renewables) have had about 70% approval in all the polls I’ve seen since the first energy crisis back in the early 1970s. I don’t want to talk about the problem any more. I’d like to talk about solutions.
Climate change is moot. Let’s begin to do the things that save money and energy, reduce pollution and waste, create jobs, decrease foreign imports, and improve the economy. Mama Gaia will do whatever she’ll do. I don’t care whether catastrophic climate change is real or not, happening or not, caused by me or sunspots or the Reptiloids. I just want to use my solar income and get closer to zero emissions, zero defects, and zero injuries (DuPont’s standard for their business according to Gil Friend in The Truth About Green Business. Evidently, DuPont has not only saved a significant amount of money this way but earned more by sharing some of their methods and practices.)
Judging from what I read, hear, and see, we’re stuck in this moot court climate debate merry-go-round and can’t or won’t step off.
cross-posted to dailykos, bluemassgroup, eurotribune
Maybe I’m tired and not catching the edge.
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p>Maybe it’s just a strange post, which is not to say I disagree with most of it.
The edge is that there are a number of universally agreed solutions to reducing waste, pollution, and greenhouse gases that are cost-effective and job-producing no matter what your politics are on the issue of anthropogenic climate change. It is my opinion that the so-called debate on the issue is a smokescreen to preclude any action at all. I think that there are direct actions that people can take within their own lives and within their own neighborhoods which can not only reduce their own carbon footprints but can also force their representatives to support such activities on a national scale.
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p>Does that clear it up for you?
We simply disagree then. Fair ’nuff.
With what do you disagree?
I also disagree with the tenor — that we should change in ways which happen to reduce CO_2 because they happen to also reduce other “bads”. Before awareness of climate change we knew about all these other bads, and simply didn’t take nearly enough steps to reduce ’em.
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p>Climate change is the biggie. It’s the catastrophe scenario. Those other things aren’t catastrophes. Cancer rates doubling isn’t a catastrophe, nor are rivers loading up with pollution. They’re bad, to be sure, but not on the scale of risk that climate change is, not even close.
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p>Climate change matters. If you don’t believe that humans are inducing a problematic change in climate, then ask yourself: are there other reasons to do what the climactics want (pollution, foreign oil, trade deficit, local jobs, etc)? If yes, join us for the ride. I think that is your point.
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p>The problem with your thinking is: if you do believe the climactics, then the imperative to take action is much greater than before — and the old way of doing things (weak CAFE, ratcheting up the Clean Air Act so slowly that we still have 50% power from coal, poor building efficiency standards, etc) is what we got with the old view of environmental, trade, and employment issues — and it clearly isn’t sufficient.
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p>So yeah, don’t buy the climate change is bad and caused by humans argument? Consider it moot and think on those other things… and lets be honest — where climate change is dominated by an individual’s personal high priority, it’s easy to clasp on to denial. So, who’s in denial?
* theocons: if you believe that man and dino walked together 6000 years ago, ain’t no way a plot of temperature vs. time is going to have an impact. Theocons will never believe climate change is an issue.
* wall-streeters: if the solution to the problem is a taxation scheme or more regulation, it is antithetical to their fundamental. They simply can’t buy in to anything but cries for personal action, which can not solve a tragedy of the commons problem.
* carbon energy folks: this is everything from Big Oil execs to the wife of a coal miner. If you make your living on carbon fuel, you’ve got to deny carbon change. It’s your livelihood.
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p>We’re talking about a broad segment of peoples, and look: those other reasons haven’t made an impact on these groups either. Forgive me, but I’ve yet to see the Baptist conventions cry out for more environmental protection. Wall streeters aren’t clamoring for a more robust EPA and carbon energy folks scoff at environmental concerns.
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p>So tell me, who’s left? Which groups of people
(a) don’t believe human activity is leading to dangerous climate change, but
(b) believe that halting water and air pollution, ending our dependence on foreign fuels (btw: most nuclear fuel comes from abroad), and creating new energy jobs here at home is so important that they’re willing to work damn hard at getting policy, taxation, regulation, and all other schemes necessary to accomplish those goals?
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p>Who are these people? Realistically, how many of ’em are there? Are there enough in any one place to stand along side climate change folks and push a legislator “over the hill”?
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p>I think the number of folks who fall into this camp is few, too few to worry about. The fact is that climate change is just another environmental issue to folks. If you’re predisposed to give a crap about our generation’s impact on the environment of future generations, you likely believe climate change is real and want the gov’t to take tangible steps to deal with it. If, however, you didn’t already worry about what condition our grandchildren’s Earth will be in, you also don’t believe climate change lest it get between you and your God given right to as much consumption as possible, to hell with the consequences.
I personally believe that climate change is real, is happening, and is probably already on the way to being catastrophic. My problem is that playing the catastrophe card has gotten us very close to nothing. In fact, you can make the argument that crying catastrophe has only energized the opposition.
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p>By saying that climate change is moot, I wish to point people toward the universally agreed upon ideas that save energy and money so that we, finally, act upon them. The fact that they also reduce GHG is a boost but should be beside the point. There is a real business case for greater efficiency and the business community recognizes them as Total Quality Management or Six Sigma. Build on those realities and leave the controversy for some other time.
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p>I’ve been involved in energy issues since before the first energy crisis in the early 1970s. In all that time, we have not done what we know we should do whether the threat was high prices, foreign oil, or climate change. I am looking for another way to motivate people and think that de-escalating the rhetoric and undertaking practical efficiency actions may make that difference.
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p>I don’t want to talk any more. I think all that talk has become a substitute for action, especially for the deniers. I want to see more direct action, practical action, that makes a difference for individual homeowners and neighborhoods. The example of the weatherization barnraisings, which have increased enormously since Cambridge’s HEET started them in the summer of 2008, is heartening. We should be talking about that at least as much as the minutiae of the East Anglian emails.
The bulk of scientific authority agrees on global warming issues. The time for action has long passed. It isn’t enough to pass a few tax laws to fix the problem. The human population is producing CO2 at an alarming rate. We must lower the world population. We must look to mandatory population controls through world governments to reduce the human menace from seven billions to a manageable number.