Jerry is now on my banned senders list

Vote in a differnt government then! A major problem is that people are arguing over the symptoms and ignoring the malaise. Carbon Credits looks to me like the proverbial rearranging of the deckchairs on the Titanic. Increasing the costs/taxes to poluters and gifting to the non-poluters seems back to front to me - give the poluters loans to improve their production equipment, money raised by taxing the users of the goods produced.

Greg.P.

We've got ice melting in Antartica - ice that has been there millions of years. An interesting point is that the ice melting is supporting ice further inland that is 5-10km thick.

Greg.P.

But how much is it going to cost? We can't afford it!

So long as you've got some clean towels and a disinfectant spray for the carpet ...

Greg.P.

Which causes problems if the country isn't equipped to handle that kind of weather.

In up-state New York, ten degrees of latitude lower than London, Winter is harder than in the UK even today, but just unpleasant although heating bills have gone through the roof so people feel cold indoors. But we are geared up for it. Everybody has a wardrobe of serious winter clothing - like the sort of stuff most Brits only wear for skiing. The council ploughs the roads and salts them, private contractors plough the driveways. Trains are less susceptible to ice and snow because they are designed to take the weather into account. At my nearest station there is a yellow thingy that looks like a jet engine on wheels with its nozzle pointing down onto the track ahead to melt snow and ice. We never run out of salt and grit for the roads. This means higher local taxes to pay for all this.

But at least things don't grind to a halt. Although one year we did have "the wrong kind of snow" which caused problems with the electric trains.

Building for heavy snow means stronger roofs to carry the extra weight of all that snow. Stronger overhead power lines that can support a weight of ice. And all sorts of less obvious things that Britain will have to catch up on.

A conservation organisation in the Adirondacks has been organising for individuals to but carbon emission certificates. It's only the proverbial drop in the ocean, but it does mean some of them don't get transferred to dirty industries.

Using less energy usually costs less than using more energy, but again the cost of getting it wrong is permanently and irretrievably unaffordable. Guy

Nice way of putting it, but is it just energy vs scientists. I believe its a scientific bandwagon that many people have jumped on and are not always giving a balanced interpretation of the information available.

There is nothing efficient in the way money is currently being wasted on some 'apparent' energy saving projects. A potential increase of GBP100 on annual power bills by putting a vast number of low energy light bulbs in cupboards doesnt seem to be a very good idea.

Cheers, Simon

Sounds really scary so we must do something - by the way how do you know what the cost of getting it wrong will be ?

Cheers, Simon

I worked on some of those models - CLIMAP.

There are a lot more uncertainties than that. For one, why were large data sets completely ignored?

Concerned, not worried. This is a process that has been going on for the past 20,000 years - +/-. Had the warming not occured, we'd still be chasing wooly mammoth.

What it will cause is an Ice Age. Certainly in Europe, and possibly Asia and North America. So, it will all even out in the end ...

Glasgow is about 55 degrees North which, IIRC, is about the same lattitude as Anchorage, Alaska.

Nope. Plenty of precedent, even during the last 20,000 years.

Lots of credible explanations. Variation in solar output, to name just one.

You owe it to yourself to read more than what the IPCC puts out. The IPCC and all of the scientists associated with their findings have a monetary interest in convincing all of us that they and only they are right - they keep their jobs. Some of them get tenure which gives even more job security.

Really? Here's some input from CDIAC. Note that they are talking about One Half degree Celsius or Less and they are using ***1961-1990*** as a Base!

[Trends in annual mean temperature anomalies for the globe show relatively stable temperatures from the beginning of the record through about 1910, with relatively rapid and steady warming through the early 1940s, followed by another period of relatively stable temperatures through the mid-1970s. From this point onward, another rapid rise similar to that in the earlier part of the century is observed. The year 2008 was the tenth warmest in the global record (0.33°C above the 1961-1990 reference period mean), exceeded by 1998, 2005, 2003, 2002, 2004, 2006, 2001, 2007 and 1997. [Jones et al. (1999) report the 1961-1990 reference period means for the globe, northern hemisphere, and southern hemisphere as 14.0°C, 14.6°C, and 13.4°C, respectively.]

An additional summary of the Jones et al. temperature record (along with several other informative climate-related "Information Sheets" available from the CRU) may be found here. The 1990s were the warmest complete decade in the series. The warmest year of the entire series is 1998, with a temperature of 0.546°C above the 1961-90 mean. Thirteen of the fourteen warmest years in the series have now occurred in the past fourteen years (1995-2008). The only year in the last fourteen not among the warmest fourteen is 1996 (replaced in the warm list by 1990). The period 2001-2008 (0.43°C above 1961-90 mean) is 0.19°C warmer than the 1991-2000 decade (0.24°C above 1961-90 mean).]

150 years or less in the Americas, and somewhat more in Europe. And, of course, the planet is about Four Billion years old. Hominids have been littering for the past 8,000,000 or so. Perhaps we were responsible for one or more of the Ice Ages.

Follow the Money!!

We've got ice melting in Greenland. Ice that has been melting for 20,000 years.

Very sensible. So, it won't be done.

Follow the Money! Who makes a profit from Carbon Credits? Al Gore for one, and several "energy lobby" participants.

1963 I was trapped on a USAF base just outside Swindon for two weeks! When the NCO club ran out of beer, several of us broke trail through the snow drifts to the nearest Pub.

Unfortunately I can also remember 1947. Loved it!