Look. Climate Change is very probably happening, and we should take sensible action to be cleaner and more friendly to our planet. But Sir David Attenborough has been making high profile docudramas accusing Climate Change for all the worlds ills, regardless of their actual cause.
First on Netflix where his “Our Planet” show attributed Pacific Walrus cliff fall deaths at Ryrkaypiy to climate change. Since then it has emerged that in all probability the Walrus population being there was very normal, it being a bit of a regular holiday spot for them. It was a bit crowded as Walruses are having a bit of a baby boom recently. The cliff fall stampede that lead to the deaths may well have been caused by the polar bears that were hunting in the area, exacerbated by added fear of the drone they were using for ariel footage and by his camera crew blocking the safer southern descent.
Next in BBC’s “Climate Change – The Facts” (sic) we were treated with some carefully massaged statistics and forecasts and then a dying Flying Fox Bat population due to the 42C heat attributed to Climate Change. Such temperatures actually not that unusual for Australia where it is and always has been bast*rd hot. It’s been bast*rd hot there for hundreds and hundreds of years. It was not even close to the 48C highest recorded temperature from their pre industrial 19th century.
Like Matilda shouting “Fire! Fire!”, when he actually does get around to talking about some of the real genuine impacts we have had on our world, sadly David may well now not be believed.
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"ariel footage"? Washing powder, or mermaids?
‘Look. Climate Change is very probably happening...’
Very probably?
Definitely!
There never has been climate stasis and climate has been changing for 4,5 billion years or so; it is dynamic, chaotic and non-linear.
There are no data to show any trend in the climate system outside natural variation.
If we are to ‘stop’ climate change then in what perfect state must we arrest it, and where do we find details of this perfect state, and how exactly to ‘stop’ it, and how to keep it from changing ever again?
In case we were in any doubt that those who propagate the climate change nonsense are mad, we have had it confirmed by the willingness of those afflicted to take instruction on the subject from a 16 year old with mental problems.
* It's raining, my washing is getting wet, Something Must Be Done!
# Yeah, bring the washing in.
* No, somebody must stop it raining!
Take the economic point of view before saying that "we" should do something about climate change. Specifically, take the scenario of Prof William Nordhaus. Both climate change and climate mitigation are costly, but climate change is the more costly. "We" apply policy until the point where for the marginal cost of policy exceeds the marginal benefit of costly climate change mitigated.
There is an onus on those implementing the policy to achieve policies as optimal as possible. That is a global and uniform carbon tax.
But there is a problem with the "we" in policy. Most countries - responsible for the vast majority of global emissions - have no intention of imposing costly climate policies on their people. For a country like the UK costs expended on mitigation will be net beneficial to the people of that country. Further, the costs of climate change increase dramatically with temperature. Nordhaus uses a quadratic function. A quartic seems to fit the Stern Review better. As such, the optimal policy is to do as little as possible, whilst getting other countries to shoulder the burden.
Also, there are two types of country where mitigation policy costs are likely to be much greater than for say France or the UK.
First, are the developing countries, where cheap fossil fuels can help economic growth. That is such countries are exempt for any obligation to reduce emissions in the near future. With >60% of emissions it effectively renders impossible trying to reduce global emissions by 55% by 2030. This is the reduction estimated by the UNEP emissions gap report 2018 to maintain warming within 1.5C
Second are the nations who derive a large part of their national incomes from selling fossil fuels. These include Russia, Saudi Arabia, Iran and Kuwait. It could be pointed out that the US produces more oil, coal and gas than Russia. In Mtoe equivalents the US produces up to 50% more. By US nominal GDP is about 12 times larger.
But there is a problem with the "we" in policy
Easily soluble by making the carbon tax assymetric.
Example: passengers on all flights leaving London are charged CO2 taxes. International passengers on inbound flights are only charged if they are arriving from countries that don't apply a CO2 tax. The tax collected gets remitted to their departure local authority.
Ditto for imports: finished products get charged a tariff based on the CO2 produced in their manufacture. No tariff at all if it's been charged already. The tax collected gets remitted to the regional government where the item is manufactured.