Comments johnmcc793 has made

Missing the point!

To Pompey and others discussing mountaintop mining, you are missing a piece of truth.  

When the acid rain program was added to the Clean Air Act, the SO2 trading mechanism made it possible for eastern coal boilers equipped to burn only hard eastern coal to switch from western KY and southern Il high sulfur coal to the very low sulfur content coal of eastern KY and Appalachia.

1.2 pounds of SO2 per million btu of heat became the prized commodity among mine owners and their "compliance coal" customers.

We can thank Environmental Defense Fund for the SO2 trading program and the "unintended conseuence" of creating a "compliance coal" market for MTR coal in Appalachia.

Back when the acid rain program was being debated (I was there) Chairman Henry Waxman proposed legislation to "buy" SO2 scrubers for the nation's 50 largest SO2 emitting plants.  EDF thought that was an expensive and silly idea and went for the quick fix...unintended consequences and all.

Look it up.  The history of MTR is writen in the Clean Air Act.  Gets complicated but the truth is important.

John McCormickOn The entire 'clean coal' effort could be fruitless posted 9 months, 2 weeks ago 17 Responses

Downwind Truth

Makes no sense to be opposed to wind energy.  It is essential in the US mix of electric generation.  But, it has its downside and that is the hidden reality of its advocates; inlcuding Al Gore.

Big Horn Wind Project reports its monthly net generation data to the US Department of Energy's Energy Informaiton Administration (Form 920) and its generating capacity (Form 860).

Using 2007 data,  the total megawatt-hours (MWh) of net generation was 550,365 MWh.  Total generating capacity of the wind farm is 199 megawatts (MW).  

If the farm operated 24/7 throughout the year its on-line factor would be 100%.  Only a few nuclear units operate inear that range but 365 x 24 x generating capacity is how the industry calculates the on-line factor of generating units.

Thus, Big Horn has a theoretical on-line factor of 1,743,240 MWh of electric output.

The follwing is the 2007 monthly MWh and on-line capacity for Big Horn provided by the operator:

        Monthly on-line %
JAN    23.93%
FEB    26.27%
MAR    39.02%
APR    38.54%
MAY    33.57%
JUN    41.34%
JUL    29.83%
AUG    29.07%
SEP    28.85%
OCT    33.28%
NOV    19.63%
DEC    40.78%

2007 Total    31.57%

This is not a condemnation of wind power.  It is a reality check that no matter how many towers are put up, they work when the wind blows and that may not be in synch with demand.

Electricity storage is offered as a solution to wind downtime but we are not there yet.

100% of elec gen from renewables in 10 years is an impossibility and we do not help our cause by ignoring the intermittent nature of wind and solar and the constant nature of power demand.

Go Senator Obama!

John McCormick
On The European wind industry continues its march to dominance posted 1 year ago 1 Response

"Socialism in America"

For candidate Ronald Reagan, it was "Morning in America".

Well, the sun rose a week ago and we find it is "Socialism in America".

For an admitted progressive, liberal, I welcome more and hopefully more resourceful government into my family's life.

We know the penalty of trusting that hedge fund with our earnings. Now, we are putting our faith in the Federal Reserve to bail out our and the global economy. Look around at the imploding institutions and nation-governments looking to government-funded rescues.

So, lets get used to the future of depending upon each other's wealth to get us through this rough and likely extensive global economic contraction. If the private sector is not willing to lend to its private sector brethren because there is no confidence the borrower will survive, it is time to abandon that ship and climb aboard a ship of state.

Lets take this new (revised) state of affairs a long leap forward into US and OECD energy policy and eventually into global energy policy. Exit the private sector. Enter the public sector.

Wind farms and planned wind farms need access to the large urban electricity markets and that requires thousands of miles of expensive transmission lines. US utility dereg has put those investments into the hands of private power line companies who profit from less wire because that causes power transmission congestion at certain times and in certain areas of the country so they can charge more to power suppliers with excess power to sell a high demand customer. Why do we not put an end to this predatory line-lending practice by nationalizing the nation's three un connected grids, Eastern, Western and Texas into one Interstate wire system just like we did for the interstate highways.

Too much to swallow in one bite? I agree.

Huge costs for taxpayers to buy up the privately held transmission wires and towers. Lets put this idea into overdrive and suggest we simply expropriate those wires for the public good. The owners can write off their losses in tax breaks over time.

The State and federal governments (we, the people) enjoy condemnation rights of private property when we deem the owner is holding out for an extortionist selling price. But, the public needs that land and we will not be denied when it is in our collective interest.

Getting control of the wires, we, the people can now use our tax dollars to build what a shaky capitalist system of investors are not willing to do; we can build the wind and solar farms to get that likely 20% max of non-CO2 emitting new power into the grid and start to replace aging and dirty fossil fueled capacity with cleaner, more efficient generating capacity (including next generation nuclear reactors) to assure reliable power in a growing renewable power future.
Does that sound too radical? Ever heard of TVA?
I can stop here and let you add some ideas about getting back control of our energy future by owning it through our tax dollar purchases.

Then, lets get on with propping up the UN system to expand our future think into the global community.

John McCormick
On Will we see $3 gasoline before $5? posted 1 year, 1 month ago 11 Responses

Parsing her sparse energy intellect

Pangolin,  what a challenge McCain has trying to corral his maverick VP candidate.

She does not know how to wing answers to tough questions and frankly, she cannot survive the debates.

A note to you:  do not end a sentence with a preposition.  It is bad form.

John McCormickOn Asked about oil's fungibility, Palin says ... um, something posted 1 year, 2 months ago 5 Responses

Different worlds share same outcome

With a global warming planet and all that entails regarding more frequent and intense drought, storms, disease outbreaks, loss of habitat and coastline there is no place for anyone to hide.

People who know enough to be unconcerned about global warming will possibly be some of the hardest hit victims because their capacity to prepare and adjust will be too limited.  Of course, the very poorest and lease capable to defend themselves will be VICTIM ONE and we know that much.

I care less about those who care less about glbal warming because I see international trade giants such as the APEC nations beginning to get serious about global warming.  China does not have the internal wealth to survive long-term global warming impacts and it will suffer the loss of the waters of the Himalayan glaciers long before Battery Park is inundated.  Nonetheless, both will happen in time regardless of the Republicans and Ayn Rand's selfish children.

John McCormick
On Well-informed Republicans are not concerned about climate change posted 1 year, 6 months ago 60 Responses

Lay off Sen. Clinton

Dave, you tend to run on a bit longer than your message requires.  Senator Clinton may not be all things to all people but she has been a good and hard-working Senator and poltician.  The baggage she carries is not all of her doing.

Cut her a bit of slack.  She earned that much!

John McCormickOn Learning from the gas tax episode, Obama could treat rural whites like adults posted 1 year, 6 months ago 13 Responses

new] Yep...where is this going

Does anyone else feel ripped off by the whole damned You Tube **serious** approach to a serious topic.

Now, we are treated to the unquestionably stupid and sexist hypothesis that goes as follows:

[They would rather date men who operate exclusively on the little brain, much easier to manipulate.  A paycheck with a penis, the perfect man!]

Folks there are several ice bergs dead ahead and we are scratching around with nonsense...driven, in part, by that failed attempt to get our attention by hosting an exhibitionist to do just that.

Grist needs a dorm monitor and likely an overhaul.

John McCormick
On How to get people to pay attention to peak oil posted 1 year, 6 months ago 45 Responses

CO2 equivalents...so that means

We all make the mistake of focusing only on CO2 as if the methane, nitrous oxide, CFC 12, HCFC 22, perfluoromethane, sulfur hexafluoride, water vapor, etc. are not important.

In fact, they represent a climate forcing potention equal to about 13 percent of the CO2 level.

2007 CO2 level is about 385 ppm; thus CO2 equalvents are comparable to a CO2 level of 412 ppm today.

A lot to think about.

John McCormick On Atmospheric carbon dioxide, methane rise sharply in 2007 posted 1 year, 7 months ago 16 Responses

How much is AW worth?

I tried to stay with the AW piece to the end but my sense of being suckered got the best of me.

However, I did fix on the last sentence of his piece and the whole thing came together....from out of the BLUE.

Warbach wrapped up his sales presentation with the following:

[When you look at the planet earth from space, you don't see social problems, you don't see economic problems. But you do see a little bit of green. And a whole lot of BLUE.]

Well, from wherever I view our planet,  I do see social problems and economic problems...anyone got an argument with that?

And, that whole lot of BLUE that Warbach sees:

BLUE IS THE COLOR OF THE (HOW MANY) WALMART SIGNS SPREAD ACROSS THIS PLANET.

Adam:  Brilliant!!!!!!!!

John McCormickOn Adam Werbach calls for a new movement of a billion consumers posted 1 year, 7 months ago 73 Responses

We made them rich

Amazing, you are in your game on this thread.

We create rock stars out of nobodies and feed their egos by giving air time and dollars to their every thought, deed, rant and product.

Adam started out as one of the legion of idealists but had not the heart to stay in the trenches.  

Instead, he took to the fast lane and moved into a better zip code while others of us stay on the ground trying to make sense of the babble that surrounds US non-policy to placate selfish consumers in a  global warming world.  Walmart is China's outlet store.

You summed it up:

[The rich and famous are far beyond us simple bloggers.  So much jet set sophistication,]

This all makes me really blue.

John McCormickOn Adam Werbach follows up 'Death of Environmentalism' with 'Birth of Blue' posted 1 year, 7 months ago 46 Responses

I cann't bear to think about it

Folks,  

I found this on the web:

About The Polar Bear Conservancy

Founded in 2006, the Polar Bear Conservancy is dedicated to protecting the polar regions' most magnificent mammal.

Contact:
Lisa Stahl, Director of Media Relations
The Polar Bear Conservancy
206-784-0309
http://www.polarbearconservancy.org

Will they teach the bears to climb rope ladders to scale the 500 foot snow cliffs that rim the Antarctic coast.

Save us from these misguided ones.

John McCormick
On New campaign plans to relocate polar bears to Antarctica posted 1 year, 8 months ago 27 Responses

Blood of Iraq on Nader's hands

Put aside the righteous outcry that you have a right to vote for whom you wish.  

There were only two choices in 2000.  Nader said he would not allow the election to fall to Bush but Nader did not pull out of the Florida election by telling his supporters to vote for Gore.

Say what yu will abouta Nader's virtue and contributions to consumers.  He delivered Bush and Cheney and possibly 600,000 Iraq's are dead; several million displaced; the country in shambles; nearly 4000 American soldiers dead; many thousands of American soliders severely injured; possibly hundreds of thousand of returning American soldiers needing long-term care the White House ignores...what else can you add to this sad list of only one chapter of the past 7.5 years.

Nader will never answer for the mess he caused by goading 97,000 Floridians to vote for him.

Ralph, do you see the difference now!  Get out of our face!On Ralph Nader might jump into the presidential race posted 1 year, 9 months ago 129 Responses

Urban Legend

Charlie, great piece of work. This should be a no-brainer for NYC.

Congratulations.

You are now, also, an urban legend.

John McCormickOn Spearheading transit for livable cities at 93 posted 1 year, 9 months ago 4 Responses

Not an open question!

Tom, you said:

[Must we call for emergency mobilization? Must we seek to put all "available and necessary resources" at the service of a global crash program to stabilize the climate?]

Of course, we must.  But, the collective WE will not act sufficeintly and in time to reduce (I would settle for leveling off)the buildup of CO2 equivalent concentration in the global atmosphere.

The US has the world's largest and highest paid environmental awareness industry and this is the sunset on Bali; the 11th time the world has focused on an international agreement to save our children's future. (Press coverage abounds) Yet, in 2007, US  demand for oil, natural gas, coal and electricity all increased by 2 percent or more.  Go figure! Is anyone listening to the warnings or do we expect the problem to go away?

I am telling anyone listening that this century will see the collapse of capitalism (start with sea level rise) and I have no idea what will replace it.  We are only hanging on for the ride.

Time for truth telling to force us to prepare our children to survive the future we are delivering to them.

People tell me I must offer up a solution to this tragic future I forsee.  I say there are some problems that are intractable if all players are not investing in the solution.  The Arctic ice meltback of 2007 happened with a .6 (C) mean average global temp increase  but knowing people debate whether 2 degree (C) increase is maybe too much to sustain the earth's ecosystems and climate balance.  HELLO!

China and India have about 40 years of reasonable  productivity then the light go out as the Himalayan glaciers have no more water to give to the more than 1.6 billion people surviving on those mountain streams.

Code Red is a start but turning on the emergency siren is where I am going.

John L. McCormickOn The case for a sustainability emergency posted 1 year, 9 months ago 18 Responses

Wall Street Concern

GreyFlcn,  I spent many unproductive hours trying to frame the AGW message that will catch Wall Street's attention.  Its a many-trillion dollar gambling parlor and operates globally-now at the speed of light.  But, we know "Wall Street" is our euphemism for "capitalism".  

Having reached the end point with my Wall Street focus, along comes the great international credit crunch and panic.  And, wow.  Wall Street saddled up and became the search and rescue team on steroids.  Maybe it is too late to stave off serious and long-term economic recession in the US and non-commodity export nations but there is a lesson here.  Wall Street will act in its collective self-interest and the better we understand whom those self-interest are, the more likely we can affect their behavior.

The many billions of shares traded every hour around the globe are not the work of day-traders sitting at the kitchen table.  Pension and mutual funds are the major betters and day traders hang out t the $2 window.  

Putting an increasingly higher price on carbon and making bettors understand the risk of betting on carbon-overweight stocks will eventually have a desired effect because share earnings will diminish as production costs increase faster than consumer income.

Imagine midwestern electric customers having to absorb a 10 cent/kilowatt-hour charge--bringing those customers into line with prices paid by New England customers (supplied mainly by gas/oil/hydro and nuke sources).  The Midwesterns would revolt and either the US economy would collapse or non-carbon electric power sources would come streaming into that market region.  Capital for the new low/no-carbon generating equipment would be derived either by borrowing at likely high ROR rates or by shareholder equity.

It is hard for me to imagine "Global Wall Street" operating in any other way.

John L. McCormick
On Climate change is as much a social priority as an environmental concern posted 1 year, 10 months ago 7 Responses

Mising the Point

Sheryl, I went to the link you provided and read the following summary of why Environmental Defense champions CO2 cap and trade.  

Nat said:

{We have proof that this works in the acid rain program. When we put a cap on sulfur dioxide (SO2), the cause of acid rain, the power sector and its suppliers came up with a range of technological innovations to meet the new limits. Some were relatively mundane - for example, figuring out how to burn low-sulfur Wyoming coal in boilers designed for high-sulfur coal from Illinois or West Virginia. Others were more dramatic. The prospect of a cap on SO2 prodded a team of GE engineers to figure out how to turn the waste from a "scrubber" into gypsum, which could be sold as a byproduct.]

I also have proof the Environmental Defense strategy to let the market place decide how to comply with the acid rain control program of the Clean Air Act caused the coal industry to rip apart the mountains of Central Appalachia.  

The Creator made the mistake of putting high quality, low sulfur coal in the mountain seams and that was where the coal and utility companies went to get their compliance coal in addition to the Northern Plains coal they shipped 1500 miles.

In 1985, Congressman Henry Waxman proposed taxing electric customers a very small fee that would be used to pay for sulfur dioxide pollution control.  It would have accomplished the same result as the Environmental Defense market-based approach but medium and high sulfur coal stripped from the Midwest relatively flat topography would have continued to be the fuel of choice of the polluting plant operators.

Had the Waxman approach been adopted, there would have been no need to spend the extra money to rip coal from the high Appalachian mountain seams.  

If you want hard evidence, use the US Dept. Of  Energy's Form 423 which provides the quantity, quality and source of coal purchased by utilities going back to the early 1980s.  With a bit of effort, those tables quantify the shift of coal production from Illinois and Western Kentucky to the mountains of Virginia, West Virginia and Eastern Kentucky.

When I recently asked an Environmental Defense lobbyist to justify the ED approach to acid rain control,  he told me that mountaintop mining was an "unintended consequence".  

Yeah.  Go tell it to the mountains.
On It's too late to stop climate change, argues Ross Gelbspan -- so what do we do now? posted 1 year, 11 months ago 45 Responses

Tipping Points

The phrase 'tipping point'is a foggy concept in the here and now AGW discussion.  It has no legal, scientific, political or economic basis point.  When does it begin? What is being tipped? What is the consequence of a 'tipping point' and in what time frame?

I contend we would not recognize a tipping point, in our lifetime, if it hit us in the face.

Is the now-accelerated melting of the Andean glaciers a 'tipping point' for the world of AGW believers?  Seems not.  But, it is a large and frightening moment in time for down slope farmers, villagers and municipalities reliant upon glacial melt water for irrigation and drinking water.

Lets assume Dr. Hansen is correct in saying that we're 10 years from a tipping point...I agree with him we are ten years or less from more consequences of a warming world.  Starting the clock today, I can assure you the politics in the US, Australia, China and India are not in place nor in the riaght frame of mind to do much of anything to [reduce greenhouse-gas emissions within 10 years].  Thus, [we'll pass some threshold where severe and possibly irreversible climate impacts will become unavoidable].  I accepted that as well --- about ten years ago.

The Nov. 10, Washington Post opinion piece of Robert Samuelson " Greenhouse Guessing" at:

http://tinyurl.com/uoa79  

is a graphic depic...    

It is an 8 meg report but it will convince you, perhaps, that having reached a "tipping point" might depend upon where you stand and when it changes your life.

John L. McCormick
On Should we worry about sudden climate shifts? posted 3 years ago 4 Responses

Let Our Children Tell Us how they view the future

To djnoll:

I emailed you separately to respond to your welcome comment.  You replied and agreed to share a suggestion to GRIST that it open a page for youth to speak out on issues of environment, energy, climate change and most important and paramount, how they view their future in a world of our making.

The following is an invitation to GRIST contributors to join this appeal to the GRIST folk in the hope they can advertise this opportunity to the youth of America and give them an audience of grownups who are failing to give them the opportunities we have so richly enjoyed.

From John McC
To  djnoll

Thank you for the kind words.

I found your February comment also and thought it best to reply directly and not on the Grist blog.  I must confess, I am skeptical of the real value of blogging.  Earlier attempts to start a valid and accountable discussion of America's energy use and options our children may need to select have generated  some replies not worth reading. I am reluctant to encourage ranters.

Your February comment deserves a reply and with it a suggestion  that might ripple into a substantive Grist discussion others might join because  it does not address our egos; it is about and for our children and  grandchildren.

You have grandchildren and I hope I will one day.  As parents, we  share that unwritten responsibility governing our entire lives -- we must  live and do for our children until they are able to do for themselves.   With that goes the
life list of means and opportunities we want to provide them  and coax, nudge, badger and do whatever it takes to get them to utilize the  values, smarts, and whatever else we can offer them as tools to become healthy,  happy and
loved offspring.  Sounds lyrical but all parents have their own  ways to express what and how we want to give to our children.  

Most of us  struggle to just get them into college and out of trouble; a 24-7 task to which  too many of us devote less time than we should.

That said, I am beginning to see my teen age son as a victim of my generation and not a benefactor.  When I talk with Danko about the world he  is rapidly growing into, it is a challenge to hold back the scary details as I  see them because children need hope as well.  That does not mean he is not  aware of the shrinking future out there for him and his class mates.  He  just doesn't have an avenue to voice how he sees the world around  him (the real world) and the impressions he has about the future.   Schools do not encourage students to
go outside of the test-track and when he  gets together with his buddies, they want to do what I did, play sports and more  sports.

Here is a thought: invite GRIST to open a young people page and encourage youth to describe to us how they see the path we are leading them down.  

I want to end this note here because anything else I can say would be redundant.

If you think this is a worthy proposal, we could post a shared comment and see what is the response.

Peace,

John McC

This is from DJNoll

I agree with you that our children should have a voice in how we continue to move forward on this planet of ours.  I believe that many of our children have lost hope for a better world, and until they have a voice again, and we listen, there will be not renewal of the environmental movement.  Perhaps renewal is the wrong word - I should say regeneration or re-energization.  Our children do need to be invited to the table and I think your idea of a young people's page is fantastic.  Our children have amazing imaginations that can generate ideas so fast that it is absolutely amazing what they may be able to see as ways to improve the future.  I will happily join you in making such a suggestion to GRIST.  If you wish, please attach this e-mail to GRIST, and submit it as a suggestion that is supported by other GRIST readers.

May we all find Peace in the Beauty that surrounds us,  DJNoll
On An interview with doomsaying author James Howard Kunstler posted 4 years, 6 months ago 25 Responses

Long Day's Journey: step One...

I want to correct my above posting.  The population of Rhode Island is a bit more than a million persons.  National Wildlife Federation may have several million members, though I do not have current information. I meant to type "Sierra Club" when I referred to 'card-carrying environmentalists'.  John McCOn An interview with doomsaying author James Howard Kunstler posted 4 years, 6 months ago 25 Responses

Long Day's Journey: Step one....

Howard Kunstler, like the few among his clique, has added to the short list of truth-telling exposures to the industrial world's future.  There is no cure for the alcoholic in denial and, aren't we all in denial about the calamity we older ones have set up for our children.

Yes, the "debates" on the end-of-oil, climate change, US federal deficits, private debt (add your favorite) are going to play out for some time to come.  But, nowhere have I heard the right or the left convince me the outcome for any of these dramas will be satisfying for me and certainly not for my children.

Wind and solar energy and increased energy use efficiency are the topics and tasks we busy environmentalists toil at.  We cling to the hope they will give us time, bail us out, come to the rescue and prove us right.  

I have been an environmental activist and believer for thirty five years.  And, I have been programmed to believe environmental organizations are credible and altruistic.  Watching the near-haphazard way we/us have squandered those thirty-plus years to the point we are now toothless social clubs instead of a powerful political movement sickens me to the core and makes me feel complicitous.  The national Sierra Club sent out some 741,000 ballots last year to its members to elect its Board of Directors.  Maryland has half as many SUVs registered.  Folks the enviros are not matched to the task of averting what Mr. Kunstler projects.

When pessimism becomes reality it is too late to organize the deck chairs.  Like it or not the non-denialists among us are ready to encourage some very bold ideas such as getting off our duffs and marching to proclaim the rights of our children to have as good a life as we have enjoyed.  And, if that means they can have access to things they might truly need such as next-generation nuclear power I say lets be certain they have that option.

Dr. Caldicott aside, our aloofness about real energy decisions in America has wasted precious time and our children will pay the price.  Bio-diesel and the cult or renewables are boutique energy sources meant for remote villages and civilizations.

We cannot wish the world to be the way we want it to be.  Climate change-wise, it is the way it is because the population of Rhode Island exceeds the number of card-carrying environmentalists.  GE and WRI may have the money and luxury to partner in a new world of E-magination but it will take more than glitz to give our children a chance for a future.  It will take trillions of dollars of investment in base-load, non-carbon emitting power generation stations here and there and everywhere.

John McC
On An interview with doomsaying author James Howard Kunstler posted 4 years, 6 months ago 25 Responses

Soooo American

This discussion is over the hill.

Did Oprah post this soul-searing question?  What does it matter that we confess our eco sins.  We don't have the luxury of time to waste on this cathartic moment.  Folks, the bow is pointing down.  Does the planet really care if we buy environmentally unfriendly copy paper.

CO2 is increasing almost 2 ppm/yr.  Isn't that compelling enough to deserve a more meaningful discussion?  We are such modern Americans! On So tell us ... what's your dirty little environmental secret? posted 4 years, 7 months ago 84 Responses

Imagine Dr. Lovelock imagining that!

Bill McKibben, what better way to post the following challenge to you than to present it in this blog discussion on your Imagine That offering.

The challenge to you is simply to read James Lovelock's view on nuclear power as the solution to global warming and share your thoughts on his statement.  Your opinion is greatly valued among environmentalists and we could all benefit from hearing your take on Dr. Lovelock's own "Imagine That".

Of course, there is no 'solution' but many complementary and some not complimentary steps, policies and actions that collectively can diminish the global warning threat.  To ignore any option, out of fear or ignorance, is to deny our children the tools they will need to survive the chaos we have brought to them.

James Lovelock: Nuclear power is the only green
solution

We have no time to experiment with visionary energy sources; civilisation is in imminent danger.

Published in The Independent - 24 May 2004

Sir David King, the Government's chief scientist, was far-sighted to say that global warming is a more serious threat than terrorism. He may even have underestimated, because, since he spoke, new evidence of climate change suggests it could be even more serious, and the greatest danger that civilisation has faced so far.

Most of us are aware of some degree of warming; winters are warmer and spring comes earlier. But in the Arctic, warming is more than twice as great as here in Europe and in summertime, torrents of melt water now plunge from Greenland's kilometre-high glaciers. The complete dissolution of Greenland's icy mountains will take time, but by then the sea will have risen seven metres, enough to make uninhabitable all of the low lying coastal cities of the world, including London, Venice, Calcutta, New York and Tokyo. Even a two metre rise is enough to put most of southern Florida under water.

The floating ice of the Arctic Ocean is even more vulnerable to warming; in 30 years, its white reflecting ice, the area of the US, may become dark sea that absorbs the warmth of summer sunlight, and further hastens the end of the Greenland ice. The North Pole, goal of so many explorers, will then be no more than a point on the ocean surface.

Not only the Arctic is changing; climatologists warn a four-degree rise in temperature is enough to eliminate the vast Amazon forests in a catastrophe for their people, their biodiversity, and for the world, which would lose one of its great natural air conditioners.

The scientists who form the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reported in 2001 that global temperature would rise between two and six degrees Celsius by 2100. Their grim forecast was made perceptible by last summer's excessive heat; and according to Swiss meteorologists, the Europe-wide hot spell that killed over 20,000 was wholly different from any previous heat wave. The odds against it being a mere deviation from the norm were 300,000 to one. It was a warning of worse to come.

What makes global warming so serious and so urgent is that the great Earth system, Gaia, is trapped in a vicious circle of positive feedback. Extra heat from any source, whether from greenhouse gases, the disappearance of Arctic ice or the Amazon forest, is amplified, and its effects are more than additive. It is almost as if we had lit a fire to keep warm, and failed to notice, as we piled on fuel, that the fire was out of control and the furniture had ignited. When that happens, little time is left to put out the fire before it consumes the house. Global warming, like a fire, is accelerating and almost no time is left to act.

So what should we do? We can just continue to enjoy a warmer 21st century while it lasts, and make cosmetic attempts, such as the Kyoto Treaty, to hide the political embarrassment of global warming, and this is what I fear will happen in much of the world. When, in the 18th century, only one billion people lived on Earth, their impact was small enough for it not to matter what energy source they used.

But with six billion, and growing, few options remain; we can not continue drawing energy from fossil fuels and there is no chance that the renewables, wind, tide and water power can provide enough energy and in time. If we had 50 years or more we might make these our main sources. But we do not have 50 years; the Earth is already so disabled by the insidious poison of greenhouse gases that even if we stop all fossil fuel burning immediately, the consequences of what we have already done will last for 1,000 years. Every year that we continue burning carbon makes it worse for our descendants and for civilisation.

Worse still, if we burn crops grown for fuel this could hasten our decline. Agriculture already uses too much of the land needed by the Earth to regulate its climate and chemistry. A car consumes 10 to 30 times as much carbon as its driver; imagine the extra farmland required to feed the appetite of cars.

By all means, let us use the small input from renewables sensibly, but only one immediately available source does not cause global warming and that is nuclear energy. True, burning natural gas instead of coal or oil releases only half as much carbon dioxide, but unburnt gas is 25 times as potent a greenhouse agent as is carbon dioxide. Even a small leakage would neutralise the advantage of gas.

The prospects are grim, and even if we act successfully in amelioration, there will still be hard times, as in war, that will stretch our grandchildren to the limit. We are tough and it would take more than the climate catastrophe to eliminate all breeding pairs of humans; what is at risk is civilisation. As individual animals we are not so special, and in some ways are like a planetary disease, but through civilisation we redeem ourselves and become a precious asset for the Earth; not least because through our eyes the Earth has seen herself in all her glory.

There is a chance we may be saved by an unexpected event such as a series of volcanic eruptions severe enough to block out sunlight and so cool the Earth. But only losers would bet their lives on such poor odds. Whatever doubts there are about future climates, there are no doubts that greenhouse gases and temperatures both are rising.

We have stayed in ignorance for many reasons; important among them is the denial of climate change in the US where governments have failed to give their climate scientists the support they needed. The Green lobbies, which should have given priority to global warming, seem more concerned about threats to people than with threats to the Earth, not noticing that we are part of the Earth and wholly dependent upon its well being. It may take a disaster worse than last summer's European deaths to wake us up.
Opposition to nuclear energy is based on irrational fear fed by Hollywood-style fiction, the Green lobbies and the media. These fears are unjustified, and nuclear energy from its start in 1952 has proved to be the safest of all energy sources. We must stop fretting over the minute statistical risks of cancer from chemicals or radiation. Nearly one third of us will die of cancer anyway, mainly because we breathe air laden with that all pervasive carcinogen, oxygen.

If we fail to concentrate our minds on the real danger, which is global warming, we may die even sooner, as did more than 20,000 unfortunates from overheating in Europe last summer.

I find it sad and ironic that the UK, which leads the world in the quality of its Earth and climate scientists, rejects their warnings and advice, and prefers to listen to the Greens. But I am a Green and I entreat my friends in the movement to drop their wrongheaded objection to nuclear energy.

Even if they were right about its dangers, and they are not, its worldwide use as our main source of energy would pose an insignificant threat compared with the dangers of intolerable and lethal heat waves and sea levels rising to drown every coastal city of the world. We have no time to experiment with visionary energy sources; civilisation is in imminent danger and has to use nuclear - the one safe, available, energy source - now or suffer the pain soon to be inflicted by our outraged planet.

James Lovelock is an independent scientist, the creator of the Gaia hypothesis which considers the Earth as a self-regulating organism, and a member of EFN - the association of Environmentalists For Nuclear Energy - www.ecolo.org

Source: The Independent - May 24th -2004
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