The other essential point in this debate about emissions reductions is that better efficiency, conservation and alternative energy are all unavoidable in the face of dwindling non-renewable energy sources.  So aside from addressing the risk you very correctly describe, action sooner, not later, will prepare us for Peak Oil shock.  It will also reduce the necessity of western meddling in middle eastern affairs.

Invent a clever saying, and your name will live forever! -- Anonymous

>> the lesson is not that Katrina was caused by or made worse by global warming. >>

I disagree. Certainly after Katrina, the next hurricane in the gulf was the fastest to spin-up than any seen before.

Why ?  Katrina caused a massive oil spill and the oil slick on the gulf was considerably thickened.

Oil dampens wave height, making the surface of the sea glassy which increases hurricane spin.

If the UAS continues to pollute the seas with oil, then you get what is owed to you.

it's a week one scientifically and from the policy end, Andrew.

I agree 100% that we should invest in establishing an AGW mitigation policy, but no feasible mitigation policy will prevent already commited warming, and of course additional commitments will accumulate for the time being.

Katrina might make a great political 2x4 for Dems, but an AGW policy will not obviate the need to mitigate likely climate change impacts.  In the case of hurricanes, much more immediately effective policies would be to start restoring up barrier islands and wetlands, strengthening infrastructure, improving evacuation capabilities, and moving people off of the most vulnerable coasts (or at least eliminating the various subsidies that incentivize their ongoing presence and further development).

Sincerely,

TT

TokyoTom,

In the case of hurricanes, much more immediately effective policies would be to start restoring up barrier islands and wetlands, strengthening infrastructure, improving evacuation capabilities, and moving people off of the most vulnerable coasts (or at least eliminating the various subsidies that incentivize their ongoing presence and further development).

As I understood the thrust of Andrew's piece, it was that Katrina is a good analogy for the risk/benefit scenario in which we currently find ourselves with regard to global warming.  We knew, in detail, the risks of not better preparing New Orleans for a strong hurricane.  We chose to accept additional risk for the "benefit" of not spending the money in the near-term.  Hence we will now be spending much more money in the long-term, in part, a "penalty" for accepting a higher risk scenario.

One imagines that, if the current administration applies logic & analysis to anything at all, they consider the risk of global warming negative impacts to be low (imperfect science, low range is feasible, etc) and the benefits of not doing anything now high (i.e. more money in my pocket today).

Unfortunately, part of our struggle is against human nature itself.  The risk assessment guy gets no glory.  If I run a toxicology trial and discover a potentially life-threatening toxicity of a new drug, prior to trials in man, I do not get pats on the back.  In fact, the researchers who originally championed the drug for it's pharmacological properties are usually pissed off and argue endlessly with you.  The point is you never know how many lives you saved, because your work killed the drug before it got a chance to do harm.  However, if I don't run the appropriate study, or I missed the significance of the finding, or I completely understood the significance of the finding and was overruled by superiors, I am the one who takes the heat when people start dying in clinical trials.  It's a lose-lose situation.

Global warming is the same way;  if we start trying to deal with the impact of climate change now, we will never know how successful we were (i.e. how bad the damage would have been if we did nothing).  But if we do nothing now, it dosen't make us feel really good to be the "I told you so" guy when the water is up to our chins.

kmp, thanks for your comment.  I agree with you and Andrew completely, and understood his point that Katrina is a case study in how "Sometimes it's better to spend money to head off an uncertain risk than to wait for the risk to materialize. Worst-case scenarios sometimes do come true. For global climate change, wait and see is particularly risky."

My point is a side comment simply to caution that hurricane policy and climate change policy should not be conflated.

   Given the utter failure of the government during and after Katrina, there seems to me to be one clear, if scary lesson.

   Anyone who expects mitigation for global warming to work is deluding themselves.  The government can't think its way out of a wet paper bag.

patrick

I saw a 60 minutes piece on a small Gulf Shores town in Mississippi.

It was a touching story of a father and son sorting through the rubble and trying to rebuild.

I was touched.

Until the end...when they focused on a sign that showed the high water mark of a flood from the 1960s.

The father said triumphantly they would "rebuild this town again".

Rebuild?  Obviously they have a history of being wiped out every 40 or so years, global warming or not.   I really don't have a lot of sympathy for people who want to live the beachfront lifestyle and then make the rest of us pay for it time and time again.

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  That a major city was destroyed with such a poor reaction from the government.  Frankly, the entire leadership of the Department of Homeland Security should have been fired, as should the Department of Defense, and Bush should have been impeached.

  Which is not to advocate a particular re-building plan, but really, this has been pathetic.  

  I agree, BioD, it must be shown, but more than shown, it must be told what to do, and what is and  is not acceptable.  In my dreams, anyway.

  The world watched this after watching the Disaster in the Desert, and lost even more respect for America.

  Given the size and complexity of the problems likely to be cause by global warming, only governments will be big enough and powerful enough to respond.

  Anyone who has fantasies about their individual efforts being enough has watched too many bad late night movies.

  The same goes for anyone who thinks that individual corporate efforts will succeed, or local efforts (notice how quickly the good done by California was wiped out by Texas and it's new coal power plants).

  Only co-ordinated efforts among the national governments can really solve this problem.

  Alas, our current national government is a bunch of idiots.  We should be scared.

patrick