Grist | Topics | 18 Results

RESULTS		Results 1 – 18 of 18
Headline	Author	Published	Section
The conservative climate change problem An acknowledge-and-do-nothing strategy is little better than denialism	Ryan Avent	08 Jun 2008	Gristmill
Reihan Salam writes an incredibly disappointing, and boggling, blog post here, on his preferred strategies for dealing with climate change. Disappointing, because if Reihan, one of the best conservative writers out there, doesn't get the logic of carbon pricing, then there's little hope for some sort of conservative renaissance on climate change policy. Boggling, because Reihan is too smart a guy to get so many things wrong in such a short amount of time.Let me sta ...
Topics: carbon tax, carbon trading, climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism (all these topics)

The jewel of denial The delayers' paradox	Joseph Romm	14 May 2008	Gristmill
The primary goal of the global warming deniers and their disciples is to waste time and delay action, which is why I prefer to call them delayers. (This post is inspired by the surprising finding that only 27 percent of conservatives say the earth is warming because of human activity, such as burning fossil fuels.) The delayers' paradox The deniers and delayers are those who argue that failing to embrace strict reductions in greenhouse-gas emissions will not lead to s ...
Topics: climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism, climate science (all these topics)

A trip to the Land of Strained Analogies More blather about sacrifice from pundits who don't really care about climate change	Adam Stein	05 May 2008	Gristmill
I see the pundits are still lobbing up chinstrokers about how addressing climate change is going to require 'sacrifice -- serious wartime sacrifice.' This sounds Very Serious. The only quibble I have is that it's probably not true. 'Going green' in a carbon-constrained economy won't feel like sacrifice to most people. It will feel like shopping. Meaning, it will feel like all the decisions we make every day, but tilted imperceptibly by the price ramifications of a carb ...
Topics: climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism, tech (all these topics)

A decarbonization story: Part 2 Does the IPCC dangerously assume 'spontaneous' decarbonization?	Joseph Romm	17 Apr 2008	Gristmill
No. The central point of the recent Nature article 'Dangerous Assumptions' (available here [PDF]) is that the IPCC made dangerous assumptions in their reference scenarios: ... the scenarios assume a certain amount of spontaneous technological change and related decarbonization. Thus, the IPCC implicitly assumes that the bulk of the challenge of reducing future emissions will occur in the absence of climate policies. We believe that these assumptions are optimistic a ...
Topics: climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism, greenhouse-gas emissions, IPCC (all these topics)

The adaptation trap 2: The not-so-honest broker More on Roger Pielke, Jr.	Joseph Romm	31 Mar 2008	Gristmill
In Part 1, we saw that ... Adaptation as primary strategy for dealing with climate change is widely oversold. This is especially true as atmospheric CO2 concentrations approach 800 to 1,000 ppm, a likely outcome if we listen to either the delayers or deniers. A leading adaptation advocate and apparent delayer-1000, Roger Pielke, Jr., 'labels adaptation what is in fact mitigation, and his idea of mitigation is apparently research into adaptation.' Let me ela ...
Topics: climate, climate change adaptation, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism, greenhouse-gas emissions, IPCC (all these topics)

The adaptation trap and the nonskeptical delayers (like Roger Pielke) -- Part 1 Pielke labels adaptation what is actually mitigation	Joseph Romm	31 Mar 2008	Gristmill
The wheels may be falling off the media's climate discussion, if a recent L.A. Times piece is any evidence. The piece, 'Global warming: Just deal with it, some scientists say,' is really an article about not dealing with it. The L.A. Times, with the help of the delayer-1000 du jour, Roger Pielke, Jr., has brought to prominence (and fallen for) what I call the 'adaptation trap': The adaptation trap is the belief that 1) 'it would be easier and cheaper to adapt than fig ...
Topics: climate, climate change adaptation, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism, greenhouse-gas emissions, IPCC (all these topics)

Experts agree: We should all lie. A lot. About important stuff. Nobody fights for change unless they see there's a problem	John McGrath	29 Oct 2007	Gristmill
Ugh. So my local paper decided to print its own local blend of Nordhaus-Shellenberger drivel. Did you know that "it's time to stop blaring dire warnings about the perils of climate change and, instead, start enthusiastically proclaiming solutions"? I sure didn't. It's not as if people like Amory Lovins, Paul Hawken, Bill McKibben, or I dunno, Gar Lipow have spent years talking about exactly that. It's not like the central message adopted by successful c ...
Topics: climate change impacts, climate change skepticism, climate, messaging, environmental movement, climate change mitigation (all these topics)

Geez, All We Got Was Karl Rove's Resignation Governments ruffled by climate kerfuffles in England, Australia		13 Aug 2007	Daily Grist
Geez, All We Got Was Karl Rove's Resignation Governments ruffled by climate kerfuffles in England, Australia A couple of government climate kerfuffles have broken out: In Britain, a leaked briefing paper says the country won't meet a European Union target of 20 percent renewable energy by 2020, and suggests lobbying other nations for a more flexib ...
Topics: Australia, climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism, England, news, renewable energy (all these topics)

An enemy of my enemy ... Conservatives like Bush's climate plan because greens don't	David Roberts	05 Jun 2007	Gristmill
The conservative National Review likes the president's new climate change strategy. Not because it will work to reduce emissions, mind you. Because it irritates environmentalists and Europeans.
Topics: climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism, jackassery (all these topics)

Strange bedfellows in climate politics A Nation columnist goes contrarian; GM goes the other way	Charles Komanoff	22 May 2007	Gristmill
Did lefty pundit Alexander Cockburn and corporate behemoth General Motors secretly agree to swap climate positions? It looks that way. GM, swallowing hard, recently joined the U.S. Climate Action Partnership, the elite enviro-business coalition pushing cap-and-trade -- a so-called "market-based system" for controlling carbon dioxide emissions. Meanwhile, the famously acidic Cockburn lacerated global warming orthodoxy in his column in the Nation ma ...
Topics: Big Auto, business, carbon tax, climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism, greening biz operations, US CAP (all these topics)

Planet Gore Disinfotainment Watch: Utterly misrepresenting research Keeping an eye on the 'wingers	Joseph Romm	20 May 2007	Gristmill
(Part of a series of posts keeping an eye on Planet Gore, the National Review blog devoted to obfuscating on climate change.) New research finds low cost for tackling climate change. But not when that research is reported by Planet Gore. Sterling Burnett recently authored a classic example of PG's disinfotainment. He writes: Has the media completely lost objectivity and the search for the 'truth' with regard to the issue of global warming. The latest reason that made m ...
Topics: politics, legislation, climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism (all these topics)

Why do we respond to bozos? Churchill, not Chamberlain	Ken Ward	07 May 2007	Gristmill
Why are we letting pro-fossil fuel bozos hijack the only forum that environmentalists and climate-change activists have for wrestling with the daunting task of transforming America? I posted a few practical suggestions in response to David's question, 'Should we be rebutting the skeptics?' I'm going to restate one proposal -- to adopt a Craigslist-type policy allowing Grist readers to flag inappropriate posts. Gristmill is a forum for conversation and debate between ...
Topics: Al Gore, climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism, climate science, environmental movement, politics (all these topics)

Power, program, and practical considerations: Objectives How to build a real climate movement	Ken Ward	30 Apr 2007	Gristmill
((brightlines_include)) Campaigns and programs crafted to advance the Bright Lines strategy must also fit real world constraints and political realities on the ground, and take account of external roadblocks to effective action. The following objectives address these issues. 1. Tangible risk. Climate change is like world hunger: it's an issue of concern when media attention is high, just as coverage of periodic famines raises concern about world hunger. Most American ...
Topics: China, climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism, India, politics (all these topics)

Helpful hints for global warming deniers	Gar Lipow	01 Apr 2007	Gristmill
Many global warming deniers have moved on from denying the existence or human causes of global warming to denying it's worthwhile to do anything to mitigate it. 'Burn all the fossil fuels you want', they suggest, 'and adapt to the changes. Doing anything to reduce global warming is too expensive.' In a spirit of reconciliation, I thought I'd put forward some specific proposals to implement their approach. On a planet with unchecked greenhouse warming, we would have a l ...
Topics: climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism (all these topics)

The latest debate on 'overselling' climate science Tedious	David Roberts	19 Mar 2007	Gristmill
Two meteorologists say that climate scientists are "overplaying" the climate threat (which they concede is real and urgent). Another scientist responds that, yeah, we shouldn't overplay the threat, but the threat is real and urgent. As so often with this immeasurably vapid debate, the slightest bit of scrutiny reveals that there is very little substantive difference in what the scientists in question believe. Two larger points: The disagreement is almost ...
Topics: climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism (all these topics)

The 'two sides' of the climate debate One of them is missing	David Roberts	05 Feb 2007	Gristmill
Bad Actors and their enablers have been pushing a particular spin on the climate debate: it has "two sides," the denialists and the alarmists. What can wise people above it all in the center do but roll their eyes at the grubbiness of it all? I'd like to introduce you to one side of the debate: Only 13 percent of congressional Republicans say they believe that human activity is causing global warming, compared to 95 percent of congressional Democrats. Mor ...
Topics: climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism, jackassery, James Hansen, politics (all these topics)

My problem with Revkin's article It muddles the science and policy debates together	Andrew Dessler	03 Jan 2007	Gristmill
The darling of the the climate blogosphere for the last two days is an article by Andy Revkin on the silent middle ground in the climate debate. Since I am nothing if not a blogosheep, I felt compelled to follow the pack and weigh in. The problem I have with the article is that it confuses two separate debates, one scientific (is climate change real?) and one value-based (what should we do about it?). By putting these two issues into the blender, the article confuses ...
Topics: climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism, climate science (all these topics)

Carbon reductions or poverty reduction? Poor countries can't afford to tackle climate change	Jason D Scorse	15 Nov 2006	Gristmill
I know, I know, this is a false choice that skeptics use to stall action on climate change. Or is it? Check out this article from Reason. It makes some interesting points. Here's a quick summary: Developing countries do not have the funds to tackle climate change, period. This then requires a massive investment on the part of rich countries. It also requires massive emissions reductions in rich countries, which will be costly in the short to medium run. Poo ...
Topics: climate, climate change mitigation, climate change skepticism, international politics, politics (all these topics)

Stories About: climate AND climate change mitigation AND climate change skepticism