Glad you picked up on it, great response.

If writers do not bend over backwards to lend credibility to denialist lies, their mortgages will most likely default.  Unless, like us amatuer bloggers, they have other gigs to get that needed cash.

Check out Thank You For Smoking on HBO now.  The quintesential film on lobbying and lying.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

As I kayak Puget Sound I watch swarms of loons and ducks watching me with fear.  To conserve energy and organization they watch and watch until fear overcomes the elders and they take flight or dive in unison.  The loons making those loon sounds are not the quiet watchful leaders.  We can not look to NYT for leadership.  I see swarm leaders in Grist.

That demands real reporting, not an artsy talking-head sketch accompanying some silly piece of wonky shop dribble-drabble. And for all my criticisms of any of them, lumping S&N in with Lomborg and Gingrich is an amazingly crappy comparison. It really is just awful. I want to give Revkin credit for the hard reporting he's done, but I'm extremely frustrated by these attention-grabbing misadventures.

If Revkin wants to get into some more purposeful debate-framing "reporting," then I'd ask him to consider not only how quickly we're sliding from substance to tone as the debate moves from problems to solutions, but how that's happening in a way that marginalizes who is being left behind and left out of the discussion. I'm 23, white, and I may not be able to tread wonkery water forever in a debate like this myself, but what scares me most is that we white boys writing books, articles, and op-eds continue to debate ourselves and our intentions till we're blue while those affected most by climate change die in the shadow of our posturing.

If we're already hitting a wall with empty existential statements like "humans have become the meaning of the earth," then we're in serious trouble.

And if we want to talk about what "one of the most polarizing forces in politics," "the bad boys of environmentalism," and a lousy researcher with screwed up priorities all have in common, then could we at least discuss how whatever policy proposals they may have might actually impact the public, according to what we already do know about what that public is facing? That would take some reporting, right?

While I agree with all of your comments, I think it is also important to appreciate the richness of the discussion that has come out of Andrew's post. More and more I see blogging, not so much as a way to express my views, but rather as a vehicle for discussions amongst other readers. The more the article stimulates discussion, which this one certainly has, the better.

marguerite manteau-rao http://lamarguerite.wordpress.com 'It's All About Green Psychology'

Perhaps it is news that Lomborg calls for a carbon tax, or that Gingrich embraces the precautionary principle. However, aside from any judgments we may make on how slow their learning curves are, in my opinion presenting them as urging a move to some actual "pragmatic center" between "left" and "right" because of those little tidbits seems wildly problematic at best.

Both of you are doing vital work.  Thanks for all of it.

If it is all right to do so, I would like to add a humble point of view to the discussion.

For more than 30 years population biologists, ecologists and environmentalists have been unsuccessfully, I suppose, trying to alert our political leaders to the potentially pernicious effects of global warming.  In the face of these many entreaties, the managers of the global economy and their bought-and-paid-for politicians and minions have resolutely assured us that we have nothing to worry about and, consequently, there is nothing for us to except continue to grow the global economy.  All will be well, they said adamantly and relentlessly, by pursuing this path and, under no circumstances, could this path be a primrose path leading our children toward a calamity.

Now the same people who have been saying that we have nothing to worry about or to do because global warming is a hoax, not junk science, and are now grudingly acknowledging that, yes indeed, we do have a BIG problem.  Global warming is real.  But now these denialist and naysayers have what for me is a unexpected posture toward the challenges looming before humanity. Here is what I am hearing: the challenges posed by global warming are too big to address and, as a result, there is nothing for us to do except accelerate economic globalization.  Along the way, we will hope for a "technolgical fix" for a disaster that could befall humanity later in Century XXI as the global economy expands beyond the point it can be sustained by the limited resources and frangible ecosystem services of Earth.

Perhaps I misunderstand the distinctly human-forced predicament that appears, at least potentially, in the offing.  Comments are welcome.

Thanks,

Steve

Steven Earl Salmony
AWAREness Campaign on The Human Population
http://sustainabilitysoutheast.org/

I happen to think hope resides in lots of places, from wild nature to progressive policy. I'm not so much agreeing or disagreeing with S&N's statement about the meaning of the earth as I'm saying to my mind it just doesn't get us anywhere.

I also think you're falling into the same trap about this "center" business. To say that the worldview of "most people" falls into the "center" is what I think is bogus - and to their credit, one thing S&N do well is to deconstruct that very point.

We don't need to ride the center, man. We need to consider what works and works accountably from any given angle, left, right, or center be damned.

I do agree, escaping the political pigeon holes will be critical to finding the least damaging passage thru the Big Wreckoning.  

Just like with deniers, we can work with the people who "get it" - not waste more time answering people like Lomborg.  They'll get on board eventually. Or not.  It shouldn't matter either way as the rest of us roll up our sleeves and get to work.

Thanks for your comments.

Please consider, dear friends of life and the Earth, that too many brothers and sisters in my generation of elders are so singlemindedly focused on the accumulation of wealth and power, in feathering their own gigantic nests, exchanging secret handshakes in exclusive clubs, flying private jets, sailing yachts and visiting exotic hideaways, that they have forgotten how human life and all else that lives utterly depends upon Earth's limited resources and frangible ecosystem services for existence.

The "powers that be" have evidently failed to understand what it means when their children try to remind them that the Earth is round, finite and has biophysical limits. One consequence of this denial of the requirements of practical reality is that the large scale and rate of per capita consumption is evidently dissipating natural resources faster than the Earth can restore them for human benefit. So great is conspicuous per capita consumption by a small minority of people in our time that biodiversity is being inadvertently extirpated and the environment recklessly degraded.

Is the fulfillment of the insatiable wishes of unrestrained consumers a result of unbridled big business interests relentlessly pursuing a course of seemingly endless economic expansion? Are we witnessing the very resources needed for the survival of life as we know it and the maintenance of the integrity of Earth being fecklessly overconsumed as we proceed with unbridled economic globalization?

When my generation has completed its `mission' of literally consuming a lion's share of the resources of Earth, I fear our children will look back at us in anger and wide-eyed disbelief for so much that we have done and failed to do.

With thanks for this open discussion.

Always,

Steve

Steven Earl Salmony
AWAREness Campaign on the Human Population, established 2001
http://sustainabilitysoutheast.org/

Just a small correction. Lomborg does endorse a carbon tax in his latest book.

JHA

He offered to have a chat with you and jointly post the discussion. I think you would do well to the journalism and the discussion by accepting this invitation.

Here's my stance:

Tone Matters.
We need inspiration and visionary leaders who will lead us towards a future better than today rather than "not worse" than today.

Laws are laws.
Political laws dictate that you bend your branches just far enough across the river to touch the other branches. The problem is that the laws of physics and chemistry do not bend, they break. These laws demand a level of action beyond our current political will.

To synthesize, we need to focus on the social and economic opportunity that global warming presents, because that will inspire and motivate people. But the only rational solutions to dealing with this are the ones that physics and chemistry demand. Action short of that is not middle ground but no ground at all.

Also, check out Bill McKibben's thoughts on this subject
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007 ...

"We're in a desperate race. Politics is chasing reality, and the gap between them isn't closing nearly fast enough."

So, is it reasonable to chart a course in the middle of politics and reality? Where does that leave you?

wiserearth.org/user/danielbell

In a 2002 Science article by New York University physicist Martin Hoffert and 16 other leading energy experts, Hoffert et. al argued that, "although regulation can play a role, the fossil fuel greenhouse effect is an energy problem that cannot be simply regulated away." It is a conclusion overwhelmingly echoed by other leading analysts, including the UN IPCC and the Stern Review.

What's required, energy experts agree, is not just a price for carbon, but also massive public investments to deploy clean energy technologies so we can achieve the performance and price breakthroughs needed for these new technologies to be picked up worldwide, including in places like China and India whose development is being fueled by cheap coal and oil.

Indeed, given how quickly China is bringing new coal plants on line, the most important thing we can do is bring down the price of new clean energy sources as quickly as possible. Direct public investment in innovation is a faster means to this end than gradually making dirty energy sources expensive so that clean energy sources gradually become cost-competitive.

In a forthcoming paper for the Harvard Law and Policy Review, "Fast Clean Cheap," we argue that a regulation-centered approach would only achieve 10 - 30 percent emissions reductions in the U.S. by 2050, whereas we need 80 percent emissions reductions in the U.S. and 50 percent emissions reductions worldwide by then if we are to avoid catastrophic global warming.

Revkin understands this, which is why he writes on his blog:

All the slow gains from market forces quite clearly... don't get the energy system out of fossil mode in time to avoid serious climate consequences.

Stuck in the older pollution paradigm, the environmental lobby has long put virtually all of its political eggs in the regulatory basket. Environmental groups like Environmental Defense, NRDC, the Sierra Club, and UCS -- the groups with the most influence (with Democrats) in Washington -- have simply never seriously lobbied for a massive investment in clean energy.

Joe Romm, Arthur Smith, and David Roberts claim that this isn't the case, that the environmental movement has always advocated for big investments. But they make this assertion without offering a whit of evidence to back up their claim.

That's because they have no evidence. The top priorities of environmental groups have for two decades been higher fuel economy standards, new efficiency regulations, renewable portfolio standards, and greenhouse gas limits. Major public investments on the order of $30 to $80 billion a year have never been a priority for environmental groups.

Here's Revkin:

You do need an energy revolution to empower something like 9 billion people by mid-century, all of whom want out of poverty. That has not been a forefront message of any environmental group I know of.

It's not only not the their message, it's not their policy priority.

It's not enough to blame the carbon lobby for political inaction. In the 30 years since Amory Lovins wrote his seminal piece on clean energy in Foreign Affairs, in the 20 years since James Hansen declared that global warming had arrived, and during all of Joe Romm's tenure at the Department of Energy, greenhouse gas emissions and our oil addiction have increased.

An investment-centered agenda is the right policy and the best politics. Romm and the rest of the environmental lobby have failed to enact transformational action in Washington, and rather than acknowledge their failures, and reconsider their approach, they are calling for more of the same.

The good news is that there is a new generation of thinkers who recognize that global warming is an urgent priority and that the regulation-centered agenda can't get us where we need to go.

The old global warming debate was between those who thought global warming was serious, human-caused, and requiring action and those who didn't. That debate is coming to an end.

In its place is being born a new debate, one centrally focused on solutions. Revkin's new blog has provided a place for thoughtful discussion about new ideas  -- and it has arrived just in time.

It's easy to write off Revkin's piece if you believe, as do so many climate activists today, that we've seen a "tipping point" in public perceptions on global warming over the past year. Indeed, how can Shellenberger & Nordhaus represent a new middle way if the center has already shifted so dramatically and everyone's ready for bold action (i.e. strong regulations)?

No doubt there has been incredible political progress, but unfortunately the center remains far from bold action. By and large, global warming ranks extremely low among voter priorities and energy prices are of utmost and growing concern. No wonder Californians rejected a proposition (Prop 87) last year that would have funded clean energy through an oil tax. And no surprise that the Washington Post runs front-page articles like "Climate Is a Risky Issue for Democrats," or that Pew polls continue to find global warming ranking nearly dead last out of the top 20 voter priorities.

It's not just about misjudging the political consensus, though. Policy literalists seemingly fail to understand the importance of tone or political and social change in general. They read Revkin's piece and say, "so what?" If today's books and their ideas don't present immediate policy solutions, they say, then who cares?

But tone, framing, and ideas matter. That Newt Gingrich is pushing the right to take global warming seriously is, in fact, a significant and noteworthy change (I go to Johns Hopkins, a relatively conservative college campus where Gingrich came to speak last year, and I can say first-hand that his book is causing a ruckus). As is Shellenberger and Nordhaus challenging mainstream environmentalists on how they've sidelined public investment.

The climate problem isn't going to be solved with Liebermann-Warner or any of the smaller measures being considered in today's energy bill. This is a half-century undertaking that will require the establishment of new political identities and majorities. Whether or not you agree with calling these authors the "new center," we can recognize that Revkin has reported on some very important trends.

They operate on simple rules (fractals) that make them become bridges when the trail breaks down for instance.  How to discover the simple rules that make progressives into an unstoppable army of peacefull change?

The swarm rising up from the grassroots, infiltrating the political jungle, and conquering the kleptocracy.  Hehey.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

We need to take this action because the recent tipping point wasn't just in attitude of citizens but in the damage the climate is doing to our civilization. If anybody hasn't noticed CNN has turned into the weather/disaster channel. (ooh, look, Bangladesh this week) Those disasters don't appear to be going away. Likewise some rather major signals like the disappearing arctic ice cap should indicate that things are getting a trifle URGENT.

As for initiating the means to the end; taxation,  regulation, mandate and subsidy are how we get things done in this culture when the market has failed. (hint: it's FAILED) I'd really love to put SUV drivers in the stocks for public humiliation but we've moved on as a culture.

Why can't we tax incandescent light bulbs out of existence? The damn things only last a few years even in the closet. Why cant' we subsidize and mandate a few hundred million solar roofs and geo-exchange HVAC installations? Why can't we just prove that hydrogen-boost reduces diesel emissions and then demand that every large diesel install the system before they can buy fuel? Why are CAFE standards impossible? We mandate all sorts of other things including the contents of my bloodstream. (no fun or shamanic herbals allowed)  

I say we quit arguing about how many CO2 molecules dance on the head of a pin and get cracking on the installation process. The "who holds the center" argument amounts to delaying the conversion of our economy. Wall Street doesn't like the proposed solutions because they free "consumers" from their little treadmill. As we delay conversion we condemn species to extinction many millions of people to brutally shortened lives. Some of those millions will be our children.

This arguement, from the New York Times, amounts to a delay on real action. It amounts to a consensus discussion on lifeboat seating on the Titanic. Just load the boats and row already.

Put the Carbon Back

My guess is that the Chinese will beat us to the game and we'll be purchasing clean technology from them instead of vice versa while we dither on funding and then finding the magic bullet machines.

And the notion that somehow with all these magic bullets we are going to get 9 billion people thru the approaching needle's eye is just fantasy when we are as far out on the overreach limb as we are.    

Whatsoever is is, is it not?

Plainly, what is necessary now is clarity of vision, coherence of mind, intellectual honesty and courage as well as a willingness among scientists to begin "CENTERING" the attention of the leaders of the human community on the threat to humanity, life as we know it, the environment and the integrity of Earth that is posed by the gigantic scale and unsustainable growth rate of the human population worldwide.

What worries me is this: our children could unexpectedly and suddenly come face to face with potentially colossal threats to human and environmental health that are derived from converging global challenges because their elders have remained adamantly and relentlessly in denial of human-driven, fulminating ecological degradation. In such circumstances, our children could be presented with extraordinary difficulties responding ably to that with which they could soon be confronted; that is to say, they will not even know what "hit" them, much less why it is happening.

I think it's incredibly exciting that Newt Gingrich is acknowledging the seriousness of global warming and calling for investments into clean energy technology.

I also think it's exciting that Lomborg is calling for carbon regulation through a tax - a position that you misrepresented in your post ("Lomborg thinks it's a mild problem that may or may not become a severe problem, one that doesn't merit constraining our fossil fuel use or making economic sacrifices.")

Rather than celebrating these developments you have largely dismissed or attacked them.

No wonder, then, that the global warming debate is moving on -- figuratively and literally, to Revkin's heavily trafficked blog.

To your question: are we centrists? I identify as a progressive. Gingrich defines himself as a conservative. I think Lomborg identifies himself as a liberal and even as an environmentalist.

Andy Revkin sees a trend in various individuals calling for a positive vision of America's future constructed around large investments in technology to bring down the price of clean energy. He thinks there's something worth paying attention to there.

You keep insisting that environmentalists are for major investment. Revkin and I keep pointing out that this is simply not the case. And, notably, you never respond with any evidence.

The national environmental lobby has never made massive public investment in clean energy a priority. When discussing global warming in Break Through, it's pretty obvious that the "environmentalists" we are talking about are the main environmental groups -- Environmental Defense, NRDC, Sierra Club, UCS, NET -- that have clout in Washington, that write environmental legislation, and that have budgets in the hundreds of millions to run ads, mobilize members, and lobby.

The environmental lobby has resisted a major push for large investments in clean energy for two reasons. First, they think that regulation plus small increases for R&D - on the order of $1 to $3 billion more a year - is all that's needed. (Hence the inadequate increases in R&D proposed by the Democratic Congress.) Our contention -- like that of Hoffert et al. and Rayner et al. (Nature October 2007), and perhaps you as well, is that investments on the order of $30 - $80 billion a year are needed.

Second, the green lobby thinks new regulations are more politically popular than major investments. And on this point they're just wrong, as every serious opinion poll shows.

Yes, various individuals have been calling for major investments for at least the last five years. Having read Hoffert et al. in 2002, I was inspired to co-found the Apollo Alliance. And yes, the expert literature, which we've summarized here, is very clear that big investments are needed.

But guess what: we're not the ones who have influence in Washington. The committee staffers look to the senior attorneys and scientists at the big environmental groups, not to Grist, Apollo Alliance, or Hoffert et al., for guidance. Sure, we all talk to Hill staffers and media. But unless you have some hidden influence on leaders of Congress that I'm unaware of, you don't drive legislative action like Carl Pope and David Hawkins do.

That's why the parts of Break Through that criticize environmentalists on climate are actually quite pointed at NRDC, Sierra Club, et al., and not at groups and individuals who have very little clout over climate policy matters in Washington.

The good news is that in the debate over Break Through, prominent environmental leaders from Carl Pope (he's quoted in the Wired magazine profile about us) and David Hawkins ( see his blog) have insisted that they support big investment.

The time has come for them to put their money where their mouths are. They need to publicly commit to making sure that Lieberman-Warner generates at least $30 billion for clean energy investments every year. A mechanism should be created to insure that the money is well-invested in R&D, demonstration, deployment, and outright procurement and not frittered away into a million little pork projects.

Will you endorse this call?

The opportunity is here to see to it that investment be taken as seriously as regulation. Lieberman-Warner, by auctioning permits, could be a vehicle to make it happen. I hope you'll join us.

Michael

I managed to get Joseph Romm to reply to this line of argument to the effect that he is very pro-public transit, but that sounds to me, as do most claims of interest in the subject, to be some kind of obligatory offering -- sort of like support for energy r&d.  So, yes, there is a world beyond regulation, but there is also a world beyond energy r&d.

Yes, I favor investments in public transit as part of an overarching portfolio of investments in everything from bringing down the price of clean energy to efficiency to carbon capture.

But there's a bigger question, I think: what's the best way to make these investments so they aren't wasted? How do we insure a transparent, democratic that results in breakthroughs in performance and price of clean energy technologies and systems? That's a huge challenge that there has so far been very little debate around.

Michael

So, we would need to go through a process of making the acquisition process more transparent, for one.  As to how to rebuild the rail network, for instance, that is something that will simply require a good amount of debate, again with full information on possible routes, costs, etc, completely available.

Of course, you can't insure anything in the political process, and you have to assume a certain level of corruption, waste, etc., just like in the private sector.  But we certainly have a large number of good examples of rail systems around the world, in Europe, Japan, and China, just to name a few.

By the way, I forgot to add in my previous comment that Trent Lott seems to be more pro-rail than the big environmental groups.  Some of that is trying to help his district, but if the military can do it, why can't railroads?  But the larger point is, there is certainly quite a bit of public support for rail, it seems to me, as the passage of various bond issues is any indication and as the greater-than-expected ridership levels of light rail projects shows.  So the lack of interest in rail on the part of progressives in general I find confusing.

Are you aware that mass-transit is less energy-efficient than the private automobile?
lafn.org/~dave/trans/energy/does_mt_saveE.html

Do you know what platooning is?
google.com/search?q=platooning

Vehicle Platooning

Maximizes Highway Throughput

Vehicle platooning makes it possible for vehicles to travel together closely yet safely. This leads to a reduction in the amount of space used by a number of vehicles on a highway. Thus more vehicles can use the highway without traffic congestion.

In fact, it has been estimated that at a fixed separation of 21 feet between vehicles traveling at 65 miles/hour, highway vehicle capacity increases from the regular 2000 vehicles per lane/hour to 5700 vehicles per lane/hour. Even with an increase of 25% in the separation between vehicles to allow for maneuvers and a 200 ft separation between different vehicle platoons, the highway vehicle capacity will still be 4300 vehicles per lane/hour - more than double the normal capacity.

Reduces Drag

It has also been observed that vehicle platooning significantly reduces the drag that each vehicle experiences. This reduction of drag translates into less fuel consumption, greater fuel efficiency and less pollution. Drag reduction is found out to be most effective when the distance between vehicles in the platoon is half the car length; at this distance, there's 50% reduction in drag and 20-25 percent reduction in fuel consumption.
[...]

How Vehicle Platooning Works

Vehicle platooning makes use of different technologies to achieve safe and efficient transport. From radars to magnets to radio communication systems, vehicle platooning systems have been found to be more efficient than most human drivers.

If you wanted to exit the platoon, your computer would interact with the other cars computers to make a space for you to pull out of the train safely.  Unite the wireless internet with the power grid making it a backbone and antennae.  and this and a lot of other energy saving systems become practical.

Cars turning from part of a light electric rail system back into individual cars, the best of both technologies.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

A lane that combines vehicle platooining with tuned inductive recharge strips for hybrid plugin vehicles could work

That would be way too expensive for infrastructure.

Frankly if you are planning on building massive infrastructure, why not just do quick charging?

http://greyfalcon.net/quickcharge
http://greyfalcon.net/quickcharge3.png

With the assumption that if the front driver drove there, that it would be okay for the car directly behind it.

Not quite sure how it would opperate in traffic though.

Hopefully too much time has not been wasted, too much of the environment irreversibly degraded, too many species massively extirpated, many too many resources recklessly dissipated and too much of the world we inhabit utterly compromised by our unbridled consumption, production and propagaton activities in these early years of Century XXI.

Steven Earl Salmony
AWAREness Campaign on The Human Population
http://sustainabilitysoutheast.org/

Oh yeah, it would be expensive, more so than the 1.5 trillion dollar (so far) Iraq oil war?  Or fuel farming, or coal to liquid?

Another advantage is that your car can recharge without plugging in, you just park over an inductive recharge parking spot.

A new wrinkle on quick charge from The energy blog though.  A commentor introduced the idea of a capacitor in the quick charge "gas pump" that recharges slowly and then is ready to transfer a whole tank's worth of power in a very short time.  With a short, fat conductor between the capacitor and the vehicle battery.

Now where are those ultracapacitors?  On hold like the rest of the new technology?  Patents on a dusty shelf somewhere in a GE warehouse.

http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog

Please find in the following link a remarkable article by a colleague-in-psychology of mine.

http://www.energybulletin.net/37091.html

Thank you,

Steve

Steven Earl Salmony
AWAREness Campaign on The Human Population, established 2001
http://sustainabilitysoutheast.org/

A couple of interesting lines:

Those "I" solutions, like changing a light bulb, appear inanely inadequate, and the more they are put forth as collective solutions, the gloomier my readers become. They recognize that we won't "buy" our way out of this one.

There was recently a debate here -- I can find the post if you want -- in which one post was signed, I assume, by a barrelful of psychologists, claiming that "changing lightbulbs" was a good way to make people aware of and used to thinking about global warming.  I always thought that the solution needs to fit the crime, so my posts tend to be much more utopian and collective action-oriented.  Any thoughts?

Also,

We do not, and cannot step back and connect the dots, because we might not like the picture that emerges.

I tried connecting some dots in a couple of my posts, so I thought this was interesting.

Thanks for your comments. Somehow we have got to understand more adequately the circumstances which humanity could soon be confronting.  Your clarity of vision and coherence of mind helps.

Always,

Steve