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Carbon Offsets

Live Earth helps Chris Dillow reduce his carbon footprint:

The moment it came on, I turned the TV off.

At the same time, Live Earth Sydney was held against the backdrop of a terrifying drought:

Faced with record beer queues, thirsty fans at Saturday’s Live Earth concert at Sydney’s Aussie Stadium were seen by the Herald offering others $50 for their beer rather than wait an hour to buy refreshments.

Thousands, deprived of the traditional rock ‘n’ roll accompaniment, went to a Coca-Cola stand, forgetting that its manufacturers had been under fire in India for allegedly creating water shortages and pollution around their bottling facilities.

Scores were seen leaving within the first two hours of the nine-hour festival, fed up with the lack of basic services, cutting their losses on a $99 ticket. Gate attendants were heard telling the human tide that they should complain to the promoter.

It was “unAustralian”, one spectator protested. “This is what happens when you let hippies organise a big event,” another said. One woman, asked by Missy Higgins “how you all are back there”, earned a wry round of applause from the stands when she shouted: “Sober.”

Be sure to put your TV back on for this.

UPDATE:
More global warming ‘denialism’ from Scott Armstrong and Kesten Green:

We asked scientists and others involved in forecasting climate change to tell us which scientific articles presented the most credible forecasts. Most of the responses we received (30 out of 51) listed the IPCC Report as the best source. Given that the Report was commissioned at an enormous cost in order to provide policy recommendations to governments, the response should be reassuring. It is not. The forecasts in the Report were not the outcome of scientific procedures. In effect, they present the opinions of scientists transformed by mathematics and obscured by complex writing… We have been unable to identify any scientific forecasts to support global warming. Claims that the Earth will get warmer have no more credence than saying that it will get colder.

 

posted on 09 July 2007 by skirchner in Economics, Financial Markets

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Comments

Be sure to put your TV back on for this.

Well, all right, you Holocaust denier, you. And me.

offering others $50 for their beer rather than wait an hour

There’s a microeconomic lesson in there somewhere.

Posted by benson  on  07/09  at  12:28 PM


Is there no depth that The Age will not plumb?

Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)  on  07/10  at  03:30 PM


Well, I watched the whole production last night as a layperson with a fairly open mind (I’m open minded about the science of global warming but sceptical about whether any policy action should be taken). I’m must say that Durkin and his film came off as unscholarly at best. If anything, it firmed my view that anthropogenic global warming is more likely than not. I can see why people (particularly older people) are sceptical of global warming science as they have heard many scares in the past that turned out to be wrong. But surely it is the best hypothesis currently available? The case for the solar radiation theory looked pretty grim when the ABC added the last 17 years of data onto the chart. Taking your point on the Armstrong and Green paper, this is not to say that the forecasts of warming and certainly on the net costs of warming are necessarily accurate. But I find the idea of a conspiracy on the basic global warming hypothesis to be unconvincing at present.

Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)  on  07/13  at  10:59 AM


I don’t think Durkin is the scholarly type and the tone and presentation left much to be desired.  The fact that the studio audience was stacked by the Lyndon LaRouche brigade was kind of funny though!

Posted by skirchner  on  07/13  at  11:20 AM


Oh my Lord!  Stephen are you seriously still a skeptic?  Is that even possible these days?

The panel discussion on “swindle” was hilarious.  Ray Evans was some deranged Rex Hunt lookalike ranting about “greenies”, Bob Carter appeared confused and mumbling and close to dementia, and Duffy was his usual pompous self.  As for the LaRouchites at the end, words fail me.

Not that it matters anymore.  Skeptics are good value for entertainment purposes these days, but little else.  Its increasingly clear Howard is going to get a walloping later this year, and the next POTUS will get serious about climate change.

P.S. a skeptic?  Seriously?!  LOL!

Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)  on  07/19  at  01:33 PM



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