Friday night, Chicagoist sat in the Kroc University Theater of the Adler Planetarium to hear Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" presentation given by someone with PhD style credibility, Dr. James Sweitzer. The majority of the presentation had the same slickness of Gore's documentary without the cut scenes of impending doom (though the excessive rumbling of traffic above the theater was slightly ominous). However, in lieu of soliloquies about being a boy on a farm, Sweitzer did have some recently released studies that demonstrate the massive effect humans could have on the environment if we don't change our ways.
In a nutshell, we are already going to push the the temperature up another 3º over the course of the next century, but we have the ability to push it into the 9º range. Somewhere after 3º we will begin massive disruption of the planets ecosystem, and begin to wipe out large percentages of species.
Despite Daley's faults, Chicagoist does applaud Chicago's efforts in the green movement with the Center for Green Technology. Unfortunately, Chicago is only a part of Illinois, who just changed a law that no longer requires tail pipe checking of cars manufactured before 1996. Newer cars are tested via on board computers.
Cars manufactured before 1996 might seem like a dwindling number, and officials say most will be off the road by 2012, the cars that this change excludes made up 40% of the infringing cars last year. Additionally, studies show that even if only 1 in 20 cars are dirty, the one polluting may easily make up for the other 19 due to quickly changing emissions standards. While the change seems clearly negative for the environment, we are going to stay away from the political quagmire of no-bid contracts and campaign donations that were involved in the awarding of the new testing contract.
But, back to the presentation. On the way back, we opted out of taking a cab and went for public transportation, changed all of our light bulbs to CFLs, and began writing letters to our congressman. Ok, all but that last part is true.
Image via Swanksalot
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There is a difference between reporting and random statements. The mean global surface temperature has only increased by about 0.3 to 0.6°C since 1900 and only 0.2 to 0.3°C over the last 40 years. To say statements that it has increased 3º and it will increased to over the 9º range is bs.
Cars manufactured before 1996 might seem like a dwindling number, and officials say most will be off the road by 1996,
Not sure what this means.
Rich, the quote you're taking issue with does not say what you think it says.
"is going to increase" ≠ "has increased"
Sorry, that meant to say "be off the road by 2012". That was a mistake, as for the statement about "will increase" that was correct. Though Rich's stats are correct, the change was only about 1º over the last 100 years and it WILL increase by 3º on our current path.
Rich, if our public discourse were denied shrieking, hysterical hyperbole, well... I guess it would lead to rational consideration of the pros and cons of burning political capital to achieve a minuscule change in global temperatures instead of say, eliminating malaria or doing something worthwhile.
Vinny, it's deliciously ironic that you talk about rational consideration without seeing that not only did Rich misinterpret the relevant portion of the post, but two commenters have pointed that fact out since then.
Talk about shrieking hysterics.
By the way, you're absolutely right about warming vs. malaria. Because addressing global problems is a zero-sum game. We have to choose one or the other. Excellent point.
Actually, it is a zero sum game. You have X in political capital to use.
You don't have a magic wand.
By using all of X, you can make the internal combustion engine obsolete in 2027 instead of 2038. It would take 4X to achieve it by 2022. It would take 10X to achieve it by 2017. It would take 50X to achieve it by 2012.
What would the impact be, changing 3.0 increase to 2.9? 2.7? So yes, a minuscule difference.
Or you can use that political capital to do something else. Something that has a much larger impact.
Can't argue with that logic.
Global warming is a myth.