Demand the Paris Summit agrees to cap fossil fuel extraction

[Infarction]

There is a petition at www.thepetitionsite.com/529/246/535/demand-the-paris-summit-agrees-to-cap-fossil-fuel-extraction/ summary being "If fossil fuels come out of the ground they will be burnt contributing to the CO2 concentrations in our atmosphere. The Paris Summit can debate this truth and should agree to a global cap with annual reductions in allowable extractable CO2 potential tonnage."

Please sign and share this petition.

[gareth]

I trust this is not veering off topic for my first post here. I at least speak of the Paris Summit. Only Auntie ABC, as they did on their 7pm news bulletin - their main news for the day - could put to air what they spruiked as an analysis of China's efforts to rein in its CO2 emissions and not once mention the tremendous program China is implementing to build nuclear power stations.

I believe they have 30 such power stations in operation, a further 21 under construction with more to come.

But the dread word nuclear did not pass Aunty's lips, nor that of its intrepid man on the ground, Bill Birtles. See here - www.abc.net.au/news/2015-11-29/china-stakes-leadership-claim-to-combat-climate-change/6983650 - if you don't believe me.

(Note to self... first post a rant. Must do better.)

[Roger Clifton]

Gareth - yes, it is amazing how much an editor can distort a message by omitting inconvenient passages.

On last night's Lateline (Australian ABC TV, November 30), Professor David Karoly seemed to promise "reductions in global average temperature [in proportion to] reductions in emissions". That is a dangerous delusion of those who would settle for token reductions, and he would not have meant to say it. Almost certainly, he meant that reductions in global average temperature can only be obtained by reductions in atmospheric concentrations of emitted gases. However much of the audience wants instead to hear the opposite, so Auntie provided the required illusion.

As spokesman for Australia's climate scientists, Professor Karoly has the authority to convince us that the rate of global emissions must reach zero before atmospheric concentrations can stabilise (for a temperature increase of, say 2°). That is a message that is not widely believed here, so it deserves a clearer assertion than he gave.

The temperature cannot return to the past "normal" in our lifetimes. In the longer term, the main positive feedback to remove CO2 from the air-and-sea - the weathering of rock - is too slow. On a geological timescale, it eventually begins to reduce total CO2 and subsequently lowers global temperatures. The word "eventually" is treacherous, because there are many processes that delay the equilibration of CO2 in its reservoirs, and others that delay the equilibration of temperature.

Putting a respected scientist on camera to tell us the bad news is one thing, but the ABC is also responsive to what its audience wants to hear. Australians look forward to benefiting from our exports of gas as much as we have benefited from exports of coal. If China installs more windmills, they will need more gas to power their backup. So, we hear that we should make reductions here and there, perhaps even to cap extraction, but the ABC knows we don't want to hear that word, zero.


PS: In December 2015, the Paris Summit signed off on an agreement that global emission should be reduced to net-zero by 2100. After a little more self-deception, Australians will look forward to "helping the world reduce" by our continuing exports of "clean coal" and "natural gas".