PGHIMC - Pittsburgh Independent Media Center

Time is running out to beat about the bush. The man-made global warming paradigm is about to collapse. In its wake the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPPC) process will have to change tack. In the mean time, the Kyoto Treaty seems to be moribund.
 
A couple of years ago I started to get interested in the man-made global warming issue. The issue was considered to be a scientific 'chasse gardée' in which climatologists call the shots. As an economist and foreign policy analyst I was, however, concerned about the possible devastating economic implications of Kyoto, because of its high costs, in terms of loss of economic growth and jobs, its adverse impact on competitiveness, its risks of triggering trade wars between compliers and non-compliers, and the danger of intrusive government intervention into the economy, thus jeopardizing our free enterprise system.
 
Initially, it took me quite a lot of trouble to start a dialogue with the climatologists in order to question them about their basic views and to discuss the wider implications with them. But as time went by, we established a reasonable working relationship. Of course they referred me to their 'bible': the 'Summary for Policymakers' by the IPCC -- a concise document which was specially written for people like me who only had vague notions about climatological science. As a policy analyst I read thousands of policy documents throughout my career, but I never encountered a document which was so riddled with inconsistencies. This made me suspicious about the man-made global warming paradigm and the IPCC process at large and I decided to read more about putative 'climate change' and to visit the panoply of websites by climate sceptics. It only confirmed my earlier uneasiness.
 
During the same period, in personal discussions with scientists, one of them confided to me that man-made global warming was the greatest scientific swindle of the 20th century. Since I had already acquired the same feeling, I asked him whether I could quote him in my publications. But he declined. Apparently this issue did not lend itself to freedom of speech.
 
At that time it was still pretty difficult to pinpoint where things went astray. But in the course of my further investigations I came across many instances of invocation of scientific authority to 'prove' points, illogical reasoning, political pressure, refusal to take cognizance of contrarian views, derision of opponents, suppression of crucial information, falsification and manipulation of scientific data, intimidation and even expulsion of scientists who did not adhere to the man-made global warming paradigm, etc. In short, all the tricks in the book, which looked so familiar to me in the light of experience that I had gained during earlier parts of my career in a totally different field.
 
Although many people know about these incidences, they did not reach such proportions that they would fundamentally discredit the man-made global warming paradigm and the IPCC process, which is based on it. However, this may change very rapidly in the near future in the light of the outcome of a recent conference in Moscow, the current reviews of the so-called 'hockey stick' curve, which is a main pillar of the man-made global warming paradigm, as well as a wave of statements of many reputed scientists who now openly confess their doubts about the anthropogenic greenhouse effect.
 
In an earlier article (Russia's Vacillations on Kyoto) I noted that Russian President Putin, at a press conference in the Kremlin on May 21, told reporters that Russia would speed up movement towards the Kyoto Protocol's ratification as part of a deal including the EU's consent for Russia to become a member of the WTO. But I also referred to somewhat more cautious statements of the Russian Deputy Foreign Minister, Vladimir Chizhov, who declared:

'Russia fully shares the goals of the Kyoto Protocol. However, its ratification will depend on the conditions provided to the country to join this accord. ... There are different opinions on the necessity to ratify this protocol in political as well as in scientific circles. ... The motives that made some countries join the Kyoto Protocol and others ignore it should be thoroughly studied.'

And I commented:

'It should not be forgotten that the Russians are reputed to be tough negotiators. Maybe Chizhov's reservations might bring new surprises. After all, the devil is in the details.'

Creeping Lysenkoism

And indeed, on 7 and 8 July 2004, the Russians convened a new seminar on the issue on climate change and the Kyoto Protocol, the outcome of which seems to overturn the earlier impression of a Russian volte face in the face of political pressure from the EU.
 
As during the earlier conference on climate change in Moscow, the economic adviser of President Putin, Andrei Illarionov played a prominent role. During a press conference after the meeting, Illarionov complained that the Russians have repeatedly asked their foreign partners who advocate the Kyoto Protocol and who insist that Russia should ratify the Kyoto Protocol, to answer a number of specific questions. But they did not receive any reply for a year. Illarionov:

'Instead of getting replies to our questions, we kept on hearing that replies did not matter. What was important is that whether or not Russia trusts Britain, the European Union and the countries that have ratified the Kyoto Protocol and that have been exerting unprecedented pressure on Russia to ratify it. This is why it was so important for us to arrange a real meeting and a real discussion of real problems with the participation of foreign scientists who have different views ....'

Concerning the basic assumptions of Kyoto, Illarionov commented:

'Basically, none of the assertions made in the Kyoto Protocol and the 'scientific' theory on which the Kyoto Protocol is based has been borne out by actual data. We are not seeing any high frequency of emergency situations or events. There has been no increase in the number of floods. Just as there has been no increase in the number of droughts. We can see that the speed of the wind in the hails in some areas is decreasing contrary to the statements made by the people who support the Kyoto Protocol. We are not witnessing a higher incidence of contagious diseases, and if there is a rise, it has nothing to do with climate change. If there is an insignificant increase in the temperature it is not due to anthropogenic factors but to the natural factors related to the planet itself and solar activity. There is no evidence confirming a positive linkage between the level of carbon dioxide and temperature changes. If there is such a linkage, it is a reverse nature. In other words, it is not carbon dioxide that influences the temperature on Earth, but it just the reverse: temperature fluctuations are caused by solar activity influence the concentration of carbon dioxide.'

After having complained about the behaviour of the British delegation, headed by Sir David King, who - unsuccessfully - tried to exclude certain 'undesirable' scientists from taking the floor, Illarionov went on to criticize the ideological and philosophical basis on which the Kyoto Protocol is built:

'That ideological base can be juxtaposed and compared with man-hating totalitarian ideology with which we had the bad fortune to deal during the 20th century, such as National Socialism, Marxism, Eugenics, Lysenkoism and so on. All methods of distorting information existing in the world have been committed to prove the alleged validity of these theories. Misinformation, falsification, fabrication, mythology, propaganda. Because what is offered cannot be qualified in any other way than myth, nonsense and absurdity.'

Illarionov's reference to Lysenkoism was particularly poignant. Who could have imagined some 15 years ago that a Russian would accuse the West of Lysenkoism and would have a point? Lysenkoism refers to an episode in Russian science featuring a non-scientific peasant plant-breeder named Trofim Denisovich Lysenko (1898-1976). Lysenko rose to dominance at a 1948 conference in Russia where he delivered a passionate address denouncing Mendelian thought as 'reactionary and decadent' and declared such thinkers to be 'enemies of the Soviet people'. Under Lysenko's influence, science -- and especially biology -- was guided not by the most likely theories, backed by appropriately controlled experiments, but by the desired ideology. Science was practised in the service of the State, or more precisely, in the service of ideology. The results were predictable: the steady deterioration of Soviet biology. It was due to Lysenko's efforts that many real scientists, especially in the field of genetics, were sent to the gulags or simply disappeared from the USSR. Lysenko's methods were not condemned by the Soviet scientific community until 1965, more than a decade after Stalin's death.
 
At the end of the press conference Illarionov was asked to answer a very simple question: 'Why don't you go along with the words of your boss, President Putin, who said quite clearly: 'We are in favour of the Kyoto Protocol?' His answer was: 'I will permit myself to remind you of the words said by President Putin. President Putin has never said that he supported the Kyoto Protocol. President Putin said on May 24, 2004 that he supported the Kyoto process. So, I am sorry, but you can't say that I do not support President Putin on this issue.'
 
However, Illarionov still acknowledged that one cannot fully rule out that Russia decides to ratify the Kyoto Treaty, because of the influence of a 'fifth column' in Russia, which is in favour of Kyoto. But he added: 'If such a decision is taken, it would deal ... a very serious blow to Russia, Japan, the European Union and Canada, the countries and regions which were rash enough to assume such obligations [of Kyoto].'
 
Mounting Doubts

The IPCC claims that human activities are responsible for nearly all earth's recorded warming during the past two centuries. A widely circulated image that dramatically depicts these temperature trends resembles a hockey stick with three distinct parts: a flat 'shaft' extending from A.D. 1000 to 1900, a 'blade' shooting up from A.D. 1900 to 2002, and a range of uncertainty in temperature estimates that envelops the shaft like a 'sheath'. It was Michael Mann of the University of Virginia and Phil Jones of the University of East Anglia who updated the influential reconstruction of global and hemispheric air temperatures used in the IPCC's third assessment of climate change. However, five independent research groups have uncovered problems with this reconstruction, calling into question all three components of the 'hockey stick'. On the basis of this research David Legates, Director of the Center for Climatic Research at the University of Delaware, and a prominent climate sceptic, concludes: 'Mann's research is clearly the outlier and does not fit with the overwhelming evidence of widespread global warming and cooling within the previous two millennia.'

However, some climate sceptics believe that David Legates has perhaps been a little bit too hasty in his verdict. The discussion still goes on. But it is likely to be in its final stage. And is also likely that the hockey stick will prove to be flawed.

But the row over de hockey stick is only one example of growing doubts about the man-made global warming paradigm. In Germany, Sami Solanki, the director of the renowned Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Göttingen, recently declared: 'The Sun has been at its strongest over the past 60 years and may now be affecting global temperatures.' The implication of this statement is that the role of the sun has so far been underestimated. In the UK David Bellamy, a well-known British conservationist and TV presenter went even further. He bluntly stated:

'Global warming - at least the modern nightmare version - is a myth. I am sure of it and so are a growing number of scientists. But what is really worrying is that the world's politicians and policy-makers are not. Instead, they have an unshakeable faith in what has, unfortunately, become one of the central credos of the environmental movement: humans burn fossil fuels, which release increased levels of carbon dioxide - the principal so-called greenhouse gas - into the atmosphere, causing the atmosphere to heat up. They say this is global warming: I say this is poppycock.'

How come that so many honorable and highly reputed scientists have so long put their faith in man-made global warming paradigm? Were they victims of inadvertence? Misjudgement? Prejudice? Tunnel vision? Cognitive dissonance? Self-deception? Is the man-made global warming paradigm indeed the greatest scientific scam ever?
 
The dénouement is imminent. In the very near future we will know which of the preceding question marks we may drop. As inspector Morse used to say to his associate: 'It has been staring us in the face all the time, Lewis! And we have overlooked it!

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Copied/Pasted Science from...
by Saltgrain Wednesday, Jul. 21, 2004 at 8:01 AM

... one who denies that the Holocaust took place.

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proof please
by puzzled Wednesday, Jul. 21, 2004 at 9:39 AM

Who denies the Holocaust? The writer or the poster?

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The poster
by Irving's good with HTML Wednesday, Jul. 21, 2004 at 9:56 AM

More wisdom from our tenured troll in residence.

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Irving and HTML
by Irving Wednesday, Jul. 21, 2004 at 8:08 PM

I'm not that good at it, moron, but thanks for the huzzahs. At least I'm not like a hippie trash indy "journalist" from Frisco who blames his mistakes on the software here. And is that the best you could do, seeing as how nobody had answered with certainty whether it's global cooling or warming or dimming? And the latest Chicken Little's Flavor of the Week is that the sun is hotter and brighter.

What will the freaks say next week???

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the treehugging psychobabble continues
by Irving Thursday, Jul. 22, 2004 at 10:20 AM

Whites more to blame
for 'global warming'?
New study claims blacks at greater risk, but less responsible for climate change
Posted: July 22, 2004
1:00 a.m. Eastern

By Joe Kovacs
© 2004 WorldNetDaily.com


A new study released by the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation suggests rising temperatures will kill more black citizens than whites in the U.S., while claiming African-Americans are less responsible than others for causing so-called "global warming."

The research, conducted by Oakland, Calif.-based group Redefining Progress, is being billed as the first-ever comprehensive examination of the health and economic impact of climate change on the black population.

"We are long past the point where global warming is considered a myth," said U.S. Rep. William Jefferson, D-La., chairman of the CBCF. "We are seeing its effects all around us."

The new report for the CBCF has three main findings:

1. America's black population will be disproportionately burdened by the health effects of global warming;

2. Blacks are less responsible for contributing to global warming than other Americans; and

3. Policies designed to mitigate global warming can generate large health and economic benefits for blacks, depending on their implementation.


Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson

"Time and again, the world's leading atmospheric scientists have warned us about the devastating impact of climate change," said Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson, D-Texas. "We now have irrefutable proof of its impact on our economy, our way of life, our health and our children."

The study alleges responsibility for the problem does not lie primarily with blacks, stating, "African-American households emit 20 percent less carbon dioxide than white households. Historically, this difference was even higher."

It claims more than 160,000 deaths annually can already be attributed to climate change across the world, and that figure is likely to increase unless action is taken to try to stop any further heat-up.

More than 70 percent of blacks live in urban areas which are in violation of federal air pollution standards, according to the report. Thus, more blacks than whites would likely be affected by higher concentrations of toxins in the air.

"African-Americans are nearly three times as likely to be hospitalized or killed by asthma as whites, with climate change expected to increase the incidence of asthma in the general population," the study says.

The research also says at the present time, blacks are more likely to die during extreme heat events.


Miami residents open water hydrants to keep cool (courtesy CNN)

"The most direct health effect of climate change will be intensifying heat waves that selectively impact poor and urban populations," according to the study, noting cities like New York, Detroit, Chicago and Philadelphia have large concentrations of blacks.

Despite the study's claims, the idea the Earth is heating up is hardly a universal belief.

Four months ago, a NASA-funded study reported some climate forecasts might be exaggerating estimations of global warming.

The U.S. space agency said the models possibly are overestimating the amount of water vapor entering the atmosphere as the Earth warms.

The theory many scientists work with says the Earth warms in response to human emissions of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, causing more water to evaporate from the ocean into the atmosphere.

WorldNetDaily has also reported that Dr. Fred Singer, professor emeritus of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia, maintains there has been little or no warming since about 1940.

"Any warming from the growth of greenhouse gases is likely to be minor, difficult to detect above the natural fluctuations of the climate, and therefore inconsequential," Singer wrote in a climate-change essay. "In addition, the impacts of warming and of higher CO2 levels are likely to be beneficial for human activities and especially for agriculture.

Just this week, the London Telegraph reported on a study by Swiss and German scientists suggesting increased radiation from the sun –not human activity – was to blame for climate changes.

"The sun is in a changed state," said Dr. Sami Solanki of the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Gottingen, Germany. "It is brighter than it was a few hundred years ago and this brightening started relatively recently – in the last 100 to 150 years."

The research adds credence to the beliefs of British professor David Bellamy, president of the London-based Conservation Foundation.

"Global warming – at least the modern nightmare version – is a myth," Bellamy told the Telegraph. "I am sure of it and so are a growing number of scientists. But what is really worrying is that the world's politicians and policy-makers are not.

"Instead, they have an unshakeable faith in what has, unfortunately, become one of the central credos of the environmental movement: humans burn fossil fuels, which release increased levels of carbon dioxide – the principal so-called greenhouse gas – into the atmosphere, causing the atmosphere to heat up. They say this is global warming, I say this is poppycock."

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Wind Turbine Factories in Thunder Bay’s Future?
by Aaron Vallejo Wednesday, Aug. 04, 2004 at 2:06 PM

Appeared in Thunder Bay’s Chronicle Journal July 10th, 2004

Wind turbine global demand is exploding at 40 per cent a year. Yes, those huge, slow, quiet, elegant energy producers. In the states of Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin, energy from wind is now cheaper than natural gas which is why Warren Buffet and his son are building a 310 megawatt wind farm in Iowa.

The city of Thunder Bay, Ontario on the north shore of Lake Superior is an ideal location for wind turbine manufacturing plants because it is in the middle of Canada and North America. Thunder Bay itself is an industrial city with the second largest inland port in the world. Both the port and city are essentially sleeping. It is time to wake both of them up. We can build wind turbine factories here, manufacture these gentle giants designed for disassembly and ship them everywhere.

Wind turbines enjoy the benefits of mass-production where the more we make the cheaper they become. In factories around the world only 3,000 wind turbines are manufactured, in contrast to the automobile industry, which makes 17 million vehicles a year. Imagine when we get to scale!

Would you like to build good long-term jobs and the clean, green economy of prosperity where we profitably fly passed Kyoto. Thunder Bay would you like to build these factories here, you have all the assets?

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squawk
by chicken little Wednesday, Aug. 18, 2004 at 6:54 PM

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1092833855872_331/?hub=Canada


Canada not alone in bemoaning cool summer
CTV
08.18.2004
staff

Canadians who've spent the summer wondering when all the hot weather will arrive aren't alone in their grumbling. Scientists at the University of Alabama say this summer has been the coldest the world has seen since 1992.

The fall in average worldwide temperature has apparently been going on since March. But researchers say they're not sure why the thermostat has dropped this year.

In the Northern Hemisphere, July's temperatures were below the 20-year average by .14 degrees Celsius and in the Southern Hemisphere by .29 degrees, said John Christy, a professor of atmospheric science at the Alabama university. Both the tropics and Antarctica showed marked coolness.

Rick Walls, a meteorologist at Environment Canada in Winnipeg, says in the eastern Prairies, it could be the coldest summer on record since data started being collected in the 19th century. He says between May and mid-August, temperatures in the region were on average three degrees below normal, beating records that go back to 1872.

In weather terms, that 's a massive drop.

But then, coastal British Columbia has been experiencing one of its hottest summers on record, with Victoria and Vancouver enjoying their second-warmest July on record.

In Victoria, July was the second warmest in records that go back to 1898, and a similar record-setting month was experienced in Vancouver, where temperatures were on average 2.2 degrees above the monthly average.

Scientists say the summer isn't completely lost. Early data this month suggests the cooling trend has been reversing.

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More junk Science
by Irving Thursday, Aug. 19, 2004 at 6:15 AM

Once again, remember how credible my copied/pasted articles are, given that i am a Holocaust denier.

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Design for Disassembly
by Aaron Vallejo Friday, Oct. 22, 2004 at 9:29 AM

Published in Lakehead University’s campus newspaper The Argus on October 11, 2004
In the First Industrial Revolution businesspeople and engineers designed products to be cheap and look nice so that the masses could have access to them. However, what happens to these products (cars, computers, toys, clothes, etc) after we are finished with them? Well, they are sent to the landfills or incinerated. Then industry goes out to look for new resources to make more cheap and pretty products.
We all know that waste is strangling our system; just look at Toronto’s situation. Whether we are talking about solid waste, pollution, water or soil contamination or highly toxic nuclear waste; waste is strangling our system.
The official proposals for the waste management are reduce the waste, reuse the materials, recycle the products, refuse to buy them and regulate the toxins. However good-willed this strategy is, it does not address the inherent problem of our system: our system creates waste.
The Next Industrial Revolution is geared to eliminating the concept of waste. Yes, eliminate the very concept of waste by design. Where in nature do we find waste? Nature has no concept of waste; in nature waste equals food for another organism. Why not design our system do the same and cycle nutrients either for the natural world (biological nutrients) or for the world of human industry (technical nutrients)?
Imagine this: Factories in Thunder Bay manufacture wind turbines and ship them everywhere for deployment as clean energy producers. Then the molecules of these wind turbines come back to the factories after their 20 – 30 year lifespan. Yes, I mean design these wind turbines for disassembly so they constantly come back to the city.
What are the advantages? Well, firstly, if these machines were designed to come apart then industry would get new high quality resources for new wind turbines. Therefore we could stop the mining of the Earth for new material. Secondly, all the materials would be totally safe for children of all species because why would we want to circulate materials that were toxic? Thirdly, the workers in these Thunder Bay factories would have endless work because every time these turbines come back to the city their molecules need to be taken apart intelligently and effectively and then rebuilt into new technical nutrient wind turbines.
To date, industry has created technical nutrient carpets (Shaw, Honeywell, BASF), polyester (Victor Innovatex), window shades (MechoShade), and the 2002 treeless book Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things is itself the first technical nutrient designed for disassembly and infinite up-cycling.

Sustaining Development Community Centre

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Yo, Aaron
by Irving Friday, Oct. 22, 2004 at 2:01 PM

Next time you make it back to this IMC, after you've gone around the world spamming the others with your Art Bell crap, of course, how about you come back and address the fact this summer was so cool, one for the record books?

I dare you to say anything remotely resembling coherence.

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Reversing Global Warming .. Doing My part
by Aaron Irving Saturday, Oct. 23, 2004 at 4:43 AM

It was much cooler this summer because I anud my friends have been doing our part. We have completely sworn off the Vegan diet, stopped eating Mexican food, and don't touch Kilebasa and Beer. For this, we have completely ceased farting. If everyone followed our lead, the world would be better and smell cleaner.

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i need pixie dust...
by George K. Monday, Oct. 25, 2004 at 5:12 PM
vine_swinger_chuckie@yahoo.com

There is as much science here as there is de-oderant under Aarons arms.
You dopes always fail to realize that the earth is climatologically dynamic. These long-term changes have been going on for some time.
I can not wait to see you cheese heads start a movement that petitions the government to put environmental controls on volcanos to reduce emissions, or for you to try and prove that mankind is responsible for eruptions.

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The Nation of China has adopted Cradle to Cradle Design
by Aaron Vallejo Saturday, Oct. 30, 2004 at 4:50 PM

Yes, thank you the Earth has always and will always be in a perpetual state of change and temperature fluctuation however since the Industrial Revolution the temperature has been gradually climbing and the carbon levels (parts per million) have increased substantially.

Maybe humans have nothing to do with global warming but is that really a chance we can take? If we were driving in a vehicle on the highway chances are we are not going to crash but I am going to wear my seatbelt anyways. The same is true here for global warming lets systemically and profitably dismantle fossil fuels/nuclear energies and together build the renewably powered world.


Published in Lakehead University’s Argus Student Newspaper October 25th, 2004

The nation of China has 1,300,000,000 citizens and is the fastest growing economy in the world. This summer steel prices rose significantly mainly because China bought up so much of the global steel production showing the economic power of the Chinese nation.
Now imagine if the Chinese economy industrialized using the same design as the United States and Europe with toxic garbage everywhere. In the epic documentary The Corporation Ray Anderson states “every life support system is in decline…there is not one published, peer reviewed paper published in the last 25 years that would contradict this scenario”.
The designers of Cradle to Cradle Design, William McDonough and Michael Braungart, presented to Chinese officials in 2002 showing that the circular industrial design powered by the sun is actually based very much on the ancient Chinese practice of precise nutrient flows for 4,000 years of permanent agriculture. The Chinese recognized this immediately.
Now through the China US Center for Sustainable Development the Chinese are converting their entire economy to work with nature. They are taking down the coal towers in Shanghai and Beijing to use the carbon in greenhouses (http://www.npr.org/programs/npc/2002/020424.wmcdonough.html (43: 55/ 58: 30)), they are rebuilding 5 cities, they are redesigning the building construction protocols to be green, they are setting up huge manufacturing facilities for wind turbines and solar panels and collectors.
Ford announced this summer that they are building a 3rd automotive plant in China. Since, Ford is very excited about Cradle to Cradle Design this factory will be a model of human industry working with nature.
“The authors, McDonough and Braungart, and China share the goal to make the book ‘Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things’ as widely accessible and affordable throughout China as possible” http://www.chinauscenter.org.
The ship of human industry is turning.

Sustaining Development Community Centre

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The Model U and Ford’s Transformation
by Aaron Vallejo Monday, Nov. 29, 2004 at 2:35 PM

Published in Lakehead University’s Argus Student Newspaper November 15th, 2004

Imagine a vehicle powered by solar derived hydrogen, the tires are biological nutrients made of corn providing vitamin C and E to the natural world. The seats and interior are nutritious fabric and material. After a 5 year lease the vehicle and its molecules were intelligently and effectively taken apart and reassembled into new vehicles infinitely.
This vehicle is Ford’s Model U concept car, the first Cradle to Cradle vehicle. The designers call it the Model T of the 21st century.
Environmentalists will cheer because these vehicles create no carbon emissions therefore no global warming, they require no new metals because of closed loop cycles so mining is not required, they give nutrition to all surrounding life by giving positive emissions. The workers will cheer when these vehicles come back to the factory to be up – cycled creating constant employment. The business people will cheer because the vehicle constantly generates revenue every time a vehicle is leased, there are no regulation fees because there are no toxic emissions, there is no waste management because everything is valuable nutrients for the automotive industry. The entire process is powered by the solar hydrogen economy.
Ford began this transformation in 1999 and their largest factory in Dearborne, Michigan which I visited this past summer, now has the largest habitat roof in the world (12 acres), new wetlands, and a new young forest.
Globally, Ford has 67 square kilometres of roof space which will be replaced with habitat for local birds because the habitat roof in Dearborne saved the company $35 million.
Yes, Ford is still building gas-guzzling SUV’s but the transformation of working with nature on an industrial level has begun. Consider this: over 5000 companies supply Ford with materials. So if Ford changes they change.

Sustaining Development Community Centre

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something for the global warming cheerleader
by Aaron is a loser Thursday, Jan. 13, 2005 at 7:53 AM

Aaron Vallejo is a loser, the moron who spams every indy on the planet, who doesn't even have the sense to learn basic HTML in order to keep from screwing up every page it touches.

But I digress. Here's something for that abject idiot who graduated from Art Bell University:

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L12551308.htm

Fossil fuel curbs may speed global warming-scientists
13 Jan 2005 00:00:42 GMT

Source: Reuters

By Matt Falloon

LONDON, Jan 13 (Reuters) - Cutting down on fossil fuel pollution could accelerate global warming and help turn parts of Europe into desert by 2100, according to research to be aired on British television on Thursday. "Global Dimming", a BBC Horizon documentary, will describe research suggesting fossil fuel by-products like sulphur dioxide particles reflect the sun's rays, "dimming" temperatures and almost cancelling out the greenhouse effect.

The researchers say cutting down on the burning of coal and oil, one of the main goals of international environmental agreements, will drastically heat rather than cool climate.

"When the cooling affect goes away -- and it must do because particles like sulphur dioxide are damaging to humans -- global warming will be much stronger," climate change scientist Dr Peter Cox told Reuters on Wednesday.

Temperatures could increase in the worst case by up to 10 degrees by the end of the century, the researchers said -- much more than current estimates.

Scientists differ as to whether global warming is caused by man-made emissions of carbon dioxide and other "greenhouse" gases, by natural climate cycles or if it exists at all.

Take away fossil fuel by-products like sulphur dioxide without tackling greenhouse gas emissions, and the extra heat will speed warming, irreversibly melting ice sheets and rendering rain forests unsustainable within decades, Dr Cox said.

"The climate will warm more in the future but the ability of the land to store carbon dioxide will be compromised," he said, adding that warmer soil was less able to hold the greenhouse gas.

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Chicken Littles - flash frozen
by Chicken Littles - flash frozen Monday, Jan. 17, 2005 at 9:31 AM

Minnesota Town Hits 54 Below Zero

16 minutes ago

By The Associated Press

Temperatures plummeted across the eastern half of the nation Monday, approaching an all-time record in northern Minnesota and freezing the Gulf Coast as a river of Arctic air pushed southward.

Photo
AP Photo



Thermometers registered a low of 54 degrees below zero at Embarrass, Minn.

"You keep living, but it gets old after a while," said Christine Mackai, the town clerk for the community of 691 people in northeast Minnesota.

Minnesota's record is 60 below, set on Feb. 2, 1996, in Tower, about 10 miles north of Embarrass.

The cold at Embarrass didn't stop the regular customers from getting their morning coffee at Four Corners, a cafe and gas station.

"Everybody left their cars running," waitress Trish Roggenbuck said. "It was pretty much breathtaking when you walked outside."

While below-zero readings stayed in the upper Midwest, thermometers dropped below the freezing mark all the way to the Gulf of Mexico coast.

The morning low was 28, with wind chills in the upper teens, at Mobile, Ala., Gulfport-Biloxi, Miss., and Pensacola, Fla. A hard freeze warning was in effect overnight into Tuesday morning for parts of Mississippi, the weather service said.

Mackai said Embarrass had been prepared for bitter cold as early as last Thursday. "It only got down to 28 below, and that's nothing. That's no big deal," she said.

Elsewhere in northern Minnesota on Monday, Babbitt chilled to 51 below, and International Falls — which calls itself the Nation's Icebox — dropped to 44 below, the national Weather Service said. Farther south, Minneapolis-St. Paul bottomed out at a mere 11 below.

The arctic blast followed several days of subzero temperatures. Weather service meteorologist Greg Frosig in Duluth said Monday's high would still be below zero in northern Minnesota.

___

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Cradle to Cradle To Washington
by Aaron Vallejo Saturday, Jan. 29, 2005 at 5:54 PM

Cradle To Cradle To Washington
Andrew T. Gillies, 12.15.04, 6:00 AM ET

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Last month's U.S. election results elicited the predictable laments from the enviro crowd. "The re-election of President George W. Bush means that polluters will enjoy four more years of lax enforcement," moaned the Natural Resources Defense Council.

But the political winds don't seem to ruffle one prominent environmentalist: William McDonough, a 53-year-old architect and man dubbed a "hero for the planet" by Time magazine in 1999. "We don't focus on politics, because they come and go," McDonough said in a phone interview last week, adding, "Republicans are very attracted to what we do."

Indeed, last January, McDonough was back at the White House, where he had previously accepted an environmental award from President Bill Clinton, expounding his ideas on ecologically sustainable design to a meeting of government officials arranged by Bush's Office of Management and Budget. "We've met with many of the departments and agencies many times since," McDonough says.

The subject of those meetings is what McDonough calls "Eco-effectiveness" and "Cradle to Cradle Design." In short, it's an effort to refashion architecture and industry so that they emulate the ecosystems found in the natural world.

An example: A regular old building acts much like a machine, powered by a central furnace and releasing sewage and other waste out through pipes. By contrast, an eco-effective building mimics a tree, drawing power from solar energy and using plant systems to purify effluents into clean water. "Waste equals food," goes a Cradle to Cradle mantra, suggesting a world where everything industry churns out can either be composted, reused or recycled into something else.

Loopy? Maybe, but some very big businesses don't seem to think so. As reported by Forbes (see: "Fabric Softener"), McDonough and his two firms, William McDonough & Partners and MBDC, have worked on projects for clients such as BP (nyse: BP - news - people ), BASF (nyse: BF - news - people ), Ford Motor (nyse: F - news - people ), Nike (nyse: NKE - news - people ), and Visteon). Perhaps most famously, McDonough advised Ford on how to green its gigantic Rouge manufacturing facility in Dearborn, Mich.

And, as the meeting at the White House last January suggests, there's also plenty of appeal for government. Why? While McDonough is not reflexively anti-regulation, a key Cradle to Cradle tenet is that regulation itself is evidence of design failure. In other words, if you can build a factory that emits nothing harmful, there's no need for heavy regulation.

A good chunk of today's environmental law, McDonough argues, doesn't aim for this ideal. Instead, he says, it sets out to make something less bad--reducing pollution and so on--rather than encouraging a fundamental redesign to turn the bad thing into something good.

Again, that notion has a fairly dreamy ring to it, but McDonough is quick to fire off an illustration of how it can work. In September 2002, MBDC partnered with the Environmental Protection Agency's Office of Solid Waste to find ways to reduce the plastics and other undesirable layers of waste found in packaging of shipments from online retailers. They issued a design challenge in March of 2003 and by October of that year had a winner: a collaboration between Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ), the Allan Schluger Company and Shorewood Packaging, a unit of International Paper (nyse: IP - news - people ).

Their product, called the "Bevelope," can be adjusted to accommodate everything from DVD cases to thick software manuals and is made from recycled paperboard that can be recycled again or composted. Shorewood Packaging says big customers now using the Bevelope are Microsoft and Philip Morris, a unit of Altria Group (nyse: MO).

McDonough has also been working with the U.S. Air Force on assessing chemicals used at aircraft and missile factories. "It's an odd place for us to be working," McDonough acknowledges, "but the idea is that the whole world is cradle to cradle, so it involves everything."

Everything? Not a bad business proposition.

http://www.forbes.com/home/manufacturing/2004/12/15/cz_ag_1215beltway.ht

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End Goal of the Next Industrial Revolution
by Aaron Vallejo Wednesday, Feb. 16, 2005 at 10:38 AM

William McDonough, international architect, industrial designer, business leader and Hero of the Planet, was given a standing ovation by all departments of the United States government after he presented this end goal and the Cradle to Cradle Design strategy in the White House on January 21st 2004.

“We hope for a delightful, safe and healthy world
with clean water and renewably power,
economically, equitably, ecologically
and elegantly enjoyed”.

The central question of Cradle to Cradle Design is:

“How do we love all of the children of all species for all time?”

In Cradle to Cradle Design we are talking about conceptually sound and hugely profitable strategies that are socially equitable and environmentally intelligent that celebrates healthy closed-loop industrial production while we regenerate the biosphere.

The latest audio (31 minutes) of William McDonough, designer of Cradle to Cradle Design is with Canadian Massive Change radio on March 23rd, 2004 (half way down the page)
http://www.massivechange.com/interviews.html
Along with many other brilliant thinkers like Janine Benyus, Wade Davis, Jeffery Sachs, Jaime Lerner, Gwynne Dyer and many more. Fabulous resources!

Now is the time to profitably and strategically build the renewably powered world together.
The decentralized, regenerative solar hydrogen economy
http://www.yesmagazine.org/article.asp?ID=450
http://www.newstarget.com/001029.html
http://www.hydrogenus.com/advocate/ad81sol.asp

As of today February 16th, 2005 the Kyoto Protocol is now international law with 141 countries on board!

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I'll believe anything
by Vallejo the Magnificent Sunday, Feb. 20, 2005 at 2:32 PM

global_warming.jpg, image/jpeg, 700x287

.

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scam and spam
by 54 below zero Thursday, Feb. 24, 2005 at 11:41 PM

The global warming scam
By Derek Kelly, PhD

Scam, noun: a swindle, a fraudulent arrangement.

A chronology of climate change
During most of the last billion years the Earth did not have permanent ice sheets. Nevertheless, at times large areas of the globe were covered with vast sheets of ice. Such times are known as glaciations. In the past 2 million to 3 million years, the temperature of the Earth has changed (warmed or cooled) at least 17 times, some say 33, with glaciations that last about 100,000 years interrupted by warm periods that last about 10,000 years.

The last glaciation began 70,000 years ago and ended about 10,000 years ago. The Earth was a lot colder than it is now; snow and ice had accumulated on a lot of the land, glaciers existed on large areas and the sea levels were lower.

15,000 years ago: The last glaciation reaches a peak, with continental glaciers that cover a lot of the sub-polar and polar areas of the land areas of Earth. In North America, all of New England and all of the Great Lakes area, most of Ohio, Indiana, Minnesota and the North Dakotas, lie under ice sheets hundreds of meters thick. More than 37 million cubic kilometers of ice was tied up in these global sheets of ice. The average temperature on the surface of the Earth is estimated to have been cooler by approximately 6 degrees Celsius than currently. The sea level was more than 90 meters lower than currently.

15,000 years ago to 6,000 years ago: Global warming begins. The sheets of ice melt, and sea levels rise. Some heat source causes approximately 37 million cubic kilometers of ice to melt in approximately 9,000 years. Around 9,500 years ago, the last of the Northern European sheets of ice leave Scandinavia. Around 7,500 years ago, the last of the American sheets of ice leave Canada. This warming is neither stable nor the same everywhere. There are periods when mountain glaciers advance, and periods when they withdraw. These climatic changes vary extensively from place to place, with some areas affected while others are not. The tendency of warming is global and obvious, but very uneven. The causes of this period of warming are unknown.

8,000 years ago to 4,000 years ago: About 6,000 years ago, temperatures on the surface of Earth are about 3 degrees warmer than currently. The Arctic Ocean is ice-free, and mountain glaciers have disappeared from the mountains of Norway and the Alps in Europe, and from the Rocky Mountains of the United States and Canada. The ocean of the world is some three meters higher than currently. A lot of the present desert of the Sahara has a more humid, savannah-like climate, with giraffes and savannah fauna species.

4,000 years ago to AD 900: Global cooling begins. The Arctic Ocean freezes over, mountain glaciers form once more in the Rocky Mountains, in Norway and in the Alps. The Black Sea freezes over several times, and ice forms on the Nile in Egypt. Northern Europe gets a lot wetter, and the marshes develop again in previously dry areas. The sea level drops to approximately its present level. The temperatures on the surface of the Earth are about 0.5-1 degree cooler than at present. The causes of this period of cooling are unknown.

AD 1000 to 1500: This period has quick, but uneven, warming of the climate of the Northern Hemisphere. The North Atlantic becomes ice-free and Norse exploration as far as North America takes place. The Norse colonies in Greenland even export crop surpluses to Scandinavia. Wine grapes grow in southern Britain. The temperatures are from 3-8 degrees warmer than currently. The period lasts only a brief 500 years. By the year 1500, it has vanished. The Earth experiences as much warming between the 11th and the 13th century as is now predicted by global-warming scientists for the next century. The causes of this period of warming are unknown.

1430 to 1880: This is a period of the fast but uneven cooling of Northern Hemisphere climates. Norwegian glaciers advance to their most distant extension in post-glacial times. The northern forests disappear, to be replaced with tundra. Severe winters characterize a lot of Europe and North America. The channels and rivers get colder, the snows get heavy, and the summers cool and short. The temperatures on the surface of the world are about 0.5-1.5 degrees cooler than present. In the United States, 1816 is known as the "year with no summer". Snow falls in New England in June. The widespread failure of crops and deaths due to hypothermia are common. The causes of this period of cooling are unknown.

1880 to 1940: A period of warming. The mountain glaciers recede and the ice in the Arctic Ocean begins to melt again. The causes of this period of warming are unknown.

1940 to 1977: Cooling period. The temperatures are cooler than currently. Mountain glaciers recede, and some begin to advance. The tabloids inform us of widespread catastrophes due to the "New Glaciation". The causes of this period of cooling are unknown.

1977 to present: Warming period. The summer of 2003 is said to be the warmest one since the Middle Ages. The tabloids notify us of widespread catastrophes due to "global warming". The causes of warming are discovered - humanity and its carbon-dioxide-generating fossil-fuel use and deforestation.

Anyone else find something fishy about the final sentence?

Comments
The above chronology of recent (geologically speaking) climate changes should place global-warming catastrophists (such as those who developed the Kyoto treaty) in an awkward position. Their fundamental assumption is that Earth's climate was stable and was doing just fine before the Industrial Revolution started interfering with climate's "natural" state. It is the Industrial Revolution, and in particular the use of fossil-fuel-burning machines, that has led us to the brink of environmental catastrophe due to global warming caused by increasing amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere.

But it is plain to see that both warming and cooling occurred numerous times before the Industrial Revolution. Similarly, all the dire predictions of global-warming consequences - sea-level rise, for example - have happened in the past. In fact, the greatest warming period was when dinosaurs walked the land (about 70 million to 130 million years ago). There was then five to 10 times as much CO2 in the atmosphere as there is today, and the average temperature was 4-11 degrees Celsius warmer. Those conditions should have been very helpful to life, since they permitted those immense creatures to find an abundance of food and they survived.

The Cretaceous was an intense "greenhouse world" with high surface temperatures. These high temperatures were due to the much higher level of CO2 in the atmosphere at the time - four to 10 times as much as is in our air today. The biota was a mixture of the exotic and familiar - luxuriant green forests of now-extinct trees flourished within the Arctic Circle and dinosaurs roamed. The global sea level was at its highest ever during this period, peaking during the Late Cretaceous around 86 million years ago. It is certain that the global sea level was well over 200 meters higher during this time than it is today. The Earth was immensely hotter, the CO2 vastly more plentiful, and the sea levels much higher than they are today.

The Earth has also been immensely colder, the CO2 much less plentiful, and the sea levels much lower than today. Fifteen thousand years ago, the sea level was at least 90 meters lower than it is today. The land looked bare because it was too cold for beech and oak trees to grow. There were a few fir trees here and there. No grass grew, however, just shrubs, bushes and moss grass. In the northern parts of North America, Europe and Asia there was still tundra. The animals were different from today too. Back then there were woolly mammoth, woolly rhinos, cave bears (the former three now extinct), bison, wolves, horses, and herds of reindeer like modern-day reindeer.

The major "sin" for the global warmists is CO2. The Kyoto treaty is meant to reduce the amount of this gas so as, they say, to reduce the degree of warming and eventually return us to some stable climate system. If we look at the historical situation, however, this is cause for alarm. For one thing, there has never been a stable climate system. For another, the level of CO2 in our atmosphere is near its historic low. In the long run, the greatest danger is too little rather than too much CO2. There has been a long-term reduction of CO2 throughout the 4.5-billion-year history of the Earth. If this tendency continues, eventually our planet may become as lifeless as Mars.

Glaciation has prevailed for 90% of the last several million years. Extreme cold. Biting cold. Cold too intense for bikinis and swimming trunks. No matter what scary scenarios global-warming enthusiasts dream up, they pale in comparison with the conditions another ice age would deliver. Look to our past climate. Fifteen thousand years ago, an ice sheet a kilometer and a half thick covered all of North America north of a line stretching from somewhere around Seattle to Cleveland and New York City.

Instead of reducing CO2, we should, perhaps, be increasing it. We should pay the smokestack industries hard dollars for every kilogram of soot they pump into the atmosphere. Instead of urging Chinese to stop using coal and turn instead to nuclear-generated electricity, we should beg them to continue using coal. Rather than bringing us to the edge of global-warming catastrophe, anthropogenic climate change may have spared us descent into what would be the most serious and far-reaching challenge facing humankind in the 21st century - dealing with a rapidly deteriorating climate that wants to plunge us into an ice age. Let's hope Antarctica and Greenland melt. Let's hope the sea levels rise. All life glorifies warmth. Only death prefers the icy fingers of endless winter.

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Changing the Design of the World
by Aaron Vallejo Thursday, Mar. 17, 2005 at 9:04 AM

Imagine a world of Abundance instead of limits and fear. Where everything we make flows in healthy cycles powered by the sun.

http://www.youwerehere.com/mcdonough/

This audio of William McDonough is from the Monticello Dialogues. The Monticello Dialogues is 6 hours of dialogues with the leader of the Next Industrial Revolution.
http://www.newdimensions.org/NEW/audio-books/S986.shtml

Found through:
http://www.mcdonough.com/#

Instead of minimizing the negatives of less destructive design; we maximize the positives of healthy and regenerative design.

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Fradulent article - "Reversing Global Warming"
by Pat Neuman Sunday, Mar. 20, 2005 at 12:14 PM
npat1@juno.com

The post called "Reversing Global Warming" (55 comments) by Aaron Vallejo remains viewable. Indymedia centers need to repair the damage created by allowing Vallejo's fradulent article and hundreds of posted comments from "Aaron Vallejo" himself, at indymedia sites throughout the U.S. since March of 2004.

profiles.yahoo.com/patneuman2000

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wrong author accused
by Now I see. Tuesday, Mar. 22, 2005 at 3:05 PM
npat1@juno.com

The fraudulent author on global warming is Derek Kelly, PhD. Earlier, I misread the author of the article below.

http://houston.indymedia.org/news/2004/03/27361_comment.php#38159

Friday February 25, 2005 at 02:37 AM

The global warming scam
By Derek Kelly, PhD

Scam, noun: a swindle, a fraudulent arrangement.

A chronology of climate change
...
"Instead of reducing CO2, we should, perhaps, be increasing it. We should pay the smokestack industries hard dollars for every kilogram of soot they pump into the atmosphere. Instead of urging Chinese to stop using coal and turn instead to nuclear-generated electricity, we should beg them to continue using coal. Rather than bringing us to the edge of global-warming catastrophe, anthropogenic climate change may have spared us descent into what would be the most serious and far-reaching challenge facing humankind in the 21st century - dealing with a rapidly deteriorating climate that wants to plunge us into an ice age. Let's hope Antarctica and Greenland melt. Let's hope the sea levels rise. All life glorifies warmth. Only death prefers the icy fingers of endless winter."

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Eternal Optimist
by Aaron Vallejo Saturday, Apr. 09, 2005 at 6:46 PM

Architect William McDonough has witnessed China’s rapid modernization and sees hope for sustainable development.

McDonough is working to bring to cradle-to-cradle protocol to China, where old buildings are being demolished as quickly as new ones are constructed.

For the past several years China has been modernizing at a frightening, almost unfathomable pace. It is not an exaggeration to say that there is no precedent for it. As China has plunged headlong into the twenty-first century, American architecture and planning firms have followed, more than willing to assist government officials and newly “privatized” developers in the massive effort. China is still, for the time being, where the action is—and the scramble for work by Western firms resembles an architectural gold rush.

All this raises serious questions: What are the long-term consequences of this feverish activity? Can the Earth survive a gas-guzzling (Americanized) China? Is it already too late to develop ideas that would help China realize a more ecological future? Not surprisingly, architect William McDonough—a man whose solution to the SUV was a sustainable SUV—is cautiously optimistic on China. Like countless other American firms, William McDonough + Partners has an active presence there. Recently Metropolis executive editor Martin C. Pedersen talked to McDonough about his work in China, the future of sustainable development, and the gifts China might bestow on us.

What are you doing in China, and who’s the client?
We’re working with the China Housing Industry Association (CHIA) and a group of developers to create templates for cities based on the cradle-to-cradle protocol. What we do is examine sites—some of which are as big as 20 square kilometers—through a different set of lenses. We look at them, for example, as if we were a migrating bird: What would we want to see there in terms of evolution? We also look at it from the ground: What am I doing here? That’s one lens. Another lens would be hydrology. What if I’m groundwater, or a raindrop? So we work from the sky into the earth. We’re the master planners for seven sites. And the basic point is that if you look at the world through a new set of lenses, suddenly the ecosystem becomes your infrastructure.

Who hires you?
The government asks private developers if they would be interested in working with us. They give out the properties and work with CHIA, which is the consortium of private developers charged with building housing.