Green, but Smart
Bjorn Lomborg is every climate change skeptic’s favorite scientist, and both sides do well to heed his advice. His point, basically, is that climate change is real, but that sufficient response is not currently within the realm of plausibility. So, he suggests, we should do what humankind does best: advance.
Can we achieve this technological miracle over the next 20 to 40 years? In a word, yes. The price of solar energy has been dropping steadily for 30 years — by about 50 percent every decade — and we could likely accelerate that decline further with sufficiently large investments in research and development.
How large? If we were willing to devote just 0.2 percent of global GDP (roughly $100 billion a year) to green-energy R&D, I believe that we could bring about game-changing breakthroughs not just for solar power, but also for a wide variety of other alternative-energy technologies.
This belief in the potential of technological progress strikes some climate activists as naïve or even delusional. But is it really? Consider one of the miracles of the modern age — the personal computer. These devices didn’t become household items because governments subsidized purchases or forced up the price of typewriters and slide rules.
The market conservative would go on to stress that the private sector does advancement much better than do central government planners…
Justin,
unlike you I am old enough to remember the late 70’s when the “best” scientists were wringing their hands over global cooling and the coming Little Ice Age.
It’s all just BS to do what the left has always wanted-put us all (except for the leftist elite of course) in mass transit.
Posted by Tommy Cranston at August 3, 2010 6:50 PM
“Justin,
unlike you I am old enough to remember the late 70’s when the “best” scientists were wringing their hands over global cooling and the coming Little Ice Age.”
Yes, and James Hansen, the “NASA Scientist” pushing “global warming” was also the “NASA scientist” pushing the “coming Ice Age”. He switched around 1988. “Earth Day” was founded as a response to the “coming ice age” and to make Sen. Arlen Specter appear “concerned”. Any doubts? Google it.
“It’s all just BS to do what the left has always wanted-put us all (except for the leftist elite of course) in mass transit.”
Only a closet Liberal would call it “mass transit”. Conservatives call it “public transportation”
I commend “State of Fear” by Micahel Crichton. It does a job on the “advocacy statistics” advanced by Global Warmers. Have you noticed how that has morphed into “climate change”?
Whether you are left, right, in the center, liberal, non-liberal, extremist, new ice age, global warming, carbon neutral, free carbon or whatever it all comes down to $$$$$$$$$$$. How much you pay for your energy needs to live comfortably, provide for your family, save for retirement, play a little and how much money the supplier of those utilities is going to make in profit from you. You can pay me now or pay me later! State of Hawaii learned the hard way by leading the charge to energy independence and then stopped when oil prices dropped only to explode upwards again. The state is 90% dependant on imported oil and all goods and services in the state are dependent on the current crude daily oil price. Unlike RI State of Hawaii will not embrace offshore wind farm technology because of the exorbitant cost and maintenance of the energy produced which drive prices up at the electric meter. President George W. Bush designated State of Hawaii a test state for alternate energy technology to work with the Department of Energy testing and integrating alternate energy technology or “Green Energy” into the state infrastructure thus lowering the state carbon foot print and acting as a model to the rest of the nation. As such every private industry and scientific technology venture plus the military has been using Hawaii as a testing grounds for alternate energy. Some have worked and some have failed and gone back to the drawing board. State of Hawaii has an abundance of alternate energy resources and independent electrical infrastructure grids. State of Hawaii’s “Clean Energy Initiative” requires state-wide reduction of 70% imported oil by year 2030 through alternate energy usage and energy efficiency (30% reduction and 40% efficiency). This goal currently is very doable with combining existing technologies.… Read more »
Newswekk April 28, 1975:
http://sweetness-light.com/archive/newsweeks-1975-article-about-the-coming-ice-age
Progressives-Always wrong. Always.
Tommy Cranston, You and I are probably near the same age because I am before the so called “Baby Boomers” and remember the predictions of the coming “little Ice age”. I also remember seeing Narragansett Bay frozen over from Newport all the way to Providence so you could walk across the bay which most of the commenters on Anchor Rising may never have seen! I believe weather cycles are related to the cyclic tilt of the earth which I think the Old Farmer’s Almanac builds into his yearly nature weather predictions which at times are uncannily right on the money 100% to the day forecasted a year in advance! There is something about paying close attention to what nature does. Of course weather predictions are always 50% right and 50% wrong in the long run. No politicians need apply! In the 1970s I retro fitted my house with passive solar to reduce my heating costs 40% and I ended up actually reducing by 38%. Blackstone Valley Gas wanted to inspect my meter and house to see what I was doing to reduce natural gas usage! I let them see and I’ll never forget the statement; “If everyone did this we would lose money!” No politics, ice age or global warming involved here just $$$$ profit. This is the same thing that the State of Hawaii has finally come to grips with. Pay the manipulated rate for imported oil or take control of your costs via alternate means to lower your costs so the dollars go to supporting the state’s population. No politics, ice age or global warming involved here just does the state keep sending $7 billion out of state for imported oil or keep the money in state providing for its people? Surprisingly the utility companies in Hawaii are… Read more »