Comments on: I’ve Got Your Methane Right Here, Pal

By: ElGaboGringo

ElGaboGringo — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 05:31:00 +0000

Nice post. Penn and Teller’s B*llshit has a good episode on recycling that makes this point. Like it takes more resources to use recycled paper than to make it from scratch and landfill it. I saw on youtube, maybe it’s still there.

By: John Jay

John Jay — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 04:39:49 +0000

David- certainly. My point is that no simple model captures all the downstream consequences, and modelers need to honestly state that, and incorporate new data as it becomes available. Too often they don’t.

By: david foster

david foster — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 04:37:12 +0000

“hydropower causes much more global warming than coal or oil-fired power stations”…too many people insist on focusing on a single variable. Even if the statement is true–and the analysis behind it seems to assume that global warming science is a lot more settled than many people think it is–there are other factors to be considered. For example, coal burning without filtration or effective combustion control, as practiced in many less-developed countries, kills people via lung disease–over the next few years or decades, not in future centuries. Oil burning involves issues of cost and national security. You can’t just optimize one variable in a vacuum or you will screw up a lot of other things.