Houston Climate Justice

Will you be strong and stand with me?

2011-10-14T23:40:00.001-05:00

Red - the world about to dawn

White - pure light on a hill, on a tower, in your face as I care for u my dear LED

Tomorrow it begins - the slow peaceful revolution of the very many at home near you and around the world!

Sleep well tonight my friends and countrymen, for tomorrow we will witness a silent scream that is more than any Munsch. It leads to more hard work and far less drudgery! Slavery lies at the end of yesterday's path. Tonight we shall change roads in our sleep and awaken fresh to a new day in America. Good the night.

A raindrop in Houston

2011-10-09T21:42:00.000-05:00

A raindrop in Houston (such things excite me now?)

I am the 99%

2011-10-07T19:29:00.000-05:00

Some of these entries are just heartbreaking:

Not only are people like these who I care most about. Not only are people like these who I am working for every day in Harris County. We all need to step up in hope and solidarity to brighten our future and (finally) meaningfully address the beastly, interconnected problems now over-ripe in western society.

It is not a political problem. The answer is not a political institution.

Join in taking direct action to solve the interconnected problems that face late stage capitalism, including human caused climate change, declining and polluting conventional energy supplies, monoculture farming and proprietary seeds with suicide genes, intellectual property rights that may not allow fair use or appropriate technology transfer, and unjust systems of compensation, education, housing and movement that disregard the need for universal sustenance and connection across cultures and generations.

Beyond LEED: There’s More to Choosing a Sustainable Workplace – The Site Selection Energy Report

2011-09-02T13:03:00.000-05:00

Beyond LEED: There’s More to Choosing a Sustainable Workplace – The Site Selection Energy Report

This is from Stuart Harris back in 2009, but still totally applicable. Planning-Design-Research (PDR): that firm's name kind of says it all. Not often do you find a group that puts planning in the front seat and bases itself on research! Remarkably diverse professionals - I can see why Exxon has gone with PDR for the past three years to prepare the way for their new corporate campus in unincorporated northern Harris County.

When I was working with Shell-Texaco-Saudi Aramco downstream joint venture real estate over a decade ago, I remember the severe feelings of personal disempowerment shared by my colleagues whenever we would broach the topic of climate stability. It will be interesting to watch whether sustainability comes to represent a typical amenity and postcard fascia or whether it catches on as a core mentality in Houston's fossil giant.

Is the Keystone XL pipeline fore-ordained?

2011-06-29T18:40:00.003-05:00

MMS, the federal oversight agency that suffered the deep sea gas blowout at BP’s Deepwater Horizon April 20, 2010, had years before received this dour determination from the Louisiana court concerning lack of attention to direct, indirect and cumulative impacts wrought, in this case, by a simple paper transaction (Lease Sale 200) for offshore leases:

(p. 40 ELR 11081) MMS’s treatment of the Coastal Use Guidelines set forth
in the LCRP is so inadequate as to suggest that proceed-

(p. 40 ELR 11082) ing with Lease Sale 200 was a fait accompli even before the

[CD] (Consistency Determination – the final environmental approval- ) was compiled.

MMS has failed to demonstrate, as it

must, that the action and its direct, indirect and cumulative

impacts are consistent with those of Louisiana’s 94 Coastal

Use Guidelines that would apply herein. Thus, because

the [CD] does not adequately evaluate all of the “relevant

enforceable policies” of the LCRP. . . it would appear to

have been compiled in an arbitrary and capricious manner

such that the result, i.e., the occurring of the Lease Sale, was

fore-ordained (Blanco v. Burton, 2006 WL 2366046 [E.D. La. 2006]).

Reprinted with permission, Sam Kalen 2010 “The BP Macondo Well Exploration Plan: Wither the Coastal Zone Management Act?” Environmental Law Reporter Copyright © 2010 Environmental Law Institute®, Washington, DC. reprinted with permission from ELR®, http://www.eli.org, 1-800-433-5120, last retrieved 6/29/2011 from http://www.eli.org/pdf/NA_40-11/40.11079.pdf

How much more ought the U.S. Department of State to consider enforceable policies of coastal states of the United States of America in its review of TransCanada’s international Keystone XL Pipeline? It has not done so, not even in the case of the State of Texas. An interstate Consistency Determination (CD) concurred by all coastal zone management authorities is certainly warranted given the international scope both of tar sands crude production emissions and the global reach of the Gulf Coast refining, pipeline and ports complex.

I might suggest the U.S. Commerce Sectretary should study potential impacts on the timing or severity of sea level rise due to enhanced climate change from the proposed enabling of Canadian bitumens as a primary input to US petroleum production, as encouraged by the Coastal Zone Management Act, 16 U.S.C. § 1452. Congressional declaration of policy (Section 303)(2)(K).

• How can the XL pipeline remain only a proposal under NEPA review while Railroad Commission permits have been pulled since 2008 (just renewed last month) and the real estate Rights-of-Way have already been substantially secured, some allegedly under bullying strong-armed tactics, and seven billion dollars in capital hangs in the balance...over two of which is expected to benefit Texas? Most of the route appears already to have been cleared and a portion of it was recently disturbed based on publicly-available Google Earth imagery.

• And who does the energy capital expect to buy all those fossil fuel products (that will directly form at least additional 12 parts per million CO2 in the atmosphere) pre-processed, cracked and refined from diluted bitumen that will travel all across the United States to arrive at the lower end of the Keystone XL pipeline between now and 2050…Americans?

• Why is not a return pipeline for delivery or recycling of diluent under consideration?

• Is it fair to allow the XL under a single private entity to be the sole 36” connection between the largest private collection point for crude oil at Cushing, OK and the largest refinery complex spanning Houston/Port Arthur, TX?

• Remember that Harris County expects about a 15% increase in ship traffic at the Port of Houston due to the expansion of the Panama Canal. Why have not the citizens of Harris County been asked whether they are willing to accept even greater increase in air emissions when up to 4.5 million bpd heavy petroleum processing units are fully slated thanks to Canadian bitumen deliveries through the Keystone XL?

• Regardless the likelihood of spills (every 7 years), natural disasters and refinery accidents, what are quantified future temporal amounts of air emissions expected with expanding refinery capacity, pipeline developments, the proposed I-69 NAFTA Highway and future port activity fully considered? What are the implications for meeting an 8-hour ozone standard throughout the future to preserve Texas highway funding?

• Why do EIS documents consider only the incremental lifecycle carbon emissions coming from the proposed extraction/transport/refinery complex when a very real question exists over the carbon-constrained future as to whether unconventional petroleum resource access would be allowed by any other government than - world’s largest lifetime contributor to global warming - the United States? China will certainly find it more economical and also less environmentally destructive to accept deliveries from the remaining Middle East supply.

• Leaving dirtier, less completely formed hydrocarbon resources such as bitumen, coal, and lignite in situ for now greatly serves the national interest concerning future generations in all respects: the environment they inherit will present fewer limitations and its carrying capacity will be more capable of sustaining them; and, the intrinsic value of hydrocarbon resources will increase greatly as conventional resources continue to be depleted and as technology is developed to treat bitumen gasification using environmentally supportive closed-loop streams. It also serves the national interest of current residents by avoiding backpedaling into energy sources that from a holistic perspective constrict rather than enlarge our energy availability and industrial capacity, while performing environmental, societal and personal torts undeniable and unanswered.

• The likely effect of extending our fossil fuel addiction as far into the future as the XL provides is deleterious in all respects. It does not provide security. We are likely as a nation and as people to fall victim to those more willing and able to overcome the current energy bottleneck through environmentally and socially supportive means. Namely, these are seen as renewable energy exploitation, transfer and storage, and successful development anywhere in the world of 4th generation (fast breeder) modular nuclear reactors that safely consume the immense wastes already in possession of the U.S. government, restoring for the future term of human civilization our fortunes by supplying tomorrow’s powerhouse.

See also:

http://cfr.vlex.com/vid/1506-limitations-during-nepa-process-19834928

http://www.federalregister.gov/articles/2006/01/05/06-11/coastal-zone-management-act-federal-consistency-regulations
Coastal Zone Management Act of 1972

as amended through Pub. L. No. 109-58, the Energy Policy Act of 2005

(source: http://coastalmanagement.noaa.gov/about/czma.html)
16 U.S.C. § 1451. Congressional findings (Section 302)

The Congress finds that--

(a) There is a national interest in the effective management, beneficial use, protection, and development of the coastal zone.

(b) The coastal zone is rich in a variety of natural, commercial, recreational, ecological, industrial, and esthetic resources of immediate and potential value to the present and future well-being of the Nation.

(c) The increasing and competing demands upon the lands and waters of our coastal zone occasioned by population growth and economic development, including requirements for industry, commerce, residential development, recreation, extraction of mineral resources and fossil fuels, transportation and navigation, waste disposal, and harvesting of fish, shellfish, and other living marine resources, have resulted in the loss of living marine resources, wildlife, nutrient-rich areas, permanent and adverse changes to ecological systems, decreasing open space for public use, and shoreline erosion.

(d) The habitat areas of the coastal zone, and the fish, shellfish, other living marine resources, and wildlife therein, are ecologically fragile and consequently extremely vulnerable to destruction by man's alterations.

(e) Important ecological, cultural, historic, and esthetic values in the coastal zone which are essential to the well-being of all citizens are being irretrievably damaged or lost.

(f) New and expanding demands for food, energy, minerals, defense needs, recreation, waste disposal, transportation, and industrial activities in the Great Lakes, territorial sea, exclusive economic zone, and Outer Continental Shelf are placing stress on these areas and are creating the need for resolution of serious conflicts among important and competing uses and values in coastal and ocean waters;

(g) Special natural and scenic characteristics are being damaged by ill-planned development that threatens these values.

(h) In light of competing demands and the urgent need to protect and to give high priority to natural systems in the coastal zone, present state and local institutional arrangements for planning and regulating land and water uses in such areas are inadequate.

(i) The key to more effective protection and use of the land and water resources of the coastal zone is to encourage the states to exercise their full authority over the lands and waters in the coastal zone by assisting the states, in cooperation with Federal and local governments and other vitally affected interests, in developing land and water use programs for the coastal zone, including unified policies, criteria, standards, methods, and processes for dealing with land and water use decisions of more than local significance.

(j) The national objective of attaining a greater degree of energy self-sufficiency would be advanced by providing Federal financial assistance to meet state and local needs resulting from new or expanded energy activity in or affecting the coastal zone.

(k) Land uses in the coastal zone, and the uses of adjacent lands which drain into the coastal zone, may significantly affect the quality of coastal waters and habitats, and efforts to control coastal water pollution from land use activities must be improved.

(l) Because global warming may result in a substantial sea level rise with serious adverse effects in the coastal zone, coastal states must anticipate and plan for such an occurrence.

(m) Because of their proximity to and reliance upon the ocean and its resources, the coastal states have substantial and significant interests in the protection, management, and development of the resources of the exclusive economic zone that can only be served by the active participation of coastal states in all Federal programs affecting such resources and, wherever appropriate, by the development of state ocean resource plans as part of their federally approved coastal zone management programs.

16 U.S.C. § 1452. Congressional declaration of policy (Section 303)

The Congress finds and declares that it is the national policy--

(1) to preserve, protect, develop, and where possible, to restore or enhance, the resources of the Nation's coastal zone for this and succeeding generations;

(2) to encourage and assist the states to exercise effectively their responsibilities in the coastal zone through the development and implementation of management programs to achieve wise use of the land and water resources of the coastal zone, giving full consideration to ecological, cultural, historic, and esthetic values as well as the needs for compatible economic development, which programs should at least provide for--

(A) the protection of natural resources, including wetlands, floodplains, estuaries, beaches, dunes, barrier islands, coral reefs, and fish and wildlife and their habitat, within the coastal zone,

(B) the management of coastal development to minimize the loss of life and property caused by improper development in flood-prone, storm surge, geological hazard, and erosion-prone areas and in areas likely to be affected by or vulnerable to sea level rise, land subsidence, and saltwater intrusion, and by the destruction of natural protective features such as beaches, dunes, wetlands, and barrier islands,

(C) the management of coastal development to improve, safeguard, and restore the quality of coastal waters, and to protect natural resources and existing uses of those waters,

(D) priority consideration being given to coastal-dependent uses and orderly processes for siting major facilities related to national defense, energy, fisheries development, recreation, ports and transportation, and the location, to the maximum extent practicable, of new commercial and industrial developments in or adjacent to areas where such development already exists,

(E) public access to the coasts for recreation purposes,

(F) assistance in the redevelopment of deteriorating urban waterfronts and ports, and sensitive preservation and restoration of historic, cultural, and esthetic coastal features,

(G) the coordination and simplification of procedures in order to ensure expedited governmental decisionmaking for the management of coastal resources,

(H) continued consultation and coordination with, and the giving of adequate consideration to the views of, affected Federal agencies,

(I) the giving of timely and effective notification of, and opportunities for public and local government participation in, coastal management decisionmaking,

(J) assistance to support comprehensive planning, conservation, and management for living marine resources, including planning for the siting of pollution control and aquaculture facilities within the coastal zone, and improved coordination between State and Federal coastal zone management agencies and State and wildlife agencies, and

(K) the study and development, in any case in which the Secretary considers it to be appropriate, of plans for addressing the adverse effects upon the coastal zone of land subsidence and of sea level rise; and

(3) to encourage the preparation of special area management plans which provide for increased specificity in protecting significant natural resources, reasonable coastal-dependent economic growth, improved protection of life and property in hazardous areas, including those areas likely to be affected by land subsidence, sea level rise, or fluctuating water levels of the Great Lakes, and improved predictability in governmental decisionmaking;

(4) to encourage the participation and cooperation of the public, state and local governments, and interstate and other regional agencies, as well as of the Federal agencies having programs affecting the coastal zone, in carrying out the purposes of this chapter;

(5) to encourage coordination and cooperation with and among the appropriate Federal, State, and local agencies, and international organizations where appropriate, in collection, analysis, synthesis, and dissemination of coastal management information, research results, and technical assistance, to support State and Federal regulation of land use practices affecting the coastal and ocean resources of the United States; and

(6) to respond to changing circumstances affecting the coastal environment and coastal resource management by encouraging States to consider such issues as ocean uses potentially affecting the coastal zone.

16 U.S.C. § 1453. Definitions (Section 304)

For purposes of this chapter --

(1) The term "coastal zone" means the coastal waters (including the lands therein and thereunder) and the adjacent shorelands (including the waters therein and thereunder), strongly influenced by each other and in proximity to the shorelines of the several coastal states, and includes islands, transitional and intertidal areas, salt marshes, wetlands, and beaches. The zone extends, in Great Lakes waters, to the international boundary between the United States and Canada and, in other areas, seaward to the outer limit of State title and ownership under the Submerged Lands Act (43 U.S.C. 1301 et seq.), the Act of March 2, 1917, (48 U.S.C. 749), the Covenant to Establish a Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands in Political Union with the United States of America, as approved by the Act of March 24, 1976 (48 U.S.C. 1801 et seq.), or section 1 of the Act of November 20, 1963 (48 U.S.C. 1705), as applicable. The zone extends inland from the shorelines only to the extent necessary to control shorelands, the uses of which have a direct and significant impact on the coastal waters, and to control those geographical areas which are likely to be affected by or vulnerable to sea level rise. Excluded from the coastal zone are lands the use of which is by law subject solely to the discretion of or which is held in trust by the Federal Government, its officers or agents.

(2) The term "coastal resource of national significance" means any coastal wetland, beach, dune, barrier island, reef, estuary, or fish and wildlife habitat, if any such area is determined by a coastal state to be of substantial biological or natural storm protective value.

(3) The term "coastal waters" means (A) in the Great Lakes area, the waters within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States consisting of the Great Lakes, their connecting waters, harbors, roadsteads, and estuary-type areas such as bays, shallows, and marshes and (B) in other areas, those waters, adjacent to the shorelines, which contain a measurable quantity or percentage of sea water, including, but not limited to, sounds, bays, lagoons, bayous, ponds, and estuaries.

(4) The term "coastal state" means a state of the United States in, or bordering on, the Atlantic, Pacific, or Arctic Ocean, the Gulf of Mexico, Long Island Sound, or one or more of the Great Lakes. For the purposes of this chapter, the term also includes Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and the Trust Territories of the Pacific Islands, and American Samoa.

(5) The term "coastal energy activity" means any of the following activities if, and to the extent that (A) the conduct, support, or facilitation of such activity requires and involves the siting, construction, expansion, or operation of any equipment or facility; and (B) any technical requirement exists which, in the determination of the Secretary, necessitates that the siting, construction, expansion, or operation of such equipment or facility be carried out in, or in close proximity to, the coastal zone of any coastal state;

(i) Any outer Continental Shelf energy activity.

(ii) Any transportation, conversion, treatment, transfer, or storage of liquefied natural gas.

(iii) Any transportation, transfer, or storage of oil, natural gas, or coal

(including, but not limited to, by means of any deepwater port, as defined in section 1502(10) of Title 33).

For purposes of this paragraph, the siting, construction, expansion, or operation of any equipment or facility shall be "in close proximity to" the coastal zone of any coastal state if such siting, construction, expansion, or operation has, or is likely to have, a significant effect on such coastal zone.

(6) The term "energy facilities" means any equipment or facility which is or will be used primarily--

(A) in the exploration for, or the development, production, conversion, storage, transfer, processing, or transportation of, any energy resource; or

(B) for the manufacture, production, or assembly of equipment, machinery, products, or devices which are involved in any activity described in subparagraph (A).

The term includes, but is not limited to (i) electric generating plants; (ii) petroleum refineries and associated facilities; (iii) gasification plants; (iv) facilities used for the transportation, conversion, treatment, transfer, or storage of liquefied natural gas; (v) uranium enrichment or nuclear fuel processing facilities; (vi) oil and gas facilities, including platforms, assembly plants, storage depots, tank farms, crew and supply bases, and refining complexes; (vii) facilities including deepwater ports, for the transfer of petroleum; (viii) pipelines and transmission facilities; and (ix) terminals which are associated with any of the foregoing.

(6a) The term "enforceable policy" means State policies which are legally binding through constitutional provisions, laws, regulations, land use plans, ordinances, or judicial or administrative decisions, by which a State exerts control over private and public land and water uses and natural resources in the coastal zone.

(7) The term "estuary" means that part of a river or stream or other body of water having unimpaired connection with the open sea, where the sea water is measurably diluted with fresh water derived from land drainage. The term includes estuary-type areas of the Great Lakes.

(8) The term "estuarine sanctuary" means a research area which may include any part or all of an estuary and any island, transitional area, and upland in, adjoining, or adjacent to such estuary, and which constitutes to the extent feasible a natural unit, set aside to provide scientists and students the opportunity to examine over a period of time the ecological relationships within the area.

(9) The term "Fund" means the Coastal Zone Management Fund established under section 1456a(b) of this title.

(10) The term "land use" means activities which are conducted in, or on the shorelands within, the coastal zone, subject to the requirements outlined in section

1456(g) of this title.

(11) The term "local government" means any political subdivision of, or any special entity created by, any coastal state which (in whole or part) is located in,

or has authority over, such state's coastal zone and which (A) has authority to levy taxes, or to establish and collect user fees, or (B) provides any public facility or public service which is financed in whole or part by taxes or user fees. The term includes, but is not limited to, any school district, fire district, transportation authority, and any other special purpose district or authority.

(12) The term "management program" includes, but is not limited to, a comprehensive statement in words, maps, illustrations, or other media of communication, prepared and adopted by the state in accordance with the provisions of this chapter, setting forth objectives, policies, and standards to guide public and private uses of lands and waters in the coastal zone.

(13) The term "outer Continental Shelf energy activity" means any exploration for, or any development or production of, oil or natural gas from the outer Continental Shelf (as defined in section 1331(a) of Title 43) or the siting, construction, expansion, or operation of any new or expanded energy facilities directly required by such exploration, development, or production.

(14) The term "person" means any individual; any corporation, partnership, association, or other entity organized or existing under the laws of any state; the Federal Government; any state, regional, or local government; or any entity of any such Federal, state, regional, or local government.

(15) The term "public facilities and public services" means facilities or services which are financed, in whole or in part, by any state or political subdivision thereof, including, but not limited to, highways and secondary roads, parking, mass transit, docks, navigation aids, fire and police protection, water supply, waste collection and treatment (including drainage), schools and education, and hospitals and health care. Such term may also include any other facility or service so financed which the Secretary finds will support increased population.

(16) The term "Secretary" means the Secretary of Commerce.

(17) The term "special area management plan" means a comprehensive plan providing for natural resource protection and reasonable coastal-dependent economic growth containing a detailed and comprehensive statement of policies; standards and criteria to guide public and private uses of lands and waters; and mechanisms for timely implementation in specific geographic areas within the coastal zone.

(18) The term "water use" means a use, activity, or project conducted in or on waters within the coastal zone.

16 U.S.C. § 1454. Management program development grants (Section 305)

Any coastal state which has completed the development of its management program shall submit such program to the Secretary for review and approval pursuant to section 1455 of this title.

16 U.S.C. § 1455. Administrative grants (Section 306)

(a) Authorization; matching funds

The Secretary may make grants to any coastal state for the purpose of administering that state's management program, if the state matches any such grant according to the following ratios of Federal-to-State contributions for the applicable fiscal year:

(1) For those States for which programs were approved prior to November

5, 1990, 1 to 1 for any fiscal year.

(2) For programs approved after November 5, 1990, 4 to 1 for the first fiscal year, 2.3 to 1 for the second fiscal year, 1.5 to 1 for the third fiscal year, and 1 to 1 for each fiscal year thereafter.

(b) Grants to coastal states; requirements

The Secretary may make a grant to a coastal state under subsection (a) of this section only if the Secretary finds that the management program of the coastal state meets all applicable requirements of this chapter and has been approved in accordance with subsection (d) of this section.

(c) Allocation of grants to coastal states

Grants under this section shall be allocated to coastal states with approved programs based on rules and regulations promulgated by the Secretary which shall take into account the extent and nature of the shoreline and area covered by the program, population of the area, and other relevant factors. The Secretary shall establish, after consulting with the coastal states, maximum and minimum grants for any fiscal year to promote equity between coastal states and effective coastal management.

(d) Mandatory adoption of State management program for coastal zone

Before approving a management program submitted by a coastal state, the

Secretary shall find the following:

(1) The State has developed and adopted a management program for its coastal zone in accordance with rules and regulations promulgated by the Secretary, after notice, and with the opportunity of full participation by relevant Federal agencies, State agencies, local governments, regional organizations, port authorities, and other interested parties and individuals, public and private, which is adequate to carry out the purposes of this chapter and is consistent with the policy declared in section 1452 of this title.

(2) The management program includes each of the following required program elements:

(A) An identification of the boundaries of the coastal zone subject to the management program.

(B) A definition of what shall constitute permissible land uses and water uses within the coastal zone which have a direct and significant impact on the coastal waters.

(C) An inventory and designation of areas of particular concern within the coastal zone.

(D) An identification of the means by which the State proposes to exert control over the land uses and water uses referred to in subparagraph (B), including a list of relevant State constitutional provisions, laws, regulations, and judicial decisions.

(E) Broad guidelines on priorities of uses in particular areas, including specifically those uses of lowest priority.

(F) A description of the organizational structure proposed to implement such management program, including the responsibilities and interrelationships of local, areawide, State, regional, and interstate agencies in the management process.

(G) A definition of the term "beach" and a planning process for the protection of, and access to, public beaches and other public

coastal areas of environmental, recreational, historical, esthetic, ecological, or cultural value.

(H) A planning process for energy facilities likely to be located in, or which may significantly affect, the coastal zone, including a process for anticipating the management of the impacts resulting from such facilities.

(I) A planning process for assessing the effects of, and studying and evaluating ways to control, or lessen the impact of, shoreline erosion, and to restore areas adversely affected by such erosion.

(3) The State has--

(A) coordinated its program with local, areawide, and interstate plans applicable to areas within the coastal zone--

(i) existing on January 1 of the year in which the State's management program is submitted to the Secretary; and

(ii) which have been developed by a local government, an areawide agency, a regional agency, or an interstate agency; and

(B) established an effective mechanism for continuing consultation and coordination between the management agency designated pursuant to paragraph (6) and with local governments, interstate agencies, regional agencies, and areawide agencies within the coastal zone to assure the full participation of those local governments and agencies in carrying out the purposes of this chapter; except that the Secretary shall not find any mechanism to be effective for purposes of this subparagraph unless it requires that--

(i) the management agency, before implementing any management program decision which would conflict with any local zoning ordinance, decision, or other action, shall send a notice of the management program decision to any local government whose zoning authority is affected;

(ii) within the 30-day period commencing on the date of receipt of that notice, the local government may submit to the management agency written comments on the management program decision, and any recommendation for alternatives; and

(iii) the management agency, if any comments are submitted to it within the 30- day period by any local government--

(I) shall consider the comments;

(II) may, in its discretion, hold a public hearing on the comments; and

(III) may not take any action within the 30-day period to implement the management program decision.

(4) The State has held public hearings in the development of the management program.

(5) The management program and any changes thereto have been reviewed and approved by the Governor of the State.

(6) The Governor of the State has designated a single State agency to receive and administer grants for implementing the management program.

(7) The State is organized to implement the management program.

(8) The management program provides for adequate consideration of the national interest involved in planning for, and managing the coastal zone, including the siting of facilities such as energy facilities which are of greater than local significance. In the case of energy facilities, the Secretary shall find that the State has given consideration to any applicable national or interstate energy plan or program.

(9) The management program includes procedures whereby specific areas may be designated for the purpose of preserving or restoring them for their conservation, recreational, ecological, historical, or esthetic values.

(10) The State, acting through its chosen agency or agencies (including local governments, areawide agencies, regional agencies, or interstate agencies) has authority for the management of the coastal zone in accordance with the management program. Such authority shall include power--

(A) to administer land use and water use regulations to control development to ensure compliance with the management program, and to resolve conflicts among competing uses; and

(B) to acquire fee simple and less than fee simple interests in land, waters, and other property through condemnation or other means when necessary to achieve conformance with the management program.

(11) The management program provides for any one or a combination of the following general techniques for control of land uses and water uses within the coastal zone:

(A) State establishment of criteria and standards for local implementation, subject to administrative review and enforcement.

(B) Direct State land and water use planning and regulation.

(C) State administrative review for consistency with the management program of all development plans, projects, or land and water use regulations, including exceptions and variances thereto, proposed by any State or local authority or private developer, with power to approve or disapprove after public notice and an opportunity for hearings.

(12) The management program contains a method of assuring that local land use and water use regulations within the coastal zone do not unreasonably restrict or exclude land uses and water uses of regional benefit.

(13) The management program provides for--

(A) the inventory and designation of areas that contain one or more coastal resources of national significance; and

(B) specific and enforceable standards to protect such resources.

(14) The management program provides for public participation in permitting processes, consistency determinations, and other similar decisions.

(15) The management program provides a mechanism to ensure that all

State agencies will adhere to the program.

(16) The management program contains enforceable policies and mechanisms to implement the applicable requirements of the Coastal Nonpoint Pollution Control Program of the State required by section 1455b of this title.

(e) Amendment or modification of State management program for coastal zone

A coastal state may amend or modify a management program which it has submitted and which has been approved by the Secretary under this section, subject to the following conditions:

(1) The State shall promptly notify the Secretary of any proposed amendment, modification, or other program change and submit it for the Secretary's approval. The Secretary may suspend all or part of any grant made under this section pending State submission of the proposed amendments, modification, or other program change.

(2) Within 30 days after the date the Secretary receives any proposed amendment, the Secretary shall notify the State whether the Secretary approves or disapproves the amendment, or whether the Secretary finds it is necessary to extend the review of the proposed amendment for a period not to exceed 120 days after the date the Secretary received the proposed amendment. The Secretary may extend this period only as necessary to meet the requirements of the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969

(42 U.S.C. 4321 et seq.). If the Secretary does not notify the coastal state that the Secretary approves or disapproves the amendment within that period, then the amendment shall be conclusively presumed as approved.

(3)

(A) Except as provided in subparagraph (B), a coastal state may not implement any amendment, modification, or other change as part of its approved management program unless the amendment, modification, or other change is approved by the Secretary under this subsection.

(B) The Secretary, after determining on a preliminary basis, that an amendment, modification, or other change which has been submitted for approval under this subsection is likely to meet the program approval standards in this section, may permit the State to expend funds awarded under this section to begin implementing

the proposed amendment, modification, or change. This preliminary approval shall not extend for more than 6 months and may not be renewed. A proposed amendment, modification, or change which has been given preliminary approval and is not finally approved under this paragraph shall not be considered an enforceable policy for purposes of section 1456 of this title....

Climate denial continues

2011-05-13T13:31:00.001-05:00

Alex Bea (Employee) 11 days ago, supporting a woman who was dismayed about a denialist response commented to her blog when she posted a video advocating action on climate change:

"One option would be to point him to the Skeptical Science blog post on the connection between CO2 and climate change (http://www.skepticalscience.com/empirical-evidence-for-co2-enhanced-greenhouse-effect-advanced.htm). He's also asking for direct causation, which scientifically is impossible. We can't create a planet in a laboratory and isolate only one thing. What we can do is look at decades of scientific literature on all aspects of the climate and see that well over 90% of climate scientists, the most experienced and knowledgeable on AGW, agree that we are causing global climate change (http://www.skepticalscience.com/global-warming-scientific-consensus.htm).

Skeptical Science is generally a great place to look for the evidence that refutes most climate denier statements. But, as I said, arguing with someone who is close minded enough to create a blog called "Global Warming (or is it Global Cooling?)" probably isn't worth your time to get into an argument with."

The non-member causing her discomfort replied directly to the support staff:

"On the contrary, I have a perfectly open mind. Only catch is that I deal in facts and reality.

Just show me an academic paper using any one of the standard scientific criteria above and I am happy to change my opinion of AGW. I mean, Alex, after decades of research something definitive should have been established by now right?

Now are any of YOU as broad minded as that?
Cheers
Roger

http://www.rogerfromnewzealand.wordpress.com/
PS if you are interested in any academic papers (peer reviewed and published) that contradict the IPCC sources, I can help you there as well.

BTW, Skeptical Science simply rely on correlations and models with built in assumptions of AGW for their "proofs"

Alex Bea (Employee) 11 days ago sounded a little exasperated with Roger:

"I would say that thousands of peer-reviewed scientific articles and 97% of climate scientists* agreeing is pretty definitive. Now the choice is to be part of the solution or to be part of the status quo, which is using our skies as a dumping ground to keep a multi-billion dollar bottom line, amplifying the problem.

Please note that this is a support site, not a discussion forum, so further responses should be directed to organizers@350.org."

So I, Paul Suckow, added:

"In addition Roger, the risk management aspects concerning what is at stake, given our dependence on this eminently habitable planet and in fact that of carbon-based life as we know it, have been known for decades to require a serious and yet postponed effort, even if we should be so lucky as to someday discover the past century and a half of science was mistaken.
Thus far, the scientific mistakes made have been on the side of underestimating the quantity and quality of adverse effects of climate change. Well, perhaps not scientific mistakes exactly, but stemming from a perhaps undue political emphasis on trying to reach massive consensus agreement between all IPCC participating country's scientific and political bodies.

I'd turn not to arcane studies of individual research questions, but to books that well sum up the recent scientific understanding of climate change like Dr. James E. Hansen's "Storms of my Grandchildren" (surprisingly inexpensive, readable and open-hearted). The "Gaia" series of works by Dr. James Lovelock regarding Gaia Theory, about the seemingly active collusion of living and inanimate components of Earth Systems to keep the biosphere as habitable as possible for as long as possible for the benefit of contemporary life-forms, entered to great controversy but has already now succeeded with multiple predictions and is proving helpful to understanding the choices (for now) still available to humanity.

Will scientific understanding and subsequent human behavior changes be enough to avoid a looming extinction crisis for Earth's current life forms? The last fractional man out on that jury is wavering yet. But would you consider that a reason not to try to help win humanity's case to preserve climate and life so that the birthing of our kind might not meet an early end?

I (and I imagine all scientifically literate people) certainly share your skepticism regarding unexamined assumptions. Fortunately, the basics of excess greenhouse atmospheric effects are well grounded and extensively studied in action on this (habitable) and other (uninhabitable) nearby worlds. One assumption I worry about is that enlightened humanity will be able to overcome its habitual fear and greed sufficiently to mount effective adaptation and mitigation of human elements that increasingly and inexorably contribute to future global heating. These views are totally mainstream today, nothing controversial, and seek helpful cooperation not deadly confrontation.

May I admit I am quite jealous of the life you might lead on so beautiful an island as the nation of New Zealand? May it always be so. Best regards always to you and to yours,

--Paul from America

Link provided as fair use of copyrighted material for personal and educational purposes:
http://www.drivehq.com/file/df.aspx/publish/paulsuckow/Teller_1959_EnergyPatterns.pdfPublish"

I guess I hate giving up on anyone as a lost cause. Even now. But was that too many words, or too dense a wording to communicate transparently?

Youth of America

2011-02-21T02:45:00.000-06:00

Youth of America, Unite!

Look toward the East, let’s Fight!

They can struggle; so can We!

We don’t wait ‘cause we be Free!

Youth of America, now it’s time!

In shambles and gambles, the future is cryin!

We know the things to do, they’re hard!

But do them we must! Or else we starve!

Satyagraha, Martin’s might!

Nonviolent Jesus, give pure light!

So much bigger than the sword!

Today this nigger rocks our world!

They say we’re not being taught to think!

That our future wages really stink!

That multinats got no controls!

That no ones listening to our goals!

Climate, alive, it’s burning up!

Dying trees and seal pups!

Blowing mountains to kingdom come!

Weapons and chemicals around our home!

Youth of America, so much to save!

Land of the Free, Home of the Brave!

We keep what’s good and we throw what’s bad!

Make the world better than we ever had!

Youth of America, march with me!

Ain’t no limit to what we’ll see!

And when they say there is no way –

We shout – one voice – Get Outta Our Way!

We shout – one voice – Get Into Our Way!

We shout - one voice – Give It Up for Our Way!

Respectfully submitted,

Mr. Paul

SMS 832-231-8373

Witter “pdl3”

Linde LLC

2011-02-01T18:00:00.001-06:00

This is not a service station. :) It appears to be an engineering, procurement and construction facility for Linde's HyCO, Selas Fluid, and Rectisol® units. It helps Linde to build, own and operate gassification plants worldwide that turn heavy refinery waste streams, from off-gases through bunker oils and asphalts, into synthetic liquid (gas) streams and thus-far unavoidable atmospheric wastes. The processes employed can give us pure products like hydrogen, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, synthetic gas, ammonia and methanol, all highly useful in industrial processes. Though undesirable remaining waste streams are oxidized (carefully burned) to recover as much soot (graphite, nanotubes and buckeyballs), sulfur and carbon dioxide as possible before dispersing a large remainder of carbon dioxide, nitrogen gas and toxic traces into the atmosphere.

I rated it OK, because who among us with a large carbon and toxics footprint wants to throw the first stone? The Linde web site toutes nearly 4,000 gasification plants designed, built and operating around the world, some of which can process refinery waste or even coal up to 3 and 1/2 million cubic feet per day when measured at standard temperature (freezing) and pressure (normal atmospheric), abbreviated MM SCFD. I believe these plants are sometimes called gas-to-liquids or coal gasification plants, and have a huge global warming potential until and unless we move into an absolutely carbon-constrained world.

About 300 of these plants now focus on recovering hydrogen gas from refinery wastes or coals. This hydrogen is typically added to the heavier "higher sulfur/nitrogen content crude oil" pumped from today's wells, or even "oil sands and heavier feedstock." Unfortunately, those, along with coal, are great emitters of CO2: about twice the amount that arises from buring natural gas, and 1.6 times that from buring lighter, sweeter petroleum. Unlike coal, these unconventional heavy oil sources have not had much chance to contaminate the atmosphere yet. If current trends continue enough heavy oil shales and tar sands exist to about equal conventional petroleum use as a source of cumulative greenhouse gas emissions. Unless coal use somehow ends worldwide, it will definitely not be safe to allow gasification plants to commonly process every last drop of heavy crude, tar sands or oil shales. According to current understandings of ancient climates, it appears that the atmosphere will tip toward uncontrolled warming with the addition of more than ten or twenty years of either coal or unconventional oils, assuming remaining readily-available petroleum will be burned. Dr. James Hansen reports that our air is already past the point of known safety, 350 parts per million CO2, and will need to return to that level in this century (Hansen, 2010, "Storms of my Grandchildren"; Hansen, 2011, "Paleoclimate Implications for Human-Made Climate Change" draft from http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2011/20110118_MilankovicPaper.pdf; http://www.blogger.com/www.350.org).

"Over 35 Linde Rectisol® units have been built worldwide in the range of 1.0 - 260.0 MM SCFD for clients in the refining, chemical and fertilizer industries. The process is used extensively in gasification plants to purify synthesis gas" (syngas) for "downstream chemical applications where product quality is critical." Linde's patented process for removing acid gases from syngas can separate out sulfur compounds and CO2 in combined or separate fractions. This would be great if the bulk of CO2 and N2 and perhaps Nitrous Oxides also were not dumped into the atmosphere, but rather collected and sequestered for closed-loop or stable long-term storage. Needed "carbon capture and sequestration" (CCS) technology exists, but so far neither the U.S. government nor big business have been willing to front the money needed to build about five pilot plants to commercialize CCS at an industrial scale. Unless a sea change in attitude occurs, we will likely end up a client of the necessary technology from the successful nation. Also, questions remain about the safety of concentrated long-term storage of massive quantities of unbreathable gases that we currently allow to mix into the open atmosphere. These are causing dangerous long-term excess greenhouse warming.

Other plants must be Air Separation Units (3,000 plus worldwide) that exert energy to extract cryogenic nitrogen and oxygen or argon. More may be Syngas plants. Selas Fluid’s product portfolio "includes pyrolysis furnaces for olefin plants, EDC pyrolysis furnaces for vinyl plants, fired heaters for refinery and specialty chemical plants and thermal oxidation equipment" for super-hot hazardous waste incinerators.

According to the admirable Selas Fluids "Safety, Health, Environment and Quality (SHEQ) Policy" signed by current and past Presidents and CEOs (posted at http://www.selasfluid.com/International/Web/LE/US/likelesfus.nsf/repositorybyalias/QHSE_Policy/$file/QHSE%20Policy%20SF.pdf),

"At Selas Fluid Processing Corporation, we do not want to harm people or the environment."

It is this reviewer's sincere hope that Linde LLC and the entire petrochemical industry that it increasingly serves will consider global atmospheric damage not as an unavoidable externality but as public harm to be vigorously avoided. Like most American's I believe it can be done. Unlike many, I believe this must be done if we are to preserve a living creation that is our dear and only home.

The Selas Fluid web site outlines their commitment:

"To achieve this vision, we Selas Fluid Processing Corporation are committed to the following:

-Safety, health, care for the environment and quality are a pre-requisite to any business we undertake

- We all take a personal responsibility for SHEQ

- Managers at all levels demonstrate visible leadership

- We apply this policy in our day to day behaviour and decisions

- SHEQ is 100% of our behaviour, 100% of the time

"We strive to be leading in SHEQ to meet the following objectives:

- Zero incidents

- Zero harm to communities in which we do business

- Safe, secure and healthy working conditions for all our people and all that work with us

- Supplying safe, compliant and environmentally responsible products and services

- Prevention of pollution to the environment

- Responsible use of natural resources

- Research, development and promotion of technologies, products and services that are sustainable with regard to SHEQ

- Satisfy customer needs and expectations

"We will

- Comply with all applicable legal, regulatory, internal and industry requirements

- Pro-actively identify, eliminate or minimize potential sources of harm or risk arising from all our activities

- Continuously improve our performance to achieve our objectives

- Share our knowledge and experience in safety, health and care for the environment

- Show our accountability for our performance by regularly measuring, reviewing and reporting

- Require our contractors and partners to manage in line with this policy

- Expect our clients and suppliers to cooperate actively in achieving our objectives

- Provide training, standards, equipment and support to ensure compliance with this policy

- Maintain open communication with our local communities and stakeholders

"This policy is a key part of The Linde Group’s overall strategy and is reviewed on a regular basis by The Linde Group executive management board.

At Selas Fluid Processing Corporation we use the acronym QHSE, as this is the term used by the majority of our clients. The content of the policy remains the same.

We give our personal commitment to the above policy which shall be fully implemented.

Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Reitzle

Dr. Aldo Belloni

Georg Denoke

Dr. Samir Serhan

John McDermott"

Source:
http://www.selasfluid.com/International/Web/LE/US/likelesfus.nsf/repositorybyalias/QHSE_Policy/$file/QHSE%20Policy%20SF.pdf
last retrieved 2/1/2011.

For those interested, Selas Fluid contact info in PA and Houston, TX may be found at:

http://www.selasfluid.com/International/WEB/LE/US/likelesfus.nsf/docbyalias/nav_sflltest.

Suckow Dissertation

2011-01-21T20:20:00.001-06:00

Sea Level Rise from MESL (SLR - Permanent) Scenarios

Based on Hansen & Sato 2011 (forthcoming draft, known as "Milankovic" paper found 1/18/2011 at http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2011/20110118_MilankovicPaper.pdf, p.20 and p. 13 - 17, especially noting Fig. 7 on p. 14).

7' - consensus minimum SLR by 2100, a passing benchmark, not a stable level

Approximated by 10' H-GAC contour

19' - likely minimum SLR by 2100 with alt. scenario, a stable level recorded in rocks offshore in Florida.

Approximated by 20' H-GAC contour

82' or 25 m +-10 m - full SLR (2317*) with alt. scenario, a peak level recorded at the Holocene maximum 8250 +- 25 years before present

Approximated by 80' H-GAC contour

246' or 75 m - full SLR (2817*) with BAU scenario, sea level at Cenozoic maximum 55.8 million ybp (PETM - most recent case of no large ice sheets on Earth)

Approximated by 250' H-GAC contour

This science changes everything! If the correlation of 25 meter (~82') SLR (the shoreline at peak Holocene - edge melting around Antarctica and partial collapse of West Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets) with the soils bands bounding inside the "Katy Prairie" holds, and the correlation of 75 meter (~252') SLR (the shoreline at peak Cenozoic - no large ice sheets on planet) with the soils bands bounding outside the "Katy Prairie" holds, then we already have a ready-made marker on the ground around the Gulf of Mexico for where to expect the extremes of climate change to take the sea level, and some (though less certain) idea of when to expect them.

Of concern to emergency management team members would be the strength of storm surge on top of these permanent rises. If global warming can be kept manageable by drastically decreasing anthropogenic GHG emissions, then only greater numbers of catastrophic (Saphir-Simpson Category 3+) storms should be expected. However, with business as usual scenarios, and the deep cold just short of freezing at the poles with increasing heat concentrated equatorially, the mid latitudes (Houston, New York, Los Angeles) risk seeing bark-stripping hurricanes on the scale of the world's worst, that Great Hurricane of 1780 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Hurricane_of_1780, see section "Impact"), "also known as Hurricane San Calixto, the Great Hurricane of the Antilles, and the 1780 Disaster," and
one of several deadly blows in October of that year. A run of bad seasons 1780-1788 established a pattern similar to spates around 1933-38, and 1961-1969, and 2004-2007, though bark-stripping winds well over 200 mph at landfall have never yet been repeated since that singular case in 1780.

Quotations pasted from <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Hurricane_of_1780>.

Asterisked years are assisted by Hansen and Sato's Figure 7 (2011, p.14) as follows: 1st meter SLR follows exponential curve on graph to year 2077, years thereafter following a slope limited to 1 meter per decade to assumes best case weather stability during temperature increase. Likely duration of glacial meltdown is almost certainly shorter with increased weather variability, possibly contributing multi-meter rise within this century if weather becomes really turbulent.

Cap and Trade? How about an assured carbon fee instead?

2010-12-14T11:18:00.000-06:00

Public Comment to California EPA Air Resources Board 12/14/2010:

"Cap and trade" has been demonstrated to work in the Montreal Protocol to reduce upper atmosphere ozone destruction, thus becoming our only model for an effective international agreement that can reliably reduce a dangerous global pollutant. However, I want you to think outside the box because the future imposed by unbridled global heating is too terrible to properly imagine and our ability to control it is rapidly dissipating.

Please consider implementing an assured carbon tax, perhaps along with the nation of China or the entire Pacific Rim, on all carbon emissions to the atmosphere. The United States of America and Canada will have no choice but to go along, which is what they want and need. To be sure there are no loopholes in responsibility, call it a carbon fee or assessment across the board. James Hansen's private communications urging a carbon fee to be fully returned to the public are particularly compelling, at http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2010/.

If you experience further principled opposition to cap and trade without giveaways as a mechanism to control future climate change, please consider this surer way to establish a price on carbon emissions: an actual carbon fee imposed at the port of entry or domestic mine/wellhead on all anthropogenic sources of atmospheric greenhouse gases rising to commensurate with very real future social costs.

This fee can start out small but effective, and grow according to an entirely predictable schedule over the next few decades. Thereafter a carbon fee can adaptively regulate carbon emissions and perhaps even incentivize atmospheric carbon reduction over the next two centuries. We should establish some control over the destiny of life as we know it, just as the Fed helps to regulate the gyrations of our expansionist economy.

Popular opinion shifted by 2007 to support real, systemic action against climate change. Business has been asking for stable expectations for the future, with of all companies Royal Dutch Shell requesting government action since their shareholder statement of 2006. Even the Houston Area Survey (http://has.rice.edu/content.aspx?id=2452, http://has.rice.edu/uploadedFiles/2009_Findings/HAS_Highlights_2010.pdf) has shown majority support, right here in the Oil capital of the planet. Any failure to act to conserve a livable climate after 2007 is the policy maker's alone. Clearly, going forward we cannot expect initiative from our U.S. Congress, and certainly not without your solid supporting performance in California.

Act in the best way possible by implementing a steadily rising carbon fee sufficient to ratchet down atmospheric carbon emissions to zero and below… and return all the revenue collected per capita directly to the people, so that their enlightened consumer actions in the free market can guide us to a better future than the one we veer toward today.

Respectfully,

Paul M. Suckow

Senior Planner, Harris County CSD, Texas

Please take 30 seconds to type a note on the Air Resources Board comment page in favor of regulating greenhouse gases, and spread the word.

http://www.arb.ca.gov/lispub/comm/bcsubform.php?listname=capandtrade10&comm_period=A

Upcoming Event for a More Sustainable Houston

2010-11-12T16:00:00.001-06:00

"Counting on Quality of Place" 2011 Regional Symposium
Center for Houston's Future

Houston
January 28, 2011
8:30 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.
Free Admission
George R. Brown Convention Center

Don't miss this opportunity to hear from the experts on Water Quality, Water Supply, and Green Buildings in the Greater Houston region.

8:30am - 2:00pm
Main Event

George R. Brown Convention Center

Honorary Chair: E.D. Wulfe
President, Wulfe & Co.

REGISTER TODAY!

Presenting Sponsor:

Breakfast Panel - The State of the Region's Water
Moderator: Michael Bloom, PE, Senior Associate, PBS&J

Panelists:
Andy Icken, Deputy Director, City of Houston Mayor's Office
Hadi Rifai, Ph.D., Professor, Civil & Environmental Engineering,
University of Houston
Jim Blackburn, Attorney, Blackburn and Carter, P.C. & Adjunct Professor,
Sustainability, Rice University
Jim Granato, Ph.D., Director, Hobby Center for Public Policy, University of Houston

Reaction to 2010 U.S. Midterm election results

2010-11-06T05:43:00.000-05:00

As an advocate for facing up to climate change as the largest challenge of human existence, the November 2 Republican backlash and Democratic losses sadden me greatly. I only wish I could take back all the American greed, ignorance and naïveté of a plurality of my countrymen. Instead I must apologize from the bottom of my heart to the vast majority, the poor, the coastal and the unborn, for what now seems the willful cowardice of a once-great nation. Yet hope remains that this adolescent behavior will pass like a bad meal, and that we shall all sit down together to share an equitable banquet under the given measure of earth’s sunshine. Until that day, many suffer and we toil in vanity.

Letter to climatologist James E. Hansen after his visit to Houston

2009-12-29T10:05:00.001-06:00

I loved the “Temperature of Science” piece. I can only imagine the patience with which you all are making the data public as well as doing your regular job of making the data! So sorry about the police escort here in Houston, but better safe than sorry. I nearly came to blows in the street when debating climate change and future use of fossil fuels with downtown coworkers.

How we all wish it were as easy to get started on an alternative path as it would have been even twenty years ago...begun forty years back, cakewalk might seem an operative term. Unfortunately the natural positive climate feedbacks have been kicking in all the while we have waited for our better angels. You know the drill - Less ice cover, more melting tundra, eventually the recovery of normal solar output, reduction of aerosols aloft due to cleaner technology in China or various economic disasters, saturation of carbon sinks, increased natural burnings of forests (including cities) and coal seams, potential explosions of a few methane hydrate deposits: the list could go on. The effect is a diminishing return on human climate protection effort of any kind, or conversely a multiplier of human climate protection effort that will be required over time, even as formidable adaptive expenses mount.

It would be interesting if Dr. Hansen et. al. could hazard a projection of about when natural feedbacks can be expected to marginalize human efforts to mitigate climate change. I don’t know if “marginalize” means the point when actual emissions equalize between all anthropogenic and all natural (feedback) sources, or the crossing of a tipping point that locks in massive natural increases in GHG, or even when the trajectory of likely total anthropogenic and natural emissions makes crossing a tipping point unavoidable. I remember reading somewhere that natural releases of CO2e recently amounted to 2 billion tonnes per year, which would have been close to 5% of the total anthropogenic GHG emissions in 2005.

Many of us have taken literally the idea that only a decadal window remained open to achieve serious reversal of the trajectory of anthropogenic GHG emissions. Recall Michael Jackson's mention in rehearsal captured for the motion picture "This Is It" of the fact "we have four years left," if I remember the dialog during his beautiful “Save the World” song properly. Yet the picture of an immediate abrupt turnaround into a drastic linear reduction of GHG emissions painted at both Kyoto and Copenhagen seems on its face patently impossible.

Figure 1 Proposed GHG Reductions (secondary sources available in original spreadsheet, and please forgive the obvious amateurishness of my work)

A fairly straight line logarithmic projection of the global trend in GHG emissions established 1995-2005 which I think may be reasonable based on expected human population growth puts us around 60 billion tonnes anthropogenic GHG emissions per year by mid-century, half again higher (negative 50% on the above graphic) than in 1990 if we allow ourselves to burn that much fossil fuel. How will natural (positive feedback) emissions compare during this period? Doubtless they will increase. But when will natural emissions then outweigh whatever humans can or will do going forward? That point surely is coming. It seems to me, if identifiable, to form the natural endpoint of human mitigation efforts, and marks a full move into utter survival mode for civilization and many millions of human beings.

Perhaps better than any U-N temperature rise by any date certain, certainly better than any Chinese energy intensity measure, the day that natural feedback GHG emissions probabilistically trump human emissions could serve as a meaningful endpoint against which to measure mitigation and adaptation alternatives and options, especially such human processes as urban planning and reconstruction, refugee resettlement and assimilation rates, typical warfare blooms and technology adoption rates. Call it a “futility point” or an “end of game” or a “new age begins here”, it is this invisible windmill against which we tilt! Is there any way to know approximately when that point may be reached in the real world?

Thanks so much for all you guys do!!!!

Paul M. Suckow,

Senior Planner

Harris County

Community Services Department

8410 Lantern Point

Houston, TX 77054

T - 713.578.2018

F - 713.578.2990

C - 832-231-8373

paul.suckow@csd.hctx.net

Discouraged to see climate change denial still with us.

2009-12-23T17:21:00.001-06:00

Have you graphed how the failed COP15 "Copenhagen plan" would have looked versus the failed Kyoto Protocol, accounting for proposed reductions against recent increases and current levels of atmospheric greenhouse gasses (GHG)? I have, and especially in light of poor counties' criticisms that neither plan went far enough to give the world a 50/50 chance of avoiding catastrophic climate changes, I must regretfully express sincere doubts that any such turnaround is possible at all constrained by a growing population within our free market global economy as it exists today.

When graphed by year, both reduction curves roughly resemble a checkmark based in year 1990 with a curved lower limb reaching into negative territory until bouncing at about -20% between 2008 and 2012, and then sharply inclining toward 2050 at about 70% or 80% reduction from the 1990 starting point.
80% reduction by 2050 is what older climate change science said would be necessary to achieve a 50% chance of avoiding dangerous anthropogenic interference with earth climate systems. Very few of us would board an elevator or a space shuttle with a 50% chance of catastrophic failure. The 80% figure was based on early assumptions with looser climate sensitivity that totalled 450 ppm, up from preindustrial 270 ppm CO2e in the air, as being a sufficient margain of safety for civilization. Actual levels already measure 390 ppm in places today. The more recent estimates would require deeper cuts more quickly, for the atmosphere already overran the apparent limit for climate stability at around 350 ppm CO2 way back in 1988, and we know of no near or mid term mechanism for pulling all that carbon "back into the bottle." The Kyoto Protocol, if extended through 2050, and the more recent Copenhagen plan appear so similar in trajectory as to be nearly indistinguishable from each other.
In either case the departure from business as usual at the bottom of the checkmark is just too stark and too acutely linear to be believed by anyone with a University of Michigan knowledge of politics, economics, or human sciences. I'll be happy to send my MS Excel spreadsheet for review or criticism to anyone with an email address.

The time for debating what to do about the problem of increasing anthropogenic carbon-equivalent emissions would now appear to have ended effectively around 1988. And contrary to much opinion, the hard questions were seriously voiced around mid-century: In 1959 none other than the real-life Dr. Strangelove, celebrated American nuclear scientist Edward Teller directly addressed the assembled oil industry elite with convincing explanation and concern about "global heating" as one reason to move beyond fossil fuels at latest before 1990. Dr. Teller was documented as one of the four speakers invited to the 100th anniversary of Colonel Drake's 1859 petroleum well, a symposium grandly titled "Energy and Man" (copyright 1960 by the Trustees of Columbia University, City of New York), and I'll also be happy to provide a link to anyone wishing to view it for personal and educational purposes.

The hard political and economic answers, partly due to the unwelcome obstruction of denialists, are still forthcoming.

Copenhagen commitment and comment

2009-12-18T17:19:00.002-06:00

The actual transcript of President Obama's speech about the most important issue of our lifetime is under the link above. The President's prepared text and my brief commentary follows in end notes:

Copenhagen, Denmark

December 18, 2009

Good morning. It’s an honor to for me to join this distinguished group of leaders from nations around the world. We come together here in Copenhagen because climate change poses a grave and growing danger to our people. You would not be here unless you – like me – were convinced that this danger is real. This is not fiction, this is science. Unchecked, climate change will pose unacceptable risks to our security, our economies, and our planet. That much we know.

So the question before us is no longer the nature of the challenge – the question is our capacity to meet it. For while the reality of climate change is not in doubt, our ability to take collective action hangs in the balance. 1

I believe that we can act boldly, and decisively, in the face of this common threat. And that is why I have come here today.

As the world’s largest economy and the world’s second largest emitter, America bears our share of responsibility in addressing climate change, and we intend to meet that responsibility. That is why we have renewed our leadership within international climate negotiations, and worked with other nations to phase out fossil fuel subsidies. And that is why we have taken bold action at home – by making historic investments in renewable energy; by putting our people to work increasing efficiency in our homes and buildings; and by pursuing comprehensive legislation to transform to a clean energy economy.

These actions are ambitious, and we are taking them not simply to meet our global responsibilities. We are convinced that changing the way that we produce and use energy is essential to America’s economic future – that it will create millions of new jobs, power new industry, keep us competitive, and spark new innovation. And we are convinced that changing the way we use energy is essential to America’s national security, because it will reduce our dependence on foreign oil, and help us deal with some of the dangers posed by climate change.

So America is going to continue on this course of action no matter what happens in Copenhagen. But we will all be stronger and safer and more secure if we act together. That is why it is in our mutual interest to achieve a global accord in which we agree to take certain steps, and to hold each other accountable for our commitments.

After months of talk, and two weeks of negotiations, I believe that the pieces of that accord are now clear.

First, all major economies must put forward decisive national actions that will reduce their emissions, and begin to turn the corner on climate change. I’m pleased that many of us have already done so, and I’m confident that America will fulfill the commitments that we have made: cutting our emissions [compared to a 2005 base level] in the range of 17 percent by 2020, and by more than 80 percent by 2050 in line with final legislation. 2

Second, we must have a mechanism to review whether we are keeping our commitments, and to exchange this information in a transparent manner. These measures need not be intrusive, or infringe upon sovereignty. They must, however, ensure that an accord is credible, and that we are living up to our obligations. For without such accountability, any agreement would be empty words on a page.

Third, we must have financing that helps developing countries adapt, particularly the least-developed and most vulnerable to climate change. America will be a part of fast-start funding that will ramp up to $10 billion in 2012. And, yesterday, Secretary Clinton made it clear that we will engage in a global effort to mobilize $100 billion in financing by 2020, if – and only if – it is part of the broader accord that I have just described.

Mitigation. Transparency. And [small nation adaptation] financing. It is a clear formula – one that embraces the principle of common but differentiated responses and respective capabilities. And it adds up to a significant accord – one that takes us farther than we have ever gone before as an international community.

The question is whether we will move forward together, or split apart. This is not a perfect agreement, and no country would get everything that it wants. There are those developing countries that want aid with no strings attached, and who think that the most advanced nations should pay a higher price. And there are those advanced nations who think that developing countries cannot absorb this assistance, or that the world’s fastest-growing emitters should bear a greater share of the burden.

We know the fault lines because we’ve been imprisoned by them for years. But here is the bottom line: we can embrace this accord, take a substantial step forward, and continue to refine it and build upon its foundation. We can do that, and everyone who is in this room will be a part of an historic endeavor – one that makes life better for our children and grandchildren. 3

Or we can again choose delay, falling back into the same divisions that have stood in the way of action for years. And we will be back having the same stale arguments month after month, year after year – all while the danger of climate change grows until it is irreversible. 4

There is no time to waste. America has made our choice. We have charted our course, we have made our commitments, and we will do what we say. Now, I believe that it’s time for the nations and people of the world to come together behind a common purpose.

We must choose action over inaction; the future over the past – with courage and faith, let us meet our responsibility to our people, and to the future of our planet. Thank you.

__________1:

In 1959, celebrated scientist Edward Teller of thermonuclear bomb fame, laid out the case for taking action against “global heating” (as he called climate change), and for motion toward controlled nuclear fusion, to the “Energy and Man” Symposium at Columbia University in NYC before the assembled energy industry elite at their 100th anniversary celebration of the “kicking down” of Colonel Drake’s first petroleum well. His data were the first years of measurements of atmospheric CO2 gathered by (Dr. Keeling for) the “Scripps Institute of California”. After a few pages explanation (http://www.drivehq.com/file/df.aspx/publish/paulsuckow/Teller_1959_EnergyPatterns.pdfPublish), Dr. Teller summarized for the oil industry:

The result is that the earth will continue to heat up until

a balance is re-established. Then the earth will be at a

higher temperature and will radiate more. It has been calculated

that a temperature rise corresponding to a l0 percent

increase in carbon dioxide will be sufficient to melt

the icecap and submerge New York. All the coastal cities

would be covered, and since a considerable percentage of

the human race lives in coastal regions, I think that this

chemical contamination is more serious than most people

tend to believe (Teller in Energy and Man 1960, p.58).

We can know that his message was received, but not necessarily the reaction to it, based on a follow up question posed by the Dean of Columbia University in the symposium record:

Dean Brown: Here is another clarifying question. Would

you please summarize briefly the danger from increased

carbon dioxide content in the atmosphere in this century?

Dr. Teller: At present [1959] the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere

has risen by 2 per cent over normal. By 1970, it will

be perhaps 4 per cent, by 1980, 8 per cent, by 1990, 16

percent, if we keep on with our exponential rise in the use of

purely conventional fuels. By that time, there will be a

serious additional impediment for the radiation leaving the

earth. Our planet will get a little warmer. It is hard to say

whether it will be 2 degrees Fahrenheit or only one or 5.

But when the temperature does rise by a few degrees

over the whole globe, there is a possibility that the icecaps

will start melting and the level of the oceans will begin to

rise. Well, I don't know whether they will cover the Empire

State Building or not, but anyone can calculate it by looking

at the map and noting that the icecaps over Greenland

and over Antarctica are perhaps five thousand feet thick

(Teller in Energy and Man 1960, p.70).

Infamously, the only actions taken by the fossil fuel industry to date are tobacco-style obfuscation of the issues and "greenwashing" via token investments in research of sustainable fuel alternatives while conducting nearly all business as usual for four decades. Unrestrained, by 2009, these efforts paid off handsomely as both Shell and Exxon Mobil surpassed the former Fortune 500 #1 corporation, Wal-Mart Stores, which in turn had unseated the prior long-running global leader, General Motors. For the specific benefit of the Houston area population, lessons should be learned from GM’s experience extending business as usual past due. The former behemoth is now a half-penny stock titled “Motors Liquidation Corporation” (https://www.motorsliquidation.com/), and a serious question of recovery hangs over my beloved City of Detroit and its suburbs.

__________2:
Graphic by Paul M. Suckow relating the reductions envisioned by the failed Kyoto Protocol to the proposed U.S.-Copenhagen plan:

The commitments mentioned in Obama's speech, 17% cut in emissions from 2005 levels by 2020, 30% by 2025, 42% by 2030 and 83% by 2050 (http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/president-attend-copenhagen-climate-talks) are based roughly on the late 19th Century assumption that a doubling or halving of CO2e will produce notable effects (http://www.globalwarmingarchive.com/History.aspx). Today, science indicates that exceeding 350 ppm CO2e, not 450, enters a danger zone leading to catastrophic and irreversible changes creating a warmer and more volatile world climate. Based on current science, poorer nations are demanding greater reductions in the use of fossil fuels and in forest degradation than the United States has agreed (or not?) to legislate. It is difficult to mention, but we may had already lost human control of the climate system by 1988, about the time Dr. Teller warned of in note 1 above, also about the time when the U.S. government and the general public first came to notice global warming as an issue (Al Gore’s Senate Hearings gathering evidence from Dr. James E. Hansen in 1988). The commitments Barack Obama noted in his speech today are expected, if followed, to result in 0.9 degrees Celsius (C, 1.6 degrees F) less global temperature increase by 2100 (Climate Scoreboard 2009 http://climateinteractive.org/scoreboard). However, this leaves an increase of 3.9 degrees C (7 F) above preindustrial earth. A two degree Celsius (3.6 F) industrialization increase is widely agreed to contain a 50/50 chance of avoiding catastrophic and irreversible climate change (though the actual 50/50 point is probably lower http://news.mongabay.com/2009/0316-climate_probability.html). Poor nations are demanding that temperature increase be held for safety’s sake to 1.5 C (2.7 F) above preindustrial earth, a figure that global greenhouse gas emissions over only the next few years virtually guarantee will be exceeded. Thus it is that experts speak of a rapidly closing window on climate protection.

It may well be that natural reinforcements of human climate forcing are already poised to take the earth back to a long-term average 22 C (warmer by ten degrees Celsius beyond preindustrial earth climate) as was common before any primate species or even the deciduous forests we inhabited existed (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2562410/). Cold-blooded creatures like the dinosaurs dominated then, and met a spectacularly immediate demise when an impact event comparable in magnitude to our modern greenhouse gas emissions eliminated their habitat.

Or it is thought possible that global climate might move as it once did over millions of years half-way between the 12 C and 22 C steady states, and then slowly return. The only analogous past natural emission of greenhouse gasses (GHG) comparable in amount and speed to the modern anthropogenic pulse did not breach a climate tipping point but resulted in a 200,000 year climate disruption that eventually settled back to normal, so I guess that provides some hope for the future (http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/).

__________3:
I worry we are at this time consider the cost of the mitigation described in note 2, variously estimated at up to $2,000 per U.S. family (http://www.marketwatch.com/story/climate-change-bill-would-come-at-cost-cbo-says-2009-10-14), but not the much greater costs of global adaptation to inevitable effects of near-term climate change (http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/17/report-predicts-significant-risks-to-citys-climate/?scp=4-b&sq=adaptation+planning+climate+change&st=nyt).

Can the rule of law and even vaunted multinational corporate powers be counted on to equitably flex borders and care for moving populations as disasters and sea levels rise? What of the natural and cultural resources that will be inundated? What will “compensation” come to mean when some lose all and others gain relationally due to “acts of God” or uncontrollable human conflicts? Can fire breaks be constructed sufficient to insulate human constructions from widespread large scale forest fires?
And much closer to home, what will we eat? What will we drink? Can the upcoming population of southern Florida be made comfortable and welcome in dry western Cuba? Can permanently inundated infrastructure be safely reused and relocated, or buffered in place adequately? Should planners be concerned about the stability of coastal areas near continental shelf methane hydrates? Can a system of disaster relocation be permanently emplaced that acts to minimize national or global suffering?

__________4:
This becomes a rhetorical question on the final day of the stalemated COP15 Copenhagen climate negotiations. Life appears always more interesting for each succeeding generation, though the levels of change and adaptations have been limited for most of our human past. 72,000 years ago in Africa (the Toba super eruption http://faculty.jsd.claremont.edu/dmcfarlane/Joyce/Mulu%20ash/Zielinski__Atmospheric%20effetcs.pdf) and again at the time of the ice age fauna extinction and North American “black mat” deposition 12,900 years ago (http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/12/091208132734.htm) modern man and related species lived for a short time under quite unimaginable conditions. How our species responds to long-term adversity is about to be made apparent. As Obama made clear in his speech text today, we in the world community must bond together or we shall surely perish separately. And we as inheritors of the western capitalist political economy must be especially flexible if human action to preserve the climate is to work in time, or at all. We should heed the world’s cry for the survival of life as we know it, damned be the cost.

* Commentary was provided by Paul M. Suckow, a graduate student at Houston’s Texas Southern University Barbara Jordan-Mickey Leland School of Public Affairs Urban Planning-Environmental Policy doctoral program. The commenting author can be reached at 713-578-2018 or paul.suckow@csd.hctx.net.

A day that so far lives in infamy

2009-12-07T10:39:00.001-06:00

Another December Seventh is upon us, but this is not just any other Dec. 7th.

Surprise attack on the main American fleet at Hawaii resulted from broken faith and secret negotiations. Believing the Russians untrustworthy, President Teddy Roosevelt at the turn of the past century became convinced that Japan should rule the Asian continent just as the United States had taken the American continents as its own. However, this conviction was not the result of open negotiations and broad global consensus, but a behind-closed-doors promise that could not be kept. After all, no one else knew about Theodore Roosevelt’s promise of Asian hegemony to Japan, and many powers including the USA and Britain (then still of some account) continued imperially to vie for control of North Asia, until Japan called the Anglo-American’s bluff in their horrible attack on the base of the Pacific Fleet. Along these lines, for me, the 19th Century Monroe Doctrine puts the subsequent ambitions of Hitler for European hegemony and Hirohito for Asian hegemony into a starkly different context, and subjects America’s recent sole claim to superpower statecraft to harsh questioning.

The climate change negotiations (COP15) opened in Copenhagen today, December 7, 2009.

Will this day ever stand for desperation and treachery, or will transparent, clear negotiations begun this day, mindful of a zero-tolerant nature for climate stability beyond 350 ppm CO2, slow our descent into endless climate violence, human chaos and governmental strain? The world’s approaches to mitigation of and adaptation to climate change are about to be settled. Beginning this December 7, the remaining trajectory of all human history become clear. COP15 is that important.

President Obama’s input to the process was planned to play to his strengths, a speechmaking opportunity to charge the hill of high moral ground on the issue of anthropogenic climate change. Obama’s appearance in Copenhagen has beneficially been delayed to coincide with the more meaningful nitty-gritty of negotiations, rather than today’s perhaps overzealous kickoff session. Last Friday, largely as a result of grass-roots efforts by American climate activists, the President quietly promoted webcast interaction between his cabinet-level advisors and the concerned youth of our nation. I’d like to think it was direct feedback from that national meeting on climate change that led to the announcement this morning that his speech at Copenhagen will be postponed for a week to coincide with the actual negotiations. Friday’s online meeting clearly highlighted Washington’s continuing accommodation of topical debate, which in the case of climate action may have already cost us the world. However, thinking of that infamous December 7th reminds us how important public and transparent dealings become in the course of history. Even if we have to wade through the heartfelt pleadings of 200 sovereign states and hear the objections of powerful staid interests and those who cannot accept that the day has finally come, our world must now turn this day which has lived in infamy into a rough ploughshare that hews straight across undoubtedly rocky terrain toward as much climate stability as is yet possible. Let’s get to it.

What the hell are we going to do?

2009-11-30T12:02:00.001-06:00

80 percent lower than 1990 levels by 2050… that’s what science says greenhouse gas emissions must be cut to avoid the worst disruptions faced by civilization since an apparent comet strike and the great floods that ended the last “ice age” (apologies to those with brains less dense than mine, who realize just how complex are the intermingled causes of atmospheric warming happening now; I speak here as if all effects were simplified into a CO2 equivalent).

By comparison, the much maligned Kyoto Protocol called for the industrialized world to trim emissions between 6 and 8 percent from 1990 levels by 2012. Without the USA, even this modest “test run” of climate change reduction activity ran afoul, resulting in an 10% global increase to 2009 (36 ppm increase / ~353 ppm 1990, and probably reaching a 12% global increase by the end of the treaty in 2012). The pending Copenhagen agreement being hailed by the US and China is a new and costlier attempt now to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 3% under 1990 levels by 2020. And then create another 77% reduction below 1990 levels within the next thirty years, as the global human population heads upwards toward 9 billion or more? It strains credulity. And do not forget that this severe target (80% below 1990 levels by 2050) was in response to an assumption that doubling CO2 levels marked a danger point, when it was in fact nothing more than the hypothetical case chosen in the late 19th century (Jean Baptiste Joseph Fourier's 1824 theory was labeled the "greenhouse effect" when Nobel Laureate Svante Arrhenius coined the term during his painstaking year-long hand calculations of the rough effects of a halved and doubled level of CO2). The real danger point at which climate appears to enter an uncontrolled spiral is now agreed to be around 350 ppm CO2 equivalent, which we passed back in the late 1980s (the atmosphere now contains about 390 ppm CO2 equivalent, increasing 2 ppm per year).

To sit back and say, “Well, then I guess there’s nothing we can do any more” is to forget that adaptation consumes far more energy, capital and labor than anyone alive today can comprehend, dwarfing to meaninglessness the current US budget debates over health care issues. All future life bodes that we include mitigation as a strategy, even as we adapt, until the attempts prove ineffective a hundred or a thousand years from now. In a recent book The End of the Long Summer, Author/reporter Dianne Dumanoski recognized,

"It will take conscious effort to resist taking refuge either in despair – in the conviction that 'it's too late' – or in the alternative, to bask in groundless, sunny optimism that 'we'll figure out something, because science always does.' "

The one thing to come clear out of the Copenhagen climate talks will be consensus of obligation to help the world's poor half (“half” sounds so much smaller than the 3,400,178,237 people included in the US Census Bureau’s estimated global population on 11/30/2009). If the world’s investment in these people only results in the American dream for all (a spectacular result for those of us who make or sell things for a living), then truly we will have lost the planet. In the United States, it seems to me that a pending climate agreement with transfer of $10 billion of wealth annually to the world’s poor to assist with mitigation and adaptation could become a vehicle to finally settle debts with African Americans and native peoples who have long sought justice. Why not complete reparations to the descendents of the slaves freed by President Lincoln and to any Native Americans who are still left behind, in the poor half of the world’s population? Direct wealth transfer would utilize all the vaunted strengths of the free market to help: those most in danger to relocate, those with unsustainable infrastructure to reinvest and reinvent, those with insufferable lives to better their circumstances.

We in the culture-defining US must lead toward a survivable planet by example, a duty we have essentially shirked at the highest levels (Exxon Mobil, Wal-Mart Stores, Chevron, ConocoPhillips to name only those US companies in the top 10 global corporations, and not to beleaguer further the US people and its congress/President with their timidity) to date. Blaming China is cowardly, as that country’s emissions per capita remain (for now) right at the limit of sustainability, about 4 tons CO2 equivalent per person per year. The lack of change in America, where we continue our 20 tons per person per year “lifestyle” binge, has been inexcusable since at least 1959 (if you go by Dr. Edward Teller’s-Dr. Strangelove’s-warning in “Energy Patterns of the Future” presented to energy industry elite at the 1959 “Energy and Man” symposium in NYC). Business as usual is by now an outright crime against humanity, as viewed by our children.

President Obama, much as I love him, feels constrained to make a whirlwind visit and speech then leave the true negotiations to others at Copenhagen, a bully pulpit function in the absence of real legislative US action. Every city should host a vigil or a protest to bring attention to the momentous nature of the discussion and decisions that will be made there. If you want to be a part of the action on the 11th or 12th of December (Bill McKibben of www.350.org is calling for coordinated action on either the 11th or 12th): vigils outside congressional offices, letters to the editor, op-eds, or local direct action. Visit or join your www.1sky.org local group for more.

Led by China, CO2 gases rose in 2008 - Climate Change- msnbc.com

2009-11-18T16:35:00.000-06:00

Led by China, CO2 gases rose in 2008 - Climate Change- msnbc.com

Spiralling feedback effects strengthening climate change are not something we will grow out of. In fact, if the world's economy is not on a substantially different footing by the time a general recovery takes hold, then I dare say life as we know it, in the long run, is doomed. Sorry to go all "2012" on ya....

Given unmodified capitalism's current strength and long lead, reversing course in time to save ourselves seems highly dubious. It is not likely, and certainly not desirable, that humanity should live through a second big economic collapse prior to the tipping point after which human efforts toward greenhouse gas emissions reduction lose effectiveness and nature wails on. Pity it seems we cannot become immediately and globally more radical in reimagining future energy, transport and commerce without their legacy wastes. Future generations will naught but thank us if, somehow, we do.

This is it.

2009-11-15T12:40:00.001-06:00

Great movie commemorating a great loss; it really helped to humanize Michael Jackson. It made me a little jealous of him. He got to check out before the climate really changed and we are left holding no option but to adapt or die. Expressive, expansive, belated tip of the hat to you, MJ.

But I didn’t mean to write about a movie. I meant to write down the dissertation idea that finally fit. This is it: How National Environmental Policy Act environmental review would change if Carbon Dioxide (CO2) were named a criteria pollutant.

It crystallized out of unrelated Friday conversations at work. One was with my supervisor Janeen Spates, debating whether activities that add CO2 to the atmosphere cause physical change to the environment.

Harris County and HUD have always assumed that using federal grant money to support public services such as ambulance rides or bus ride vouchers for ill patients produced no physical changes to the environment and were thus exempt from NEPA environmental review under 24 CFR Part 58. On the other hand, constructing new apartment buildings or a new park with play equipment for the kids would produce physical changes to the environment, triggering full environmental assessment under the same federal regulations.

However, the plastic “Donald Duck” play seats that Diana and I used to love to swing on at Marquette Park on Lake Michigan in the 1960s have already cracked up and either joined all that trash in the landfills or is by now well on its way floating serenely toward the great Pacific Ocean garbage flow. A permanent physical change to the environment? Certainly, even though no physical evidence of the play equipment remains on the beach less than fifty years after installation. But the CO2 that left the tailpipe of our car as we happily wheeled down Lakeside Drive to cavort on that same beach is still with us. So is the CO2 expended in constructing the “Donald Duck” swing equipment, in manufacturing the plastic seats themselves, in transporting them from wherever they were made to the beach where they were used by countless happy kids, each of which transferred over a pound of Carbon (2.5 miles * conservatively .9 lbs of carbon dioxide/2ish kids per car) to the atmosphere on the way there, and after wiping off their sandy feet, again on the way back. About half that carbon dioxide was absorbed by the world’s waters, acidifying them, and the other half is still up in the air, for a century or more, helping raise the mean temperature of earth during the entire time.

So if the Carbon emissions produce more permanent change, and arguably more adverse change, to the environment than the plastic and metal remnants of the disused 1960s play equipment of my youth, why is CO2 still generally discounted in the federal environmental review process?

That part of the NEPA environmental review process that I work with almost daily is HUD’s interpretation of the statute codified in federal regulations at 24 CFR 58. Another Friday conversation was with one of my two planners, Jared Briggs, who fresh from recent training relayed the sense that HUD is moving away from narrowly defining its community development mission as safely housing people with less toward a broader view of real community building. In lifting its view from only those traditionally underserved to the whole community, a move that has been underway at least since the welfare reforms of the Clinton era, opportunity exists for adopting a more generally holistic view that is consistent with the postmodern American city and country.

Houston can be a tough crowd for an ecocentrist. Yet even Dr. Stephen Klineberg’s evenhanded Rice University Houston Area Survey finds increasingly that the population considers the threat of global warming as “very serious,” passing the majority mark in 2008. The Houston Area Survey found consistently that between the 1980s and the 2000s people agreed (ranging between 61% to 72%) with the statement, “Protecting the environment is so important that continuing improvements must be made, regardless of cost.” If they’re saying that in the (petroleum) energy capital of the world, how much more acutely must the rest of the world feel this?

After last night’s sleep, I thought that if we gave long-lived greenhouse gasses their shrift in environmental review, our assessment of what produces beneficial and adverse environmental effects would change quite radically. My wife Donna, upon hearing it, told me to write it down this morning before I forget, which is her quite meaningful stamp of approval. Ha-ha, forget a real dissertation hook into the climate change adaptation planning that I have been working toward at TSU since 2004 and also lets me engage Dr. Ibitayo on my committee? I wrote it down.

The Massacre at Fort Hood

2009-11-07T10:01:00.001-06:00

(تَكْبِير) “Allahu Akbar” in deed. If in place of Allah you substitute the profane belief that “might makes right”; that the direction of violence can ever project a force for justice. Not even the most coldly ironic human can make sense of the massacre that took place in the military heart of Texas on Thursday afternoon. Yet I believe that such was bound to happen eventually. The fundamental illogic of training in the martial arts, of knowing to kill in order to deny the land to those you dislike, and to dominate and dehumanize others so that their way does not impede your way, this day is cruelly exposed like a giant raw nerve at the heart of a beast.

Can anyone condemn the soldier who turned on his mates who can also abide what those slain and unslain were either commencing or finalizing at the Soldier Readiness Center of Fort Hood, the “largest active duty armored post in the United States”? (http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,572305,00.html).

If the string of domination by violence noted in the Bible beginning with Cain and his brother and continuing to Saul’s thousands and David’s tens of thousands had continued unbroken to this day, how many of us would be yet alive? सत्याग्रह Satyagraha, my gentle readers.

2009-04-25T11:32:00.000-05:00

Nothing against Christians, or more generally monotheists, but after 9-11 occurred and the U.S. did not avoid launching war with Iraq, I finally called a spade a spade and went atheist (or as I like to euphemize it, "interfaith" for American ears...sounds less antagonizing). Hope that doesn't offend my gentle reader's sensabilities too badly. I finally tried to write an apology for my switch from a Christian to an atheist faith in my blog. In case anyone is still wondering where the old Paul went: (http://paulsuckow.blogspot.com/2008/06/how-god-exists.html).

In these decades I am far more concerned about the approaching effects of climate change on real life as we knew it around the time of our birth than I could ever become exercised about the conceptual soul's eternal verities. If you are a betting (wo)man, you should understand that we are fast approaching an overrun of a 50/50 point in the odds that human life will become extinct along with much, maybe half, of every lifeform humans have ever known. In toxicology and public health, a lethal dose of anything for 50% of subjects (LD50) is commonly shunned entirely. It's already not certain that we can avoid the vortex of natural reinforcement that will lead to a radically different planet from the one on which forests and crops and mammals and ocean life have evolved, and especially during the long ice ages thrived.

Not since the end of the Younger Dryas millennium have human civilizations endured a decadal rise approaching 8 degrees Celsius. And that was catastrophic for all civilization at the time, to the point that science is still largely written to say that "our" civilization began after the survivors of what I'll call the original "Noah" flood (around 6450 years +-25 before present) came down from the mountains into the Tigres-Euphrates valleys to establish male-dominated city-states like Ur. All literature except perhaps the largely unexplored oral traditions of Himalayan spoken Sanskrit lost the thread of human civilization to that point. We theorize that that sub-glacial outburst flooding from ancient Lake Agassiz was only the most recent and all things considered a somewhat minor global pulse of what has arrived during the progressive meltdown of the ice age (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Agassiz). It seems reasonable to consider the Semitic Noah/Nuh(a) story, Gilgamesh epic and similar accounts in other literatures to perhaps conflate local events as in Sumeria around 2900 BC with the much earlier collective memory of ice age losses. The current Wiki article about this currently gives no help (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noah), leaving us with Science Channel reporting.

A synopsis of historical sea level rise:
Greater catastrophies in the deeper past may be linked with Sanskrit rememberances of advanced, global and presumably sustained ice-age civilization(s), long thought to have been purely mythical. Sea level rise of about 25 meters appears to have resulted from an initial antarctic icecap rapid disintigration called Meltwater Pulse 1A about 14,300 or 14,200 years ago. The geological record of that pulse is widely agreed upon, though most scientists smooth out the timeframe to inlude a 500-year runup to the rapid portion of the disintegration. A similarly vertical jump in the raw data seems to correspond with another period of rapid collapse, perhaps in the Northern hemisphere because some muddying in the data should possibly be expected from the assumed isostatic shifts that create uncertainty in the record (volcanism and massive technonic shifts in water/ice pressure overburdening the plates may have begun by then). The greatest ice sheet collapses of the meltdown diluted the oceans sufficiently with fresh water, truly massive amounts compared to current icemelt potential. The world ocean conveyor system seems to have been struck dead. Some insight into this can be found in observations of today's arctic deep water chimneys that have been shutting off one by one in the last part of the century, apparently weakening the Gulf Stream just enough to mask overheating of Europe and the northeastern U.S. seaboard from global warming.

Regions we call temperate today suddenly returned to cold, dry ice-age conditions for 1,300 years +-70, a period known as the Younger Dryas. Finally about 11,550 years ago a horrendous decade with an 8-degree C. global temperature climbout broke the spell. Interestingly, some of this may correspond to Plato's transcription of the ancient Egyptian account of the destruction visited upon the central territory of "Atlantis" around 11,600 years ago. For the next three thousand years ice and water-borne debris tore and formed the northern landscapes we know as post-glacial. The raw data appears to gain in volatility throughout this period of steady sea-level rise until a peak event around 8400 years ago calmed things down for a few hundred years, only to enter another millenial period of volatility with perhaps ten meters amplitude dampening slightly until what I would consider the last big flood event around 6450+-25 years ago.

Six mellinnia since we have seen a small upward sea level rise within the range of natural variability (roughly +-2 m). This year we are experiencing a similar measure of sea level rise to that typically experienced over the last century, but now up to about 1.8 mm of sea level rise from around 1.5 mm over the last century. This amount may rise non-linearily with any instability in grounded ice sheets as they continue to spead up and spread out due to continued mass loss (edge melt and loss of buttressing floating ice pack).

Almost no cultural transmission, save the Sanskritt of Himalayan survivors, crossed the entire meltdown period and into our own civilization. The Judeo-Chrisitan tradition always thought the Earth's creation to date back roughly 6,000 years, long known to be insufficient from scientific and even historical records (http://www.religioustolerance.org/ev_date.htm NOTE: this religious tolerance web site is a reliable source of interfaith principals and helpful to understanding my current worldview).

Even today, our great global civilization(s) could be but a dull reflection of the those great ancients which developed during the stability of the long ice age up through the last glacial maximum (LGM). The world ocean had very gradually lowered to 400 feet (120 m) below recent sea levels by the LGM. Perhaps we should spend more time looking for answers to questions of sustainability underwater than in the pages of more recent and simply ignorant holy books.

consumer

2009-04-22T16:14:00.000-05:00

con·sum·er
Pronunciation: \kən-ˈsü-mər\
Function: noun
Usage: often attributive
Date: 15th century
: one that consumes: as a: one that utilizes economic goods b: an organism requiring complex organic compounds for food which it obtains by preying on other organisms or by eating particles of organic matter — compare producer 3
— con·sum·er·ship \-ˌship\ noun

Adam and Ken.jpeg

2009-04-20T08:51:00.001-05:00

Adam and Ken.jpeg
Originally uploaded by paul_suckow2000

Adam and Ken eruditely quip and comment on the Astros baseball game going on below the suite window in Minute Maid Park on Saturday night. We had a beautiful view of some MLB with plenty of fine food and drink. All thanks go to Ken F. for arranging the special tickets to attend this fast and furious spectacle, in which the Astros downed the Reds seven-zip. The seventh inning was spectacular for the Astros with bases loaded and two doubles batting in four runs altogether. It's great to be a part of the Harris County workforce and the vibrant (which today means not quite in dasterdly recession) Houston community.

voracious

2009-04-17T16:58:00.000-05:00

vo·ra·cious
Pronunciation:
\vȯ-ˈrā-shəs, və-\
Function:
adjective
Etymology:
Latin vorac-, vorax, from vorare to devour; akin to Old English ācweorran to guzzle, Latin gurges whirlpool, Greek bibrōskein to devour
Date:
1635
1 : having a huge appetite : ravenous 2 : excessively eager : insatiable
— vo·ra·cious·ly adverb
— vo·ra·cious·ness noun
synonyms voracious, gluttonous, ravenous, rapacious mean excessively greedy. voracious applies especially to habitual gorging with food or drink . gluttonous applies to one who delights in eating or acquiring things especially beyond the point of necessity or satiety . ravenous implies excessive hunger and suggests violent or grasping methods of dealing with food or with whatever satisfies an appetite. rapacious often suggests excessive and utterly selfish acquisitiveness or avarice .

The Sanskrit Letter

2009-04-14T13:19:00.000-05:00

Dear Pinkal K. Bhatt of Vadodara- Gujarat, India:

I found your fascinating article today after I had been tasked by our transportation department with displaying spoken language differences in Harris County (http://www.fastcompany.com/blog/pinkal-bhatt/sanskrit-great-ancient-language-india-bharat-hindustan).

From the writings of explorer Graham Hancock, I already had an interest in ancient oral traditions passed down via Sanskrit, but your article mentioning “the only unambiguous language” and Rick Briggs (NASA) “Artificial Intelligence” (AI) quote double-double-doubled the intrigue!

Since you so kindly shared your email address with this article, I hope you do not mind this inquiry from one as yet completely ignorant of the most “amazingly rich, efflorescent” ancient mother tongue.

Twenty five years ago, I was amazed at the clarity of high-school German and its conjugations and being able to decode Goethe in his own words. Yet German is but a messy derivation of Latin, which itself is a messy derivation of Greek, which you have shown to be a messy diminution of ancient Sanskrit. Is there any truth to legends (i.e. 7 Sages) that say Sanskrit was meant to keep alive the memories and messages of human civilization and cultures through the trying times that accompanied the end of the long, stable ice age environment? I have been researching adaptation planning in response to anthropogenic climate change, most likely the cause of the latest and current great global catastrophe at the close of the past ice age. Will Sanskrit and sufficient human knowledge of the content encoded in it be able to pass on “largely unexplored” treasures along with our own civilization’s perhaps paltry science? I once suggested to learned colleagues that it stands to reason that great huge lizards would result from free ranging across a global territory stable in “hot-box” climate for many millions of years, even as the large mammals we have lost or are losing now arrived toward the end of a much shorter period of “cold-box” climate stability. It was as if ears could not hear, and no one seemed interested.

Am I correct to assume that, like the languages, current human culture has been greatly dimmed by the great disasters and near-extinctions since humans experienced the last glacial maximum? And since the surface of the sea dropped slowly over a hundred thousand years during the past ice age, would we not be likely to discover (if) any durable remains of ancient civilization rest on the seafloor approaching 120 meters below recent sea levels, perhaps at the deltas of large ice age rivers? Imagining how little of our constructions would survive underwater for 10 millennia, however, makes me think that the Sanskrit oral tradition may hold more valuable information than any physical remains ever could. What do you think are the chances that AI routines could “unearth” for English speakers today at least the broad strokes of content in these oral traditions? How do megalithic archaeological structures relate to the culture that developed ancient Sanskrit? Could some eroded megalithic remains be but the rude foundations of much more interesting constructions? Could humans have reached super sizes toward the end of the last ice age, just like the other great animals alive at the time? Could our current human bloom on Earth not be unique to our time? Does the Sanskrit record a time of giants on the Earth or ancient advanced civilizations otherwise lost entirely to our collective human memory?

Recent happenings are quite detailed in memory, yet the farther back one looks in time the less detail, color and connection events seem to exhibit in memory. There seems a natural haze within our vision of things far out in time and in space that tends to cloud the specifics. I have been struggling for several years to find a word that represents this concept, perhaps you might know one. That same concept seems to hold at larger scales, even in the most careful scrutiny of the fossil or geological record of Earth. Could this concept be true also looking into deep space, or can events there be more faithfully recorded in our perceptions of radiation emitted thirteen or fifteen billion years ago? Is ancient Sanskrit like a human radiation from the deep past, able to retain its fidelity even if the content it describes is unfamiliar to any contemporary human mind? Are meanings of oral traditions recorded in ancient Sanskrit understandable at any era with an expenditure of effort to understand them? Are such things as technological bursts of human flight and world war present in the deep history of humanity? Has any civilization ever succeeded in maintaining a peaceful existence for long periods of time? 2000 years ago, was Panini only the latest to describe the "the framework of grammar" of classical Sanskrit? Who is making sure that an ancient Sanskrit oral record continues to transmit into the future? Who is closest to being able to translate and exegete meanings beneficial to the present predicament of public affairs?

I apologize in advance if any of this stuff is plain off-track or crazy. Any enlightening responses, references, or forwarding to other knowledgeable parties regarding any of the above would be so very much appreciated. And so ends my little message in a digital bottle. Thank you for your kindness, time and attention.

Doing it all

2009-03-14T22:41:00.000-05:00

With due respect for Warren Buffett and other financial leaders, my wife and I adamendtly disagree with the single focus theory. Yes, it would be quicker and maybe safer to send in the troops, fully nationalize the banks, clean them up and ship them out again...but Barrack isn't doing that. He's tried something smarter first. And yes, FDR was more cautious about stabilizing the banks and building trust and support for his major reforms, but Barrack and the American people don't have that option. In ways we may not understand until much later, it is all or nothing, right now.

I can only vouch for his actions countering climate change, an area of expertise I have been following closely. I must leave it to others who know health care, education, and the financial system to vouch for Barrack taking on long overdue challenges in those areas. Even if Barrack's most ambitious climate change goals are met, there is no guarantee at this late time that we will be able to undo the damage already done earlier this century and the last.

I am no defeatist, but we must see through the entire package of Obama's reforms, or we may as well let everything collapse in a heap of smoking rubble right now. Congress can expect to be presented with meaningful greenhouse gas legislation by Memorial Day, according to my Washington sources at http://www.1sky.org/. Not a moment too soon, certainly, but perhaps quite a bit too late. Let me explain.

From a climate change perspective, at the most basic level, I would heed the words of warning of those who saw the danger from afar. In 1959, the global oil industry gathered in NYC to celebrate the hundredth anniversary of Col. Drake's first petroleum well. Four illustrious speakers made presentations to the assembled elect, presumably the who's who of global oil at that time. All four are well worth reading in Energy and Man: A Symposium (1960, Appleton-Century-Crofts: NY), but I admit even I was aghast to stumble across three pages (56-58) of the most erudite explanation of danger posed by global warming. Who knew that the global warming threat had been placed front and center before the energy industry as a reason to move beyond fossil fuels as early as 1959??

And by no less a hero than Dr. Edward Teller of thermonuclear bomb fame, a scientific rock star at that time, who wanted peaceful nuclear energy research to procede more than anything else in the world in 1959. Dr. Teller named the Scripps Institute by name in his speech, pointing out early results of the outstanding work carried out by Dr. Keeling on Mauna Loa. Before he died, Dr. Keeling was awarded the nation's highest science medal by then-President G. W. Bush for the way his dedication to precise measurement of carbon dioxide content in the atmosphere every four hours for a lifetime had changed the world's understanding of greenhouse gasses and the potential for climate change.

Dr. Teller rightly projected that if nothing is done to curb the use of fossil fuels by around 1990, then we risk melting the icecaps. He was straightforward about this in his speech, telling the oil execs of 1959 in so many words, "we know how big the icecaps look on our world maps, and they average 5000 feet in depth...if they were to melt, you do the math." In all the science study and money that has gone into the related fields of climate change and earth systems research, nothing has emerged to change this basic analysis of Dr. Teller (and other leading scientists of that day). I suspect this is why the issue met with such worldwide intensity around 1988, leading to the international framework, IPCC and Kyoto, and so furiously obstructed and diffused by top oil and coal interests for twenty years thereafter.

The Earth is a giant 8-ball now. No one can say with certainty how long life as we know it will continue. The best we can do is START the alternative path toward delaying climate change. This is a late start, but start we must! All indicators so far acknowledge that it is impossible to avoid. Indeed evidence is becoming palpable to our human senses that something great is happening to the weather norms, and moreso the closer to the poles one checks. My wife and I plan to cruise the inner passage of Alaska aboard the Zuiderdam this summer, economic crisis or not, because we want to remember with our own eyes what the great northern glaciers were like before they receded further and faster.

So go ahead President Obama, keep reaching for the stars. The American people will continue to support your vigorous actions. We know that maintenance has been deferred too long. These issues are entangled in an interlocking system of subsurban land use and lifestyle and life's labors that must be replaced wholesale or not at all. The stakes are already thinning that American action will be heeded as the benchmark by the rest of the world. Let's not shrink from trying, folks, just because our government apparatus has calcified and our economic lifeblood is running a little cold. It's all or nothing. Let's at least attempt to do it all. Go Barrack!

double this nation's supply of renewable energy in the next three years

2009-02-25T08:39:00.000-06:00

"But to truly transform our economy, protect our security, and save our planet from the ravages of climate change, we need to ultimately make clean, renewable energy the profitable kind of energy. So I ask this Congress to send me legislation that places a market-based cap on carbon pollution and drives the production of more renewable energy in America. And to support that innovation, we will invest fifteen billion dollars a year to develop technologies like wind power and solar power; advanced biofuels, clean coal, and more fuel-efficient cars and trucks built right here in America."

-- Barrack Obama speech before joint session of US Congress and all nine Justices, February 24, 2009.

Note that a carbon cap is absolutely necessary, and I could feel the collective sense of release, "finally!", as policy certainty began to solidify underfoot. Even the coal industry has been begging for just this certainty, and Barrack is delivering. But "cap and trade" is the weaker of two brothers...Germany has pulled ahead of us by welcoming the stronger. You may have expected me here to say "carbon tax", but no, I am referring instead to proactive and temporary price supports... Mandated pluses (and minuses) to the cost of energy based upon preference for least carbonated atmosphere and most healthy planet.

"...living our values doesn't make us weaker, it makes us safer and it makes us stronger." That's OUR President.

People who "get it"

2009-02-25T06:06:00.000-06:00

"Most encouraging of all, the ramp rate of human evolution, moving up and down history’s chart in small sections but with an overall upward trend and spike toward higher coherence, is a pattern so akin to nature’s own as to be an inexhaustible source of inspiration. As a result, as nature presses us to keep pace on its terms, we stand to react accordingly, instinctively, positively.

Earth’s prosperity has become our own salvation. Welcome to the prospect of a healthy green collar economy, where nature is the true superpower and defines our approach to a global industry united in its defense."

--Brian Bogart, a University of Oregon master’s of science candidate specializing in green defense policy.

Comments to H-GAC on Draft Report of the Foresight Panel on Envir

2009-02-23T10:48:00.001-06:00

“1. Use historical climate record and credible climate change projections in planning.” (Draft Report on the Houston Region Foresight Panel on Environmental Effects – Executive Summary, p. 2)

Dear H-GAC Foresight Panel,

In most respects, the first listed strategy can be broadly applied to the investigation of effects and impacts of climate change in our region, and relied upon to add credence to proposed mitigation and adaptation strategies. In one or two absolutely critical areas, however, this approach falls flat. One such application is toward estimating sea-level rise, the other toward subsidence. I wish to challenge two false assumptions that most analysts are accepting without much critical thought.

The fourth, and latest, IPCC Assessment Report in 2007 stated only what is known with certainty about sea level rise. The dynamics of sea-level rise are driven by three factors whose relative contributions change over a period now expected to extend on the order of decades and centuries, rather than centuries and millennia. The first of these factors is the physical coefficient of expansion as water gains heat on or near earth’s surface. This is a well known phenomenon that varies directly with the amount of heat. The next factor is the addition of fresh water to the world ocean from melting mountain glaciers, and the end of many is in sight within the matter of a few decades. This is uncontroversial because the evidence of it through direct observation and gravity measurements is well along. The third factor has not yet greatly expressed itself, but because the largest amount of fresh water on earth is locked within them, the contributions of ice melt and dynamical ice flows from grounded ice caps will increasingly and perhaps rapidly override the other two components of sea level rise. This is where the ICCP could not reach worldwide agreement among a range of scientists. On one end are the defenders of traditional millennial ice change models based on the common natural past behaviors exhibited by ice covers as the primary input of heat to their melting was the tiny gradual shifts in orbital trajectories and orientations to our single central star, multiplied by positive feedbacks in the climate system. On the other extreme are those who consider the current case to be atypical of almost all natural changes recorded in the fossil record. These considered the unprecedented speed and magnitude of the rate of climate change today to be most similar to the rapid volcanic/tectonic inputs that released a similar amount of carbon to what humans are releasing in these centuries, but into an atmosphere then much less starved of greenhouse gasses 55 million years ago. In its chummy, inimitable way, the IPCC “put its foot down” and did not allow the big argument over the larger factor to muddy the clearer science of the smaller components. It made a plain statement to the world that the factor of dynamical ice flows is not yet well enough understood to hazard a best guess. I suppose the IPCC collectively expected the world to use common sense and place a large but for now uncertain placeholder into the figures for ice melt and sea level rise. How large? Let us consider the big picture. “Oceans contain 97 % of the earth's water while the remaining 3 % is classified as freshwater. Seventy-seven percent of this surface freshwater is stored as ice and 22% as groundwater and soil moisture. The remaining freshwater, making up less than 1 % of the world total, is contained in lakes, rivers and wetlands.” - Elementary Themes, Fresh Water Ecology and Pollution web site at http://www.cdli.ca/CITE/water.htm. Here is a table showing global water status:

	Oceans	Ice	Groundwater	Flowing Water
Saltwater	97%
Freshwater		2.31%	0.66%	<0.03%

Frozen water moves from a grounded state into the ocean as either solid ice or as liquid melt water. The fresh melt water is already about 2.6% greater in volume than the saltwater it would have displaced as floating ice, bumping up the ocean surface level when it enters. Calved icebergs, however, initially displace their own weight in seawater, and then grow about 2.6% in volume while melting. Calved sea ice extends the time it takes sea level to rise by providing a bump upon calving from grounded ice and then a longer pulse to reach the same 2.6 % volume increase that melt water supplies in one pulse (Noerdlinger & Brower, 2007). So the original ice volume increases in its entirety by 2.6% when that ice is melted into the ocean.

	Oceans	Ice	Groundwater	Flowing Water
Saltwater	97%
Freshwater	2.31%		0.66%	<0.03%

Ocean volume therefore increases from baseline by 2.6% x 2.31% = 6.006% at full cryosphere meltdown simply by turning all the ice into water. Beginning with a global mean depth of 3794 m, total meltdown implies about 23 meters of sea-level rise, to 3817 m. That is as much water volume as would be contributed by a 5 degree C temperature thermal expansion.

Thermal expansion at full equilibrium with a 10 degree C average surface termperature rise, from 10 degree C to 20 degree C for the top 10% ocean layer, would compound ocean water volume by about an additional 12.56%. Beginning with a global average depth of 3817 m, thermal expansion implies a rise to 73.67 m at equilibrium, bringing global mean depth to 3864.64 m. The result is a permanent (on the scale of human endeavors) increase of 70.64 meters. Some additional mechanisms may provide additional rise not counted herein, such as temporary color changes due to blooms and extinctions of zooplankton, or constraining shape of the ocean basin and in the long run rebalancing effects as the weight of ice and water overburden redistributes, and volcanism or even tectonic changes could occur as a result.

If eighty meters (252’) of sea level rise are possible within a rapid climate change century-scale scenario, the questions remain in the timing. Examination of somewhat similar greenhouse gas-dominated climate changes reveal more immediate and longer lasting climate responses than most scientists expected only a decade ago. From an urban planning perspective, we are certainly pressed to accomplish the integrated mitigation and adaptation sequences that must be attempted with sacrificial fervor, singular focus and breathtaking scope.

Using a straightforward projection of recent trends, sea level rise as a consequence of climate change seems to be doubling about once per decade as ice cap melt begins to dominate remaining mountain glacier runoff and thermal ocean expansion components. The rate of temperature increase is established for the next forty years based on known short-term inertias in climate responses to prior and current greenhouse gas concentrations. Long term (millennial) reinforcement will only exacerbate the problems in the atmosphere. Non-linearity would tend to shorten this projection because of known positive feedback mechanisms and a lack of known negative feedbacks.

Beginning with the recent rate of 0.5 cm per decade (1.5-2 mm per year), it could be a matter of 13 decades until all ice on earth has dissolved. To expect that effective mitigation is either affordable or geo-engineer-able borders now on wishful thinking. Dynamical ice flows which the conservative 2007 IPCC 4^th Assessment Report found impossible to estimate are speeding up. IPCC has for now left blank the largest driver of sea level rise in our future. The long-pull inertia of climate reactions and the amounts of heat gain already “in the pipeline” reemphasize the environmental and intergenerational justice issues. Put in development terms there may be only time enough for 26 - 5 year architectural fads, four 25-year comprehensive urban plans, and one-to-two total building lifecycles. It is questionable whether this time is sufficient to move our major coastal population centers to safety, let alone to reestablish wetland coastal buffer zones and recover enough habitats for threatened and endangered species or even arable soil for sufficient food production.

Decadal chg Decade Eustatic Sea Level

+0.5 cm 2000 120.01 m above eustatic sea-level (ESL) at Last Glacial Maximum (LGM)

+1 cm 2010 120.02 m above ESL at LGM

+2 cm 2020 120.04 m above ESL at LGM

+4 cm 2030 120.08 m above ESL at LGM

+8 cm 2040 120.16 m above ESL at LGM

+16 cm 2050 120.32 m above ESL at LGM

+32 cm 2060 120.64 m above ESL at LGM

+64 cm 2070 121.28 m above ESL at LGM

+1.28 m 2080 122.56 m above ESL at LGM

+2.56 m 2090 125.12 m above ESL at LGM

+5.12 m 2100 130.24 m above ESL at LGM

+10.24 m 2110 140.48 m above ESL at LGM

+20.48 m 2120 160.96 m above ESL at LGM

+39.04 m 2130 200 m above ESL at LGM

And such is the result of melting all the ice that exists on earth today, 80 m (252 feet) total sea-level rise. The years after 2110, when sea-level rise breaches 1 meter per year in this projection, could see a 20-year flood of biblical proportions, ending in the final years with greater than 4 m annual rise. Harris County in sum total will return to the ocean bottom. At that time, seawater will permanently (from a human point of view) cover downtown Houston up to the 15^th floor level of employment center skyscrapers. Ice flowing away from grounded ice caps is the least understood phenomenon of current atmosphere-ocean coupled general circulation models used for sea level rise scenario prediction. Dr. James E. Hansen of Columbia University and NASA states with “likely” certainty “meter-scale sea level rise this century, and ice sheets in a state of disintegration that guarantees future sea level rise in the 10-meter-scale, with a continual reworking of future global coastlines” out of control of humanity. To quote his abstract to “Target Atmospheric CO2: Where Should Humanity Aim?” published recently in The Open Atmospheric Sciences Journal:

“The conclusion that humanity must aim for a CO2 amount less than the current amount is a dramatic change from most previous studies, which suggested that the dangerous level of CO2 was likely to be 450 ppm or higher. The change is caused by realization that ‘slow’ feedback processes, such as ice melt and release of greenhouse gases by the soil and ocean in a warming climate, can occur on the time scale of decades and centuries. This realization stems from both improving data on the Earth’s climate history and ongoing observations of change, especially in the polar regions.

“The authors conclude that “humanity today, collectively, must face the uncomfortable fact that industrial civilization itself has become the principal driver of global climate.” Specifically, they say that humanity “must begin now to move toward the era beyond fossil fuels”, and “the most difficult task, phase-out over the next 20-25 years of coal use that does not capture CO2, is

Herculean, yet feasible when compared with the efforts that went into World War II. The stakes, for all life on the planet, surpass those of any previous crisis. The greatest danger is continued ignorance and denial, which could make tragic consequences unavoidable.”

James Hansen,1,2, Makiko Sato1,2, Pushker Kharecha1,2, David Beerling3, Robert Berner4, Valerie Masson-Delmotte5, Mark Pagani4, Maureen Raymo6, Dana L. Royer7 and James C. Zachos8

1NASA/Goddard Institute for Space Studies, New York, NY 10025, USA

2Columbia University Earth Institute, New York, NY 10027, USA

3Dept. Animal and Plant Sciences, University of Sheffield, Sheffield S10 2TN, UK

4Dept. Geology and Geophysics, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06520-8109, USA

5Lab. Des Sciences du Climat et l’Environnement/Institut Pierre Simon Laplace, CEA-CNRS-Universite de

Versailles Saint-Quentin en Yvelines, CE Saclay, 91191, Gif-sur-Yvette, France

6Dept. Earth Sciences, Boston University, Boston, MA 02215, USA

7Dept. Earth and Environmental Sciences, Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT 06459-0139, USA

8Earth & Planetary Sciences Dept., University of California, Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz, CA 95064, USA

The realization that phenomena formerly considered millennially slow, like sea level rise, can happen in decades and centuries, is jarring indeed. Much of the information leading to complacency is simply not up to date with recent findings. Consider our conditions: an increase to at least nine billion human population, the global hope for freedom to attain an energy-intensive lifestyle, the forty-year periods required for adopting widespread use of different technologies under capitalist market cost-plus-profit recovery times, and the “least common denominator” effects of federal policy or international treaty making. In the real world it is highly unlikely that humanity will be able to reverse the increase of carbon in the atmosphere back down to more of a 1960s level by 2070. Yet considering inertial climate forces that is the amount and timeframe required to gain a twenty-year margin of safety at the very end of the cryospheric meltdown process. Twenty years is precious little time to adjust efforts if they prove either insufficient (draconian or totalitarian intervention can then assumed to be initiated) or excessive (allowing some relaxation of precautionary mitigation measures). And really, what difference to our coastal civilization will be 20 meters total esl rise, perhaps the best outcome we may now expect, versus worst case 80 meters esl rise?

The second assumption concerns our programmatic ability to halt land and groundwater subsidence, which are exacerbating the problems of climate-driven sea-level rise. This is of particular concern in many deltaic settlements that have grown at the mouths of rivers where they enter the ocean. Subsidence has been occurring with urban growth because of a number of factors, but principally due to groundwater mining. In the oil-rich coastal prairie, where salt domes rose with their captive deposits of petroleum, mining those resources has also removed buoyant supports for the land. Using the historical record in O’Neil and VanSiclen’s 1984 “Gulf Coast Faults” article in the Bulletin of the Association of Engineering Geologists, p. 73-87, the rate of subsidence may be conservatively estimated to drop both land and water table at more than 6” per 7 years recently. In our region much of the soil exhibits low permeability that creates a constant and considerable suction, ensuring that groundwater movements along a declining water table will continue for many years. In a changing climate, higher runoff rates and lower rates of groundwater recharge combine with persistent drought and both soil and surface water evaporative losses to increase downward pressure on urbanized land.

A program to protect freshwater supplies in underground aquifers is attempting to more fully exploit surface water resources. Yet the growth pressures on the Houston metropolitan community are such that it is hard to imagine both surface and deep water resources will not be called upon to satisfy future demand. Unless we stop withdrawing from the dwindling aquifers, no amount of surface water utilization will halt continuing ground subsidence. One look at the abundance of wetland resources recorded in maps of the Houston area around 1983 readily shows that the water table has sunk along with the land. In environmental reviews of federally funded projects we find areas that would have been covered by wetland marshes a generation ago, but now are dry down to depths of six to ten feet. Manicured storm water retention ponds in such areas, often lined with clay bottoms, are the only visible reminder that a water table does exist below the surface. Storm water is treated more as an unwanted alien ready for deportation rather than as a helpful recharger welcomed with respect and care to replenish our thirsty aquifers. Subdivisions continue to be platted and constructed without regard for the natural lines of ridges and flow. Our sense of safety seems enhanced by the receipt of a LMAR that extends congratulations for filling in a part of the floodplain. Moving the waters more swiftly and in greater concentration by artificial barriers and hard channels should ring a warning bell in us when soils are dryer than ever before. Homeowners desperately spray potable water across their plantings and into the gutter in the name of greening the neighborhood, though far off icecaps prepare to slide catastrophically into the sea. Unless we have measurable data that confirms that freshwater withdrawal is lessening, we should not assume that our surface water transportation initiatives have halted subsidence. Our flood control measures should consider the health of aquifers in a freshwater-constrained world.

One final point. In “How we grow” beginning on page 7, the combined threat of hurricane storm surge and sea level rise may already be sufficient to consider all building in elevations below 30 feet during the current development cycle to be temporary in nature. Even as New Orleans, Kemah and Galveston proceed to rebuild, we should know enough at this point to avoid risking hazard insurance on buildings in high risk areas, or at least to require rebuilding to occur on strategically safer and higher ground in other parts of the greater community. A lower limit elevation benchmark for permanent structures should move higher with the passing years to proactively prepare for the possibility of catastrophic ice sheet failure and eventually a general cryospherical collapse. Heavy investment in new hurricane-resistant buildings should consider the need for permanent resilience against rising sea levels. In many cases, the impossibility to secure essential horizontal infrastructure may preclude otherwise well hardened facilities. Historical sites such as JSC in harm’s way are especially troubling.

One resolution to the dilemma between spending good capital to meet green building standards, hardening against hazards and treating all development as temporary in nature is to begin to design all development for eventual disassembly, transport, upcycling and reuse. McDonough and Braungart in Cradle to Cradle (2002) particularly inspire living within the laws of nature.

Postscript:

Thanks for letting me submit these unsolicited comments about the draft. I was excited to see that this project was so well developed, and that Alan Clark was taking a lead planning role. I particularly appreciated the bottom of page 9, items 24 and 25, about providing counties ordinance authority over development in high hazard areas, and partnering to assist climate change planning and adaptation. If the academic participants on the Foresight Panel would care to criticize my own work toward adaptation planning in the Urban Planning-Environmental Policy PhD program at TSU, I truly welcome the opportunity. I am intensely interested in the climate inertias in oceans and icecaps, and whether we can expect them to survive societal inertia.

Sincerely yours,

Paul M. Suckow

Senior Planner

Harris County

Community Services Department

Office of Housing and Community Development

Planning & Development Section

8410 Lantern Point

Houston, TX 77054

713-578-2018

paul.suckow@csd.hctx.net

Appendix:

Due to the high specific heat and low conductivity of water, only the uppermost 10% of the oceans is able to undergo any significant temperature change.

The natural variation in ocean levels is about 10 cm from September to March. By how much does the mean temperature of the upper ocean change during this time?

About 4.5 m per degree C, so 1/45 of a degree, or 0.022 degrees C? wow.

Global warming is likely to cause a rise in sea level for a number of reasons, one of which is the thermal expansion of water. Determine the rise in sea level for every 1.0 C° temperature increase in the upper ocean.


Data for the Oceans
surface area	3.61 × 10¹⁴ m²
mean depth	3794 m
mean temperature, overall	3.5 °C
mean temperature, top 10%	10 °C

10% of 3.61x10^14 sq m x 3794 m = 1369.634 x 10^14 cu m subject to expansion, average temperature 10 degrees C; 12,326.706x10^14 in deep ocean not subject to expansion at 3.15 degrees C; total 13696.34x10^14 cu m at average temperature 3.5 degrees C.

top 10% of ocean	reference sea level (m)
water, solid ice (0 °C)	17.50
water, liquid (1 °C)	(49.47)
water, liquid (2 °C)	(49.47)
water, liquid (3 °C)	(41.01)
water, liquid (3.5 °C)	(36.73)
water, liquid (4 °C)	(32.39)
water, liquid (5 °C)	(31.37)
water, liquid (6 °C)	(29.38)
water, liquid (7 °C)	(26.48)
water, liquid (8 °C)	(21.02)
water, liquid (9 °C)	(4.49)
water, liquid (10 °C)	-
water, liquid (11 °C)	4.51
water, liquid (12 °C)	9.08
water, liquid (13 °C)	13.71
water, liquid (14 °C)	18.38
water, liquid (15°C)	23.12
water, liquid (16 °C)	27.91
water, liquid (17 °C)	32.75
water, liquid (18 °C)	37.66
water, liquid (19 °C)	42.62
water, liquid (20 °C)	47.64
water, liquid (21 °C)	51.74
water, liquid (22 °C)	55.88
water, liquid (23 °C)	60.06
water, liquid (24 °C)	64.28
water, liquid (25 °C)	68.54
water, liquid (26 °C)	72.84
water, liquid (27 °C)	77.18
water, liquid (28 °C)	81.57
water, liquid (29 °C)	85.99
water, liquid (30 °C)	90.46

Coefficients of Thermal Expansion for Selected Materials
material	linear α (10⁻⁶ K⁻¹)	Material	volume β (10⁻⁶ K⁻¹)
aluminium	23.1	alcohol, ethyl	1120
barium ferrite	10	Gasoline	950
brass	20.3	jet fuel, kerosene	990
carbon, diamond	1.18	Mercury	181
carbon, graphite ∥	6.5	water, liquid (1 °C)	−50
carbon, graphite ⊥	0.5	water, liquid (4 °C)	0
chromium	4.9	water, liquid (10 °C)	88
concrete	8 ~ 12	water, liquid (20 °C)	207
copper	16.5	water, liquid (30 °C)	303
germanium	6.1	water, liquid (40 °C)	385
glass	8.5	water, liquid (50 °C)	457
gold	14.2	water, liquid (60 °C)	522
iron	11.8	water, liquid (70 °C)	582
lead	28.9	water, liquid (80 °C)	640
nickel	13.3	water, liquid (90 °C)	695
platinum	8.8
plutonium	54
silicon	4.68
silver	18.9
solder, lead-tin	25
steel, stainless	17.3
steel, structural	12
tin	22
titanium	8.5
tungsten	4.5
uranium	13.9
water, ice (0 °C)	51
zinc	30.2

Solids

ΔL	=	L₀	α	ΔT	linear
ΔA	=	A₀	2α	ΔT	superficial (areal)
ΔL	=	L₀	3α	ΔT	volumetric

Liquids

ΔV = V₀βΔT

Liquids have higher expansivities than solids

β ≈ 10⁻³/K, 3α ≈ 10⁻⁵/K

8 Years, and We Made It!

2008-11-04T21:36:00.000-06:00

44!

We made it through the years of "W". We were not unscathed. In so many ways, we were really, badly hurt. We spent and lost trillions of dollars, into the pockets of those already wealthy, into the profiteers of war, into the desert sands, and in the end, into thin air. In large measure we have lost the dollar itself. We lost the fight to quit war. We lost hundreds of thousands of lives, an important fraction of them my countrymen and women. We lost the moral authority to exert leadership in our shared world. But soon I will be able to abandon that futile search for the first decision of the Bush administration that I can applaud. No need now to despair our losses.

Why?

My Barack. My Barack. My Barack. I like Senator McCain as the most progressive of Republicans. But I love my rightful President Barack Obama. He's my Barack, our Barack, the beacon of hope. He's the closest candidate to realizing the primacy of our energy and environmental policy problems to the survival of civilization and the democratic rule of law. He understands that educational opportunity, rather than resource boundary condition, proscribes the limits of our common future. He's the President of my lifetime closest in age to me and nearest to my experience of life. He's my Barack. President Obama, I am ready to help.

Peter Barnes' Atmospheric Trust initiative

2008-07-19T16:56:00.000-05:00

Peter Barnes' Atmospheric Trust initiative (http://www.earthinc.org/earth_atmospheric_trust.php) to reinvent capitalism as more directly protective of the environmental commons and more directly benefitting the people that inhabit the planet is similar to a trust proposed by myself in "The Lifesaver Manifesto, 1 Jan. 2006" last retrieved at http://linuxboxchatter.livejournal.com/90842.html in July 2008.

Like Barnes I proposed using a financial trust mechanism to aleviate effects of global warming. My proposal differed from Barnes' in that I did not believe in empowering individual "trustees serving long terms and provided with a clear mandate to protect Earth's climate system and atmosphere for the benefit of current and future generations." Instead, I proposed to create a much larger trust answerable to technology-enabled global direct democracy. His may have improved upon mine by including equal transfer payments to all world citizens, though this greatly reduces the working capital of the trust to adapt to and mitigate global warming. I have no idea how to avoid relatives that collect the shares of those recently dead, other than hoping that communities of people police themselves.

I suppose the biggest difference in the proposals, however, was in who made them. I am no corporate titan, sorry folks.

Bush: Russia's new president is 'smart guy'

2008-07-07T12:08:00.000-05:00

One thing about being a "C" president, W, is you know if you been licked. Good thing the American people got your back (after all you are their employee), and not the other way round.

If from Rewards and Fairies (1910, poem written 1895 by Rudyard Kipling, 1865-1936)

2008-06-17T13:00:00.000-05:00

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings,
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!

How God Exists

2008-06-13T17:41:00.000-05:00

God exists as a concept in our mind, not as anything real. The concept of God is less important today than ever before, and will become an increasing liability for society. I wanted to post how I've come to this remarkable conclusion to help heal any harm done to my still-believing relatives and friends, who I love all the same past, present and future.

There are five main reasons I have changed my heart and mind about the existence of God. At least five that I can come up with "off the cuff"…

1. Observation of the lives, interactions and deaths of many creatures, places and planets. Claims that humans are specially endowed with an eternal soul or spirit seem hopeful, but suffer from the problem of self-aggrandizement. Placing our selves central to any thought has been the most common error of our recent civilizations. Breaking out of this source of error has occurred repeatedly, leading to a better understanding and expanded worldview every time. Thinking that we are central to the universe is a normal temptation for sentient beings, leading us to eat, shelter and procreate. But it was wrong when Rome believed what it had conquered was the world (much more was going on than found inclusion in the Mediterranean empire). It is wrong that America believes its power trumps all other people on the planet (see what a little asymmetric, decentralized civil warfare in Iraq has done to that idea). It was wrong when the ideas of Copernicus and Galileo were so dreadfully resisted (discovering the circulation of matter in the universe inside gravitational wells placed humans farther from the "center" with each realization). It was wrong to think that our beautiful living Earth was unique in space and time (look at the dry Martian stream beds, sedimentary rock and ice on Mars; also the dynamic chemical resurfacings that took place on the moon and only 500 years ago over the entire surface of Venus). The ideas of the "Veritas forum” about the improbability of life were simply wrong (life is endemic, the universe is vast and self-similar, and the greater systems of life [Gaia] are self-optimizing, making probabilities of life and its survival much greater that we ever thought possible, though quite possibly farther between outposts). People were wrong to think that human life and actions should be privileged above all other (the result of such human-centric consideration has been the upset of all life on our planet, the 6th extinction). Our common experience of mortality teaches us how important each life is while it yet moves, but are we listening to the silence when living carbon reenters the cycle? Road kill repulses, yet the bloody carcasses provide a definition of dead. The services of a life that has died are mostly a feast for microbiology to recycle the physical materials, nothing more. Death of a person results in no further self-aware consciousness, just as all of the life of a person is organized purely by mental connections in the brains/bodies of the living. The death of a creature that was providing useful environmental, intellectual or cultural services is a sad event, but perhaps less so among the masses of humanity alive today than among the other remnants of large ice-age mammals.

2. Genetic research has opened many wonderful avenues of understanding in the past half-decade. It is fascinating to track the path of human migration from Africa via genetic markers. The human species has survived some amazingly close calls with extinction in the relatively recent past, such as the super-plume eruption 72,000 years ago when only a few thousand breeding pairs survived a six-year global winter, or the collision of the comet fragment over North America which air-burst into fiery death for nearly every creature on the North American continent just 13,000 years ago. But the most amazing discoveries, I think, relate to our existential questions. God, or the feeling that there is God, has been selectively bred into our gene pool much as has been right-handedness. This innate seeming-experience of God is what Pascal called "the divine vacuum" in every person. It is a feeling that has been adaptive for individual’s sense of well-being, creating meaning of what is difficult to understand, and for social control and stability during much of the past. Too often the same feeling of God in the heart of people has occasioned extreme violence (the 30-Years-War, the Crusades, and today in Iraq and Darfur). It is this feeling of the supernatural which gives rise to our speculations about afterlife (ghosts, angels, demons). Knowing the illusion of God in human breasts simply frees us to contemplate the justice of our actions and reactions. Understanding God as a concept shared by most humans and implanted in us by our parents for good allows us to plan for a better future. I think social research into the question of manipulation of society through religious feeling, perhaps expanded to our current civil religion of nationalism, by the political or other elites would be interesting.

3. The weather and climate research. Because global warming is of such concern, with the near possibility of our extinction in the balance, our understanding of Earth Systems is increasing at a rate thought to be impossible to fully comprehend individually, though I am making a valiant effort at least in my own sub-specialty of adaptive panning and environmental policy. The unprecedented floods in Iowa yesterday elicited public headlines petitioning for God's mercy, even as some on the religious right used the death of New Orleans following sixth-strongest-ever Hurricane Katrina to intone God's wrath on Big Easy lifestyles. (Pertinent to reason #2 above, some interesting research is being pursued on about 50 genes that make up the brain's and body's attitude toward sexuality, and transsexuals and other extreme intersex persons are providing the richest window into this mechanism of our makeup.) I have predicted that as disasters multiply in frequency and severity as expected by recent climate science reliance upon the feeling of God will become epidemic. I cry with the people's losses in Chengdu, China, New Orleans, Louisiana and in Rapids City, Iowa, but not to God. We should understand the role that liquid water plays in the tectonic balances in Earth's crust, and when precipitation cycles intensify on a warming planet that still maintains oceans and atmosphere for heat transfer. In a larger sense, the superstitious or supernatural feelings in human hearts are likely to cause miscues that will prevent appropriate vigorous adaptation and mitigation responses to climate change, ironically dooming our species. If for no other reason, human survival (not dominance) is the best reason I know to fight the urgings of that "God-shaped vacuum."

4. Lethal warfare is a reason that the feeling of God should be mistrusted today. I enjoy a contest as much as the next guy, say a Red Wings hockey brawl or Tigers slug-fest or an NFL, NBA or NCAA knockabout. Like most small boys, I once enjoyed the substitutionary ownership of gallant warfare via toy guns and model weaponry. But my experience of war, via unfiltered internet journalism from the front lines, together with the largesse of politicos who heartily embraced war as a diplomatic technique, convinced me in my adult years to "un-learn" our instinct to war. As Dr. Martin Luther (my namesake too, dear Dr.) King, Jr. eloquently reminded us, "A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death," and

"Somehow this madness must cease. We must stop now. I speak as a child of God and brother to the suffering poor of Vietnam. I speak for those whose land is being laid waste, whose homes are being destroyed, whose culture is being subverted. I speak for the poor in America who are paying the double price of smashed hopes at home and death and corruption in Vietnam. I speak as a citizen of the world, for the world as it stands aghast at the path we have taken. I speak as an American to the leaders of my own nation. The great initiative in this war is ours. The initiative to stop it must be ours."

Was not Dr. Martin Luther King a true patriot and benefactor of American ideals? The only appeasement that concerns me now is tacitly supporting those who sell arms to drive the U. S. economy ever higher, but its prestige and moral power ever lower. Lethal weapons have a long and storied history (see what Cain did to Able when some harvests didn't go his way, in the 4th Chapter of Genesis, and yes, I did look that up in my well-marked 1985 Zondervan study bible). You may reply, "But doesn't God condone just warfare, as in the fall of Jericho or the conquest by Israel of its promised land generally?" To the third of our population that considers my bible canonized scripture, and to the other third that goes with Koranic scripture descended from Abraham's other son, I say count the illusion of the existence of God for what it is. Could the Hebrew people so recently released from their Egyptian service have wiped out enough of the prior Palestinian residents unless their leaders resorted to an almighty source of law that forbade worship of their deities and so intermarriage, among many other useful social controls? This is celebrated in every Christian or Jewish calendar. Would Islam become the countervailing force it became if its prophet had been a Jesus-like pacifist, rather than a warring king? I think not. Newspapers reported toward the end of May that the U. S. government has chosen to supply $3 billion worth of new weapons to a subset of Iraqis for "security" purposes, in the name of the defense of my own nation. Please, not in my name! Distrust the feeling of security from lethal weapons as you distrust the human God instinct. The Earth is entering a crisis stage and human beings along with maybe a third to half of all nature a critical gate, through which not all shall pass. If losing to attrition seven of nine billion people appalls you as much as it does me, then advocate global disarmament, not global militarization. Possession of a gun will hasten extermination of those with different beliefs (I must qualify this statement, as death by natural fire, starvation or water deprivation is sometimes not preferred to death from a clean gunshot wound to the brain).

5. The failure of the church itself. If ever there was an unjust war, the second war of George W. Bush was that. It was in the titanic societal struggle that led up to that war that I first openly condemned the church. Regardless of its pro-life stance, no mainstream church was willing to offend any of its membership with clear pronouncements against the open deceit that led to war and the horrible killings that were to follow. Instead, it defended the biblical history of warfare and the disengaged policies of the American church over the past century. The large church I attended upon the eve of war recognized that people of faith could legitimately come down on either side of the question of war. By then the people of the world had largely split from their governments to oppose the war, yet the governments were treating organized state-sponsored murder of thousands as unavoidable. Royal Dutch Shell issued a statement hoping that the war would be short and waste few lives. The cognitive dissonance, when added together with that of creationism, support for the death penalty, disempowerment of women generally, lack of family planning assistance and abolition of Roe v. Wade, simply became too much to handle, and admittedly I snapped. My parents’ usual answer of “Some things are not under our control, and God requires we turn these things over to Him” no longer performed the hand laundry.

All reality we see and partake is formed at every moment from the complex addition of every one’s (and every thing’s) simple actions. It is one reality, though there is no God other than the resultant that Frank Lloyd Wright called "Nature, with a capital N." The Earth’s mountains build as upper mantle convection of a hot-liquid solid pressures colliding crustal plates, and these same folded layers of earth weather when it rains, flowing away stabilized CO2 to be buried under the sea, even as plants germinate in the detritus of their forebears to unlock the storehouse of those minerals buried so long before, to build their mighty cellulose structures, to be fallen, some eventually eaten, eventually by us at the top of Earth’s recent food chain. We each harmonize three trillion cells with the energy released from those same minerals and from that great ocean of ancient oxygen bequeathed us by so many unsung plankton algae a billion years ago. Each of our breaths lasts an average of four seconds, and without replenishing the water that makes up most of our human mind and body, we die within three or four days. We burn slowly but intensely due to the (especially American) layers of fat stored under our skin, though what remains of our teeth can last practically forever, just like the calcium shells of ancient mollusks that crushed together underground for ages provide the layered stone with which we like best to erect our edifices, and we think them lasting. Just four hundred feet under the waves of recent eustatic sea level, the stones of other civilization which may predate the last glacial maximum lie in the tumult of enraged seas newly boiling. Do these ruins of a megalithic goddess culture hold the record of how humans reacted to the three or four times prior that civilization was threatened by catastrophic global fires and floods?

6. This brings me to a sixth point, and though I suspect I could go on, I’ll end here. The unadjusted and immutable textual history, bravado and poetry that Christians and Jews deify as Holy Scripture contains highly amended (Rabbinized) records made consistent to support a belief system that still satisfies about a third of the world’s people. Those who either remain captive to that feeling of God in their heart, or who calculatingly propose to use it or adjust it for their own purposes and/or the greater good, continue to adjust scripture and religious practices to currently relevant purposes. Like glacial and geological processes, this seems to happen very slowly. However, evidence is mounting that the greater environment of life on Earth tends to remain static within the narrow bounds needed by contemporary life-forms for as long as possible, only to change radically and violently to substantially new conditions in a short time period, perhaps a century. Such a shift has occurred in me, knocking me off the God pedestal I occupied since confirmation in the church, spiritual growth through Intervarsity, and the adventure of planting a new church in urban Detroit. The change brought me not to a new understanding of the divine, but a realization that like the economy, the divine is socially and personally constructed for good or ill. Most people simply observe and do not truly use the construct at all, allowing the “invisible hand” free rein; others marshal divine force for curing diseases or launching war. Now is a time we cannot continue as bystanders of the divine. We have multiplied our numbers and effects to the level of a considerable force of nature, and as with Earth, we must now transition to be caretakers and true stewards. Can we steward the Earth or the concept of God itself? In some ways, assuming control of the Earth or the divine is distasteful on the face of it, a blasphemous usurpation of attributes ascribed to God alone. But if we continue to live unaware, according to a divine or invisible hand, we may fail at the end of 13,000 years of human efforts to sustain civilization beyond the natural disasters that attend the end of an ice age, and we truly risk possible extinction as a species. It is time to change our views of God into a belief system we all can live with through horrifying injustice, wars, earthquakes, volcanism, floods, storms and fires just around the bend. This complex result of simply burning too much fuel too fast and not allowing the forests and ocean to remain in place is the hallmark of our remaining lives and those of our children: our current climate crisis. Let us not conflate it with religious and tribal warfare.

Our concepts of God must change. This indeed is why mine has.

Pattern apparent in global warming skepticism

2008-06-13T17:21:00.000-05:00

Just a quick note from the library. While updating my research on adaptation planning and environmental policy, I found the same cast of characters that I thought to have disappeared upon the legit think tanks' pronouncement that the climate change science debate was over (in 2006). AEI (American Enterprise Institute), Heritage Foundation, and other associated right-wing spouts have again polluted the opinion sections of the peer-reviewed literature with their discredited shit. I have little hope that my (Republican) representatives and Senators know enough to completely ignore these purely political hack-jobs as they should. Really I could not believe the sceptics are b-a-a-a-c-k, obviously still funded somehow.

This appearance on the heels of the Senate bill (see previous post) finally clued me in to why we saw the upsurge of such stuff in 2003 (McCain-Lieberman bill appeared, and was defeated) and earlier peaks in deliberate disinformation meant to muddy the public discourse. Each disinformation peak corresponded to some meaningful international or U. S. political action to combat climate change, even as weak as these have been and continue to be. Please, if you hear any contrarian viewpoints, even those offered in jest, please stop laughing and debunk them from the unequivocal literature. For mother nature's sake, do NOT go off repeating them!

Greenhouse gas cap and trade enters U. S. Senate

2008-06-03T01:58:00.000-05:00

"We haven't seen a bill of this import in nearly half a century."

-David Crockett, a representative of the
National Wildlife Federation
(The Oak Ridger, 6/2/08)

I can't help it...

2008-04-23T04:55:00.000-05:00

Thirty-eighth Earth Day and I can't shake the gloom.

This year it's all about Americans celebrating their optimism and can-do attitudes. Everybody wants the Earth to survive, its lifeforms to thrive, to feel in-the-moment alive.

This is a difficult entry for me to submit. I want to play my part. I want to support life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. I want to expand abundantly for everyone the blessings we were born into.

I want to be a part of the solution.

But the weight of the evidence lays against it.

If only each of us would do a little...
Today the President (yes, I've made my peace with the outgoing W, and no longer refer to him as pResident or Shrub or worse) laid out his plans to boost automobile fuel efficiency to today's Chinese standards by 2015, and to 35 mpg by 2020. Nobody is pretending to break the addiction, only to nudge it a little in the right direction, at least to pay lip service to love for life as we know it.

People are still looking up at their star-studded ceilings full of recessed fixtures and waiting for their investment in hundred year old heat-lamp technology to burn out. It is with half anticipation and half dread that they anticipate replacing their light bulbs with compact fluorescents. Who wants to lay out something like $50 for lights, even if CFLs do last 10 times longer, and then have to climb up a precarious ladder to reach overhead and make the changes? Plus we just can't stand throwing away a perfectly good incadescent bulb that still lights, and we HATE waiting in the dark until they're cool enough to touch.

Facts are that the carbon cycle plays a zero-sum game. Conservative science that all of us worldwide can agree with says we can afford at most another 400 MT emitted. James Hansen hints that due to scientific reticence to acknowledge the sum of feedbacks evident from paleoclimate science such a figure may be overstated.

The oil that we might still access amounts to more than that, if you assume that some of the craziness to extract petroleum from oil sands will occur as the post-peak supply dwindles. Of course there is also 300 MT in the natural gas we almost certainly will burn and unbelievable amounts, over 3800 MT, in the coal that the US and China are likely to turn toward. Triggering runaway climate change seems almost to take the aire of inevitability.

Barack Obama claims WI victory before 19,000 in Houston. And we were there...

2008-02-22T13:57:00.001-06:00

Just got the new laptop! Excellent!

2008-02-22T01:20:00.001-06:00

Thanks to GenTech of Covina, CA for tremendous service and providing a first class ASUS computer. I'm very happy, right out of the box. I recommend GenTech to anyone who needs a good build on a fast computer. This will provide a useful platform for my mobile GIS analysis/training business.

Human Impacts on Oceans

2008-02-18T08:19:00.000-06:00

The map shows how human activities have already impacted the oceans, and where the damages are the most important– in dark brown. (Credit: Ben Halpern, National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis at the University of California at Santa Barbara) Here is a link to a larger version of this map. And here is a link where you could learn how this map was created. It even includes a short movie.

Barack Obama 08! Hillary for VP!

2008-02-12T10:48:00.000-06:00

The linked US News and WR editorial by Bonnie Erbe promoted the idea of a compromise between Clinton and Obama, with Barack yielding to Hillary based simply on age considerations. Frankly, the work of the next term through 2012 looks so grim that we will definitely need all hands on deck.

But from a practical standpoint, I think deploying Hillary as the lead dog may not be the wisest move. She will only be 68 when we ask her to become President in 2016, not an unheard-of age (see John McCain). Deploying her vaunted political ability to rebound during a season when the nation and the world are clamboring for change and uniting toward a reversal of recent American policies would be foolish. Let our inspiring leader Barack Obama take us through that part of the journey, with Hillary to follow on, to carry consistent policies of greater wisdom forward through sixteen years. Geesh, even 16 years sounds so short-term considering the quagmires in which we now seem bogged down - the Iraq and Afghanistan occupations, deeply structural socioeconomic problems and global warming.

From a practical standpoint, I believe Hillary's skills will be more needed in the long haul, when the inevitable pendulum of US politics begins to "swing south" again and voices rise harshly against the efforts and sacrifices that under the reassuring hand and clear voice of President Obama Americans graciously began to attain.

Additionally, positioning a person more reprehensible in the eyes of the political opposition than the Presidential candidate for the VP slot has a history of its own. Traditionally, this arrangement has allowed the candidate for President to keep above the fray while the VP candidate plays "bad cop" during the campaign.

In my opinion, at times the only thing that stood between President George W. Bush's life and his assasination during these past two terms has been the even grizzlier prospect of a President Dick Cheney in the Oval Office. Especially because of this nation's bloody history, I believe that the first Black President could and probably should employ VP Hillary Clinton as a similar shield against his own assasination (may NEVER such tragedy visit our republic again).

During a historically difficult but successful Obama Presidency her more divisive rep would be given time to heal before a Clinton again takes the reigns, finally as the first woman to rise to the Presidency. As most Americans, I feel that any of the remaining candidates could adequately fill the office of the chief executive. To reach beyond adequacy toward lasting greatness, I simply suggest that we take the longer view and deploy these most valuable human resources strategically. This would be in the best interest of the people which are our nation, all societies of Earth and indeed of all life as we know it. I am ready to work hard for this goal.

Barack Obama - Hillary Clinton '08!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas?

2007-12-17T07:29:00.000-06:00

Just before sunrise, I went outside to check on something inside our automobile, and saw a covering of frost: the second such morning of the season. Here in Houston, we do dip below the freezing point every once in a while.

But I had better store these good times in the frosty air to memory, based on the latest comments of James E. Hansen, the NASA climatologist. According to Jim, the US climate is being influenced by a "solar low" in the 13-year solar output cycle, as well as by a pronounced La Nina, when the cold end of the Pacific Ocean sloshes up to the west coast. Despite these influences, 2007 is shaping up to be the second hottest year in the history of recorded measurements.

This fact illustrates how far human control of the climate has already overridden the natural system, even without the feedbacks that will greatly increase the effects of global warming as ice and tundra melt and sea life dies and forests burn.

Projecting the solar and Pacific meridonal overturn cycles forward (red is hot, blue is cold):
123456789012312345678901231234567890123123456789012312 Solar cycle
123451234512345123412341234123412341234123412341234123 El Nino cycle (this can vary however)

222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222 Year
00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000
0001111111111 22222222223333333333444444444455555555556
789012345678901234567890123456789012345678901234567890

All else the same, that is, without catastrophic changes due to nonlinear effects like the loss of grounded ice sheets or large species blooms/extinctions, it looks like 2014-2015 and 2039-2040 will show the enhanced heat effects of global warming well, and 2052 may become a heat crisis like none other. These dates are approximate primarily because of the variations in El Nino-La Nina, which I've assumed to average five years shortening to four years periodicity in the above analysis.

Regardless, it seems clear that natural variation will enhance our experience of global warming shortly after 2012, and then produce a long lag during which we must not become complacent. These natural variations will become pronounced again after 2040, when global heat shall have increased exponentially and temperatures will have responded in full to today's greenhouse gas increases.

Please note that the above is not intended to scare people or dissuade our efforts toward mitigation. On a happy note, I think my field of inquiry has finally received a name: adaptation planning!

Passive Solar Tower Power

2007-11-12T23:39:00.000-06:00

Tonight, I watched a pretty good cable program on the History Channel, "Environmental Tech II." It was billed as discussing inventions with potential "for holding off...global warming" and though I haven't run numbers to allow comment on that claim, I did find one statistic interesting.

A solar tower concept proven in eco-friendly Spain during the 1980s was nothing more than a big greenhouse of plastic sheeting surrounding the base of a giant chimney, allowing air to be drawn in at the margin of the plastic roof, be heated by the sun, and drawn up the 430 foot wide concrete pipe to be emitted a kilometer up in the sky. In reviewing the proposed EnviroMission supersized 200-mW solar tower, the television show stated that 620 similarly sized towers could power the electrical needs of all US households. The cost of the first such tower in Australia was reportedly expected at 700 million US Dollars.

$0.700 billion x 620 towers = $434 billion.

So, once again, for less than the cost to date of the second, and completely unnecessary or even ruinous Iraq war, according to this show's assertions America with available and rather low technology could have already freed its homes completely from dependence on fossil fuels for electrical generation.

Can this be true or is this another over hyped claim typical of these kind of popular programs?

Let's see, 200MW x 620 = 124 gW of power. This is similar to the EIA figure of 122,471,071 end customers in the 2006 residential sector, but they directly consumed 1,351,520.036 gigaWatthours of electricity that year.

So average US residential end user electric billpayers consumed 1,351,520.036 *1,000,000 / 122,471,071 = 11044.441 kWh per year = 920.370 kWh per monthly bill.

And 1,351,520.036 / (365.25 days * 24 hrs) = 154.177508 gW of net internal demand which we must increase by the 16.1% overhead of marginal capacity in 2006. The actual figure in 2006 of electrical capacity claimed by the residential sector in the US may then be stated as 179.0002 gW, equivalent to 895 big solar towers, costing $626,500,618,758.

Hmmph, still less than the cost through 2007 of the Iraq war! And the money would have been spent over here on good jobs like cement and steel construction, and thereafter tourism and commerce...imagine architecturally what could be hung at the top of those gigantic towers! Oh the unimaginable blast of music an organ could produce with only a small siphon of the slipstream ascending! That's the kind of world I'd really be excited to help create!

Gmail - 06. Lee Handing Out Treats 6.JPG

2007-11-02T08:46:00.000-05:00

Gmail - 06. Lee Handing Out Treats 6.JPG

Above is a photo from Halloween night showing my Dad acting silly in a wig and passing out candy from his garage to the neighborhood kids 31 Oct. 2007. Trick or treat!

My own neighborhood was dark that night...we were the only house with a light on. I guess kids here don't feel safe to go house to house anymore, and that's too bad. We had a basket full of candy ready for them, which we have no business eating up ourselves. (P.S. I just snuck a Starburst...yum, yum.)

Note to self

2007-10-23T13:26:00.000-05:00

We may have lost Fallbrook/Escondito/San Diego/Los Angeles, California. The relative humidity in southern CA is lower than that of kiln-dried wood products. Fires ring the cities. http://cdfdata.fire.ca.gov/incidents/incidents_current appears overwhelmed.

Where are the people to go? Let no one stray less than a day away from a sufficient source of fresh and healthy water. Let no one suffer more than three days without food. Keep shielded from too much sunlight and in hygenic conditions to avoid disease.

What are the evacuation options for these areas? Can we get people out of state to unaffected areas? How do we safely secure the fire area while the storm still burns? Need I ask why the U.S. military remains concentrated in Iraq?

Should not all US major metropolitan areas, and maybe Mexican and Canadian cities too, be preparing large civic hostelry/sustainance installations in unused sports domes such as the Superdome and the Astrodome were used during and after the 2005 Hurricanes? From these, we must organize orderly distributions of the environmental refugees to piggyback with safe/stable volunteer households as quickly as possible for the duration of the emergency. Let's roll, people.

An Urban Manifesto 2

2007-10-23T11:22:00.000-05:00

1) Bring light industry back to the center

Creative economies are all fine and good but they have to make things too. Cities that depend on big brands to keep their economies humming should create conditions that encourage more ateliers and workshops in employment centers. Stockholm might want to think about this to keep H&M competitive.

2) Engineer a round-the-clock culture

We're convinced a city as big as Tokyo keeps its streets safe because it never sleeps. Yes, well-behaved residents have a lot to do with it but life on the streets also keeps more deviant forces in check.

3) Appoint a creative director

Cities now suffer from commoditization, particularly as corporate components have consolidated to multinationals. Branding is the antidote. All strong brands have a creative director with a strong vision. Cities need them too. And no, they're not called mayors.

4) Make outdoor space a right

All new residential buildings should offer outdoor space for residents. Perhaps this should be expanded to include all buildings: Where possible, older buildings should be retro-fitted with balconies or roof terraces. This might help curtail development in locations that require massive technological intervention to make them habitable by humans, and provide a natural check against polluters.

5) Focus on building urban villages

Urban villages not only keep people out of cars but they also create a sense of community and in many cases encourage small businesses to flourish.

This is modified/excerpted from issue five of Monocle magazine.

These 5 urban design points are right on. I will hang onto these for future work... now, how can we integrate them with McDonough & Braungart's (2002) suggestions from cradle to cradle?

A. waste equals food (nutrient flow cycles and biological consumption etc. end the concept of waste);

B. respect diversity and promote abundance (thrivation in interdependent relationships with intermeshed needs and desires, enhanced ways to connect, use local materials/talent, live within diverse and renewing natural energy flows like the wind, the discipline of solar income & budgeting, creating living machines); and

C: promote eco-effectiveness (living like/with nature instead of against it, following five steps: 1. get free of known culprits like toxins and carcinogenics, 2. act on informed personal preferences, often before the definitive data come in, assigning priority to eco-intelligence, respect, delight, celebration, fun, 3. create a passive positive list, evaluating components for the X-list and phaseout, the gray list of unavoidable horrors, or the P-list of preferred positives, 4. activate the positives, begin the process of substituting the better for the worse, stop trying to be less bad and start figuring out how to be good, 5. reinvent and recast our systems to require less bad and more good, think systemic change without limits, and guided by five principles: 1. signal your intentions, by committing to a new paradigm, not just extending modifications to the old, 2. restore, planting "seeds" everywhere you can, 3. be ready to innovate further, "feedforward," open yourself to signals from elsewhere, 4. understand and prepare for the learning curve, as it will take something "extra" to get us to the next steps, and 5. exert intergenerational responsibility, for the earth belongs to the living rather than the dead).

The excellent Monocle magazine article in June above requires an excellent response...

I think the real challenges lie in getting the masses to support public policies that make the necessary fundamental and by now quite radical changes needed to sustain life as we know it through the constrictions just ahead into a better era of real thriving glory.

With admiration,
Paul M. Suckow,
Urban Planning-Environmental Policy
832-231-8373
suckow@hotmail.com
http://paulsuckow.tripod.com/

To my representatives in the Congress

2007-10-17T12:54:00.000-05:00

I timed it - the President received 22 seconds of applause from you during this year's State of the Union address when he mentioned climate change. But what did he suggest? That congress do nothing, that nascent technologies will solve the problem for us. Yet we know from the 18% rise in US greenhouse gasses since 1990 that voluntary solutions will not work (also see Tragedy of the Commons by Garrett Hardin, in Science 1968 or look up http://www.econlib.org/Library/Enc/TragedyoftheCommons.html). Just a further 18% increase above present, an overall 62% increase from the start of the industrial age, and CO2 will tip through the 450 ppm that Dr. James Hansen called Dangerous Human-Made Interference with Climate (370 kB PDF) before Congress in April.

I've written to my senators and reps about this before and received form letters reitterating our failed executive's non-policies. Insufficient. Global warming is the most serious environmental threat facing humanity's fitness for the planet today. Yet, with just weeks left in the legislative calendar this year, Congress has not yet scheduled a vote to cap and reduce America's global warming pollution. If we cannot even record a vote on principle, how will America accomplish this in reality?

Everyone in the world agrees: We must cap emissions at today's levels and then work to reduce them by 30% by the end of the century (Source: http://www.unfoundation.org/media_center/press/2007/pr_22707.asp). This is a tall order, and becomes tougher with each passing day. Even as Congress continues to work towards final passage of energy legislation containing a "down payment" on global warming, Congress must also move forward with legislation to cut emissions of global warming pollutants. This must not be a token effort, unless you are in agreement to consign all humanity and life as we know it to the dustbin of evolutionary history.

As a concerned citizen, and PhD candidate in environmental policy at Texas Southern University, I urge you to do everything in your power to get a bill to the floor in both the Senate and the House this year that at least meets these four criteria:

- Set a hard cap on global warming pollution at current levels and a concrete timetable for reduction to 30% less (or lower, to the extent you think we cannot trust China, India, Indonesia, Argentina or Brazil to meet their global obligations) by 2100;

- Ensure all forms of global warming pollution are covered. To me this includes of course ALL the carbon-containing greenhouse gasses, but also rapacious land use and interlocking systems of suburban-style urban development, and congressional support for the continued existence of enhanced greenhouse producing industries and practices: coal, petroleum, natural gas, automobiles, airlines, pleasurecraft, need I continue? I am not callous: I trust that those with vested interests will enforce proper decommissioning of their industries, ie. plant disassembly and reuse, retraining and redeployment of their workforces in the transition to solar power, etc. (What if we simply turned each subsidy into an equity purchase to hasten transition?);

- Set new standards for environmentally sound cellulosic ethanol from agricultural wastes and other biofuels ie. from food waste: in fact we must eliminate the very concept of waste and turn every former waste stream into a nutrient cycle (see Cradle to Cradle by William McDonnough & Michael Braungart, 2002); and

- Foster real market competition for next generation energy sources, all of which MUST be constrained to humankind's "solar budget": Texas is a great example of this, as wind power generation capacity has topped California's already by 2006 based simply on the consumer demand in the deregulated market enabled by Green Mountain Energy Company (Austin: http://www.greenmountain.com/), though yet far from contributing a significant share of TX grid system power (1 - 2%).

With only weeks left in the legislative calendar, there is no time to lose. You may not have time to pass a law this year, but you must do more to mark up legislation and prepare for floor action.
We have put off the inevitable for too long. We must get global warming policy right and we must do it now. I am with you on this, so don't hesitate to call on me if you need anything (if you like, more writing on this topic can be found by "boxchatter": The Bitter Truth at http://paulsuckow.blogspot.com/2007/09/bitter-truth.html#links.

Heartfelt thanks to you and your staffs for the many difficult and unthankful tasks you are undoubtedly attending to as my representative in the U.S. government. Sincerely, -Paul

impeachment message for my congressional representatives

2007-10-16T15:59:00.000-05:00

Please, even you must be aware that the nation's executive has been acting against the laws of our land duly passed by Congress, established constitutionally, or made by international agreement, whether by wiretap, torture or wars of aggrandizement and aggression. Can you not call the administration to account?

The previous President was tried for impeachment based on no high crime violation of any law, only based on embarrasing personal activities. What should you do when a President is in fact an untried felon, has lied and led his administration to lie repeatedly about matters of gravest threat to national security, such as war and climate change?

If this administration's shortcomings cost not just the forfeit of trillions of US dollars, lives of thousands of US citizens, and the USA's moral world leadership that we have already suffered, but also increasingly the end of births, the slow and painful death of liberty and (this is not hyperbola) life as we know it, is it not reason enough to try President Bush and Vice President Cheney for impeachment according to the U.S. Constitution? When will we have had enough of these dreadful years?

Signs, signs

2007-10-04T16:26:00.000-05:00

I couldn't agree more. This is an advertisement for blogs available from the local newspaper website. The picture was taken at the basement entrance to the Houston Chronicle building from the underground tunnel system. The handgun sign provides a stark reminder that even in the tunnels, the people of Texas may be armed.

The Bitter Truth

2007-09-27T11:31:00.001-05:00

Voluntary measures allowing polluters to set their own goals for the global atmospheric commons are not sufficient - and will not work.

What we MUST volunteer are mandatory, mutually coerced limits on greenhouse gas emissions, which ratchet down on a set schedule to keep the earth below 450 ppm CO2. This means a cap on global emissions at current levels and then a reduction to 30% by 2100, with less to follow. (Source: http://www.unfoundation.org/media_center/press/2007/pr_22707.asp) Believe me, the effects of only 70 more ppm greenhouse gas (an 18% increase above present, and overall 62% increase from the start of the industrial age) will be thorny and costly enough. Remember, natural variation during the time since the last great flood 8450 y.b.p. was always within 5 ppm of 278 ppm CO2.

Any more than .5 degrees Celsius heat to the atmosphere from additional enhancement of the greenhouse effect (since .8 degrees was added already, plus about another degree rise input but not yet responding), and we will be in very serious trouble from uncontrollable natural positive feedbacks. Even if we meet the stringent 450 ppm limit, we're talking temperatures in Houston well over 100 degrees Fahrenheit all summer long and 18% stronger storms blowing in from the Gulf before 2100, with those pesky feedbacks enhancing conditions ever stronger with each decade through the centuries beyond. How do you like THAT present for your kids?

In this late hour, the idea of working out the ROI, with decommissioning and workforce redeployment costs included, on a global coal industry buyout at first blush seems attractive. Yet, the only thing holding off the fully enhanced greenhouse effect right now are the aerosol pollutants high in the sky. The year after THESE clear up, either through transition to cleaner power sources or because of industrial collapse, the earth will receive its first taste of full-on global warming. I hate to say it, but we'd better pace ourselves in the reduction of small particulates and categorical pollutants, yet we must turn the carbon off!

Or does anyone out there know how to reliably trigger controlled major volcanic episodes every two years as needed?

An Atheist Benediction

2007-09-01T13:49:00.000-05:00

May the good Earth bless and keep you,
May the sun shine on you and be gracious to you,
May we live together in peace all the days of our life.

On the purported false claim of Bosnian pyramids

2007-08-27T15:19:00.000-05:00

On the purported false claim of Bosnian pyramids:

Let the stone speak for itself. Applying the existing body of scientific knowledge to the investigation might in turn be helpful, or could in fact hinder correct interpretation.

It seems logical to me to conduct a professional physical investigation if the initial evidence seems promising. If the construction proves extensively human-shaped, evidence will exist in most places on all sides, but might be especially pronounced on the east side, sheltered from prevailing winds and rains. Such a monumental construction may then be supposed to predate the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM), at least 25.5 thousand y.b.p., perhaps even belonging to an earlier interglacial over 100 thousand y.b.p. I say “human-shaped” because such a large structure, if it was made by humans, would more likely have been carved by megalithic carvers from the living stone of a suitable set of mountains, and then perhaps dressed, rather than built in the well-known Giza fashion from transported stones.

If enough time has passed since construction, especially if it had weathered more than one ice age, isostatic settlement of the crust, perhaps even tectonic settlement back into the crust and erosion of the sides might have been hugely significant by now. The small photos and TV images I have seen appear to show a fine central pyramid shape surrounded by hillside almost again as tall as the ‘pyramid’ at a much lower angle of repose. Also, the alignment with cardinal points is noted for all megalithic monumental constructions. The age of the Gigantija temple on Malta, for instance, may be betrayed by its alignment with a north pole from long before the current geographic north precessed to its current location. Do the sides of the purported pyramid point in exactly the same or a similar direction in the summer solstice as Maltese temples or Stonehenge? Finally, should not the depth of soil overburdern indicate something about the age since the surface below was last exposed? How long would it have taken to build up a few feet of undisturbed soil on the type of rock located below given post-LGM forest growth rates?

I cannot agree with the archaeological mainstream that it is self-evident that no civilization interested in and sufficient for constructing monumental structures ever existed in the Balkan region, only that evidence of such is likely to be impossible to locate with the passage of at least one ice age and its progressive meltdown outburst floods. If the constructions being uncovered are of human origin, as some early descriptions of compact blocks (as surviving dressing or under dressing?) could excite us to consider, then dating the age of a dressing should be fairly simple to obtain from organic evidence trapped in the seams between undisturbed blocks and foundation materials. It seems likely that a shred of something, if not entire pigeon poops, might have left at least microscopic evidence of the period of construction. If the 'pyramid' is shown to be of human construction AND predates reliable radiocarbon dating of any trace remains, then we really do have something amazing on our hands (over 40,000 years old!).

–Paul Suckow, 8/27/2007.

References:
Lepper, Bradley T. (2006) Discovery of pyramid in Mexico tempered by false claim in Balkans. The Columbus Dispatch. May 9. Last retrieved 27 Aug. 2007 from the World Wide Web: http://www.columbusdispatch.com/live/contentbe/dispatch/2006/05/09/20060509-D7-02.html

Rose, Mark. (2006). The Bosnia-Atlantis Connection. Archaeology. April 27 Online Feature. Last retrieved 27 Aug. 2007 from the World Wide Web: http://www.archaeology.org/online/features/osmanagic/index.html.

Rose, Mark. (2006). Bosnian 'Pyramids' Update. Archaeology. June 27 Online Feature. Last retrieved 27 Aug. 2007 from the World Wide Web: http://www.archaeology.org/online/features/osmanagic/update.html.

2007-08-23T11:09:00.000-05:00

Hummingbird at the San Diego Zoo

Carnage

2007-08-23T10:19:00.000-05:00

Why do cats like to catch and kill bugs, or, more accurately, "play with bugs until they die"? They do not require them for their diet, so it seems to contradict the law of the jungle that states "only kill what you need to survive."

2007-08-14T09:10:00.000-05:00

In my sister's last email, she complained about the lack of focus in the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod upon the mission of building up the church. She mentioned the defensive nature of church "turf wars" cannibalizing "sheep" vs. her desire for a shared activism in support of church planting and expansion. Her concerns mirrored the broader debate spurred by "creation care" conservationists vs. James Dobson and his ilk of social reactionaries within the evangelical and mainstream churches generally about the nature of the mission of the Christian Church. True to my "interfaith" outlook, I tried to contribute further expansion of her world view by this response:

"Nice 2 hear from you Diana. There are usually political problems in every earthly organization, but it seems especially in the churches/mosques/temples that are the descendants of the second urban revolution in Ur and its sister cities of 4000 BC. That's the time in Sumeria when "the power to control and shape everyday life in and around the city and the associated spatial practices of phronesis and citybuilding became much more highly concentrated, centralized, and male-dominated" (Soja 2000, 56) - I'm reading his book Postmetropolis for part of my dissertation.

The Soja book is leaving untreated the ice-age cities of (as far as we can tell) the first urban revolution lost at least since 8450 y.b.p. under over 300 feet of seawater - see "Noah." :) I think those ancient cities' remains are the only place we may find historical guidance for how the doomed civilizations then treated their residents as the days of the floods approached - did their rulers tell the common hunters, gatherers and traders of the approaching danger, did they cry out to their goddesses, or did they decide to let society continue unawares, send seed populations to the highest Himalayas and simply hope for the best?

So far in my reading of the literature, no inscriptions or documents have been recovered from the many underwater megalithic ruins located so far. True, they tend to be over ten thousand years old, yet they have stood underwater until crumbling badly in only the past decade due to turbidity from global warming. I hope science occurs in time to find some clues that inform climate change public policy before deadlines are up in the next few years, and it sure would be exciting to become a part of the search!

Should we put a moratorium on all new coal plant construction immediately, or allow society to continue on various capitalist paths to oblivion for life on earth as we knew it? Certainly, the US cannot influence China without making that decision for itself. And without China's cooperation, the sixth great extinction is sure to be set into irretrievable motion within a decade. For me it is so painful to watch the "sheep" of our population pass by every day without awareness of actions needed to preserve our species and similar complex animals.

Sorry to sound cliche in doom saying, but reality is truly that gritty, even as we enjoy our wonderful "new" 1960 house in Houston! Having learned from the prophet Jonah, I promise that if mammalian and deciduous forest life should come to be spared, then I will sit under a leafy tree and rejoice, not sulk.

Love to you all, -Paul"

Insights and Quotes from Andres Duany

2007-06-28T19:03:00.000-05:00

Insights and Quotes from Andres Duany
from speech to the Houston MFA on 6/26/2007

Bureaucracy can only slow down what a city does not want. It can do nothing to speed what it wants for this is a function of liquid capital.
The traditional neighborhood is preferred for daily life across time and cultures.
New Urbanism seeks to level the playing field and let the market decide.
Houston as a freeway city is profoundly unfair to the ~50% of residents who are too young, too poor or too old to drive. Vehicle ownership sucks $9,000 per year [(AAA 3/26/2007 quotes $0.52 per mile for new vehicles)] away from alternative opportunities.
The US, and especially Houston, TX are so privileged that it could afford both horizontal and vertical infrastructure. Now as America becomes relatively poorer, horizontal infrastructure rules out the vertical.
Additional horizontal infrastructure (streets, pipes, wires, low density buildings) is fruitless for the improvement of quality of life. A premier road-building planner of the past century, Robert Moses, found out that the more road capacity he installed, the greater the traffic that filled it in a self-reinforcing cycle named the Induced Traffic principle.
Quality of life is not the same thing as standard of living.
A definition of quality of life: The amount of uncommitted time and money people enjoy to interact with chosen others.
"Houston is a city unassembled."
A plan is like a template. You must push something through it. Houston has the material to push through, but has not yet formed the template.
Houston may have one generation of economic energy left. We should make a plan and do something lasting with that energy.
Europe is the only region of the world that is designing the intelligent cities that will win the 21st century.
China is unfortunately following in the footsteps of the USA. "Horrible US consultants are producing horrid development."
The USA is finding that suburban sprawl is extremely hard to retrofit for improved quality of life, because suburban development is a discreet, concrete, interlocking and self-reinforcing system.
Every city, including Houston, is competing with every other in the world. It takes strenuous thought, coordinated planning and hard work to compete effectively.
Remember the scope of city-building: Architecture looks to five-year increments, urban planning uses a 25-year horizon, and the urban built environment generally remains a minimum of fifty years. Why not do it right?
Houston is defaulting to private government at the least level. This inaction creates a low-boil monocultural lifestyle segregated by neighborhood association.
The car has allowed people to sort to an extremely fine grain, for segregation is the natural condition.
"We need an administration of the greatest diversity instead of the least cost."
Slim (1 page), specific, outcome oriented codes are needed in Houston.
Houston has little or no barrier of cumbersome preexisting code to overcome.
"We must code for diversity."
The "transect" offers five levels of density tied to the environment into which they are built, allowing choice and diversity within an overall well-structured environment.
"It all started with the fake shutter." We need functional coded in, and fake removed. Andres mentioned LEED ND may result in a de facto code for sustainable urban design.
Compact, walkable communities only become expensive when there is a lack of supply for the existing demand.
A cycle of gentrification always happens over a period of about a decade:
Risk Oblivious move into an overlooked area that needs a little work. The urban pioneers have arrived.
Risk Aware move into the coolness under the umbrella of a developer. The early adopters have arrived.
Risk Averse people follow the crowd. The gentry have arrived.
From a planning perspective, once through the period of gentrification, a development becomes a regular functioning part of the built environment.
No city is stable. It's either getting better or getting worse at all times.
People build a city.
We must wake up every morning and ask ourselves, "Well, what am I going to do now?"
What if this generation woke up in Houston and decided to plan a city for keeps?

Are you thinking, "Woe is me" or "What to do"?

2007-03-19T10:48:00.000-05:00

I just got off the phone with my congressman's office where the Housing Staffer was more interested in finding out where I get my inside news about House Resolutions and Amendments than about my issue of continuing Katrina/Rita homeless population (about 60,000 people by one count). Arch-right congresspeople go with the territory here in Texas during this decade, thanks to discredited denizens like Tom Delay. Yet I'd expect that representing literally millions of people who are subject over the next 40 years to a fate similar to those of New Orleans should soften hearts just a little, perhaps. For the sake of the displaced, as an advocate planner for all, including the poor in our nation, I HAVE to do something! So I call my congressman to let my opinion be known.

Plus, the entire city in which I live, Bellaire, TX, USA, is within the floodplain going forward. Hurricane mitigation/global warming mitigation go hand in hand all around the Gulf of Mexico, yet our U.S. government remains mired in the disaster/response/recovery/next disaster funding model. I hope my dissertation can play a part in the change to preventative measures that will save lives and homes and extend the health of the grand old US Dollar a little further into the future.

Is Houston Over?

2007-03-18T07:15:00.000-05:00

Reports that Halliburton is divesting from Houston's KBR (yet retaining a controlling majority interest in its affairs) and leaving town for Dubai are disconcerting. This is the shot over the bow to the Houston petrochemical industry, and I hope it is listening. It is also a signal to the US that it has indeed lost its primacy to too-powerful multinational corporations, and I hope we are listening.

I think Halliburton's is a brash, bald move to consolidate its hold on war profiteering and oil/energy/destruction/rebuilding services in the too-literally "booming" oil products center of the middle east, further reduce its overhead and labor costs, and attempt to escape just environmental laws, taxation and litigation. I don't like the Halliburtons of our world getting away with murder any more than I like the idea of Dick Cheney holding a firearm.

Source: http://www.halliburton.com/default/main/halliburton/eng/news/source_files/news.jsp?newsurl=/default/main/halliburton/eng/news/source_files/press_release/2007/corpnws_031107.html

State of the Union 2007

2007-01-23T22:37:00.000-06:00

Thank you, Mr. President, for not mentioning 9-11 directly until after you talked about:

planning to balance the federal budget by cutting non-war programs within the ten years since you lost control of government spending in 2002,

lip service to alternative energy,

reducing oil use by 20% (over ten years?!),

increasing CAFE standards to save about 10% of oil use (over 10 years?),

and some unspecified assistance for medical IT (huh?),

and these among the tired Republican sawhorses about:
staying on the offensive and pressing on in Iraq,
yet another "defining hour,"
growing the economy and building national prosperity,
increasing domestic oil production and increasing ethynol use times five,
privatization of health insurance,
limiting the patient's right to sue,
additional teaching to the test,
school vouchers,
quickly approving your reactionary choices for federal judges,
and an end to southern immigration, turning most spanish speakers into temporary workers who will cycle in and again out of our country
to labor for us, never enjoying the benefits of citizenship. Hmm, what other people of color does that bring to mind?

But then, fifteen minutes through tonight's speech, though not before 2 indirect references to terrorists and the war, we heard:

--<8 SECONDS APPLAUSE>--
"America's on the verge of technological breakthroughs that will enable us to live our lives less dependant on oil."
"And these technologies will help us be better stewards of the environment."
"And they will help us confront the serious challenge of global climate change."
--<22 SECONDS APPLAUSE>--

Mr. President, just how dumb do you think the American people are?

I believe they'll see through the empty applause line more quickly than their representatives did. You have clearly pointed up the lack of any government commitment toward reduction of the ravages of global warming: future Katrinas, future heat waves that exceed the capacity of our airconditioners, future lack of drinking water for hundreds of millions of people, future pandemics that weaken and kill, future extinctions that simply do not need to happen.

And to all that talk of war and the engaging the enemy on (their Holy) foreign soil and military expansion and troop increases and doubling the strategic oil reserve and threats against Iran and war stories about the war dead and sacrifices of American soldiers, I say,

Do not forget whose idea was this whole $670 billion war thing, Mr. Bush.

Do not forget who invaded a sovereign territory against the will of nearly the entire world, Mr. Bush.

Do not forget who started the Iraq war in a nation that despite reeling from a decade of U.S. sanctions was hostile toward terrorism and had completely forsworn weapons of mass destruction, Mr. Bush.

Ah, The War...that's you all over, Mr. Bush. :(
I wish you would not have felt compelled to devote more than half your report on our state to promoting your war. Really, it seems not our future you are concerned with, as much as your own.

As a small consolation, it was nice to sit through a Presidential speech without getting an earful about the evils of abortion or gay marriage.

Um, what are shoreless ambitions? And in your final speech, whenever that may be, Mr. Bush, please, please, just for me, please say the word as it is spelled:
"NUC-LE-AR." Good God, Y'all, best of luck blessing yourselves!

Dear Mr. President,

2007-01-10T21:31:00.000-06:00

I don't for a moment believe that you will listen to me any more than the millions more powerful than I that are near tears in frustration with your executive rule.

I listened as fairly as I could as you spoke tonight. Twice. Thank you for your attempt to appear humble. We cringed like crazy when you continued to try to link your war of choice with your war on terror. Really, reminding us of 9-11, again, was just in bad taste. It is not obvious to us that every terror-minded being has been distracted into the fight in the Anbar neighborhood of Baghdad.

We, the people, still don't honestly understand why you decided to invade then occupy Iraq four years ago. One would think it would be clear to us by now. And where do these next 21,000 fresh troops come from? Wouldn't they be predominantly involved in the bloodiest house-to-house street fighting since the last world war? Doubling our combat force to me means doubling the killing in Iraq and doubling our casualties. Do we have twenty-one thousand extra plus twenty-odd thousand tired fighters trained, willing and able to carry out this clear-and-hold urban warfare strategy?

I am still so angry, frustrated, and aghast that you allowed this war to start in the first place. You have redirected my future taxes toward funding death and destruction, about half of which may have already occurred. That's dumber than stupid, in my book. I cannot unstick that responsibility (and all of the blood that followed) from your and Dick Cheney's shoulders. This world did not deserve what it has received from America through you, and more than Iraqi people are spitting mad about it. It is a greater shame than you can possibly acknowledge with your words tonight.

You'll disparage my words tonight as pessimistic or defeatist. I am not. I, like almost all American people, believe that we maintain realistic hope and personal responsibility for creating an *acceptable* global future. Before 2001, I might have written *exciting*...you have definitely worn me down, Mr. Bush. But still I seek a better outcome than that we are headed toward.

I might have been encouraged if you had outlined a temporary escalation for force protection while we withdraw ourselves and I would hope at least one side from the civil war we unfortunately caused. We house about a quarter million former South Vietnamese here in Houston today. They are generally prospering peacefully in the local economy. (Read Leonard Wibberley's “The Mouse that Roared”, oh sorry, watch the DVD of the 1959 movie version when you get a chance, it’s a cold-war fable you’d enjoy.) I don't know whether we can expand or establish US cities to accommodate something like 10 million refugees from Iraq, but it would be exhilarating to try. You might even salvage some votes for the Republican Party if you let Tom Delay help you deploy concentrations of those new citizens strategically. Or you might find a huge labor pool able to help homestead the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast, who knows.

If many prayers were answered, and your seemingly belligerent expansion of the war this month resulted in a great big locked-down green zone with less sectarian violence and millions of peaceful living people inside, then imagine the refugee stream that would arrive from everywhere else in and around Iraq. The siege pressure against your secure neighborhoods would soon become unbearable, and they would inevitably implode at great risk to any who had stood with us. And how many brigades of US soldiers do you think would emerge unscathed before the last five police stations fell in Baghdad?

I thought your speech encouraged civil war, given the sectarian nature of both the US puppet government and its enemies. I seriously don't know anything you can do to dodge the bullet in Iraq. You say you want to create peaceful conditions, restore a semblance of civil infrastructure, and allow a coalition government by any with power who want that. The best thing you could do, sir, to encourage people that you really mean business this time would be to personally lead the surge in Iraq.

I know that would be a much riskier move than your flight-suited landing in a cargo plane on a spare carrier off the US west coast under a propagandist’s banner. But if you are honestly committed to your stated goal of liberty, peace and opportunity in a (likely post-carbon) middle-east, there would be no period of your presidency of which I would be more proud than those last two years when you and Dick Cheney personally led the troops in battles you truly believed in, to the best of your abilities.

If all future US military action became actually defensive, that would really be a legacy of which to be proud. Please don't make the US armed forces bigger. Let them reduce with attrition. Stop the development and testing of new nuclear weapons. Military conflict plays no role in the future world, unless we ask it to. Perhaps calling for additional volunteers (a New Republican Guard?) to join you in Iraq would assist your efforts there, and benefit us at home by weeding them, some permanently, from the domestic population.

And it seems you still can't say "nuclear" straight, though you came a little closer tonight than before. If you spend the rest of $600 billion only to buy time until you can permanently vacation at your Crawford dude ranch that would truly be evil. Even I am not that cynical yet. I applaud your effort to give a substantial talk tonight and hope sincerely for the highly improbable best.

Myron Ebell, Exxon-Mobil stalling still...and it's 2007!

2007-01-04T13:57:00.000-06:00

Bah. Humbug. So what if Santa ends up swimming in a gigantic cold lake by 2050, searching for the floating detrius of his workshop?

Global Warming.

"It’s mostly rubbish," Myron Ebell, director of global warming policy at CEI, said in a statement [drcrying the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) continued warnings]. "The[ir] report even mistakenly labels me an economist." [p.s. Ebell has no Ph.D. qualification at all.]

"The policies promoted by groups such as the UCS would do much more harm than the [global] warming itself," added [Myron] Ebell [of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a so-called 'right wing think tank' and one of the groups cited by the Union of Concerned Scientists as having received funding from ExxonMobil]. "Building coal-fired power plants in China and Africa will provide inestimable benefits to people with only slight risks of minor harms from global warming."

Anyone who does not see through these old-world capitalist talking points by 2007 really needs to get with a new-world economy. Lightweight carbon fibers, my boy, carbon fibers!

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16455825/

For those of you who may not know Myron Ebell, this next link provides from cold water. For a pure Ebellsian read from 2002, prepare yourself for some ghoulishness, then follow this link to the white house, of all places: http://www.whitehouse.gov/ceq/foia/cei/2_ceq_14.pdf

On Ebell's qualifications, I direct you to this from the bottom of his bio on the CEI website:

A native of Baker City, Oregon, Mr. Ebell holds a B.A. from Colorado College and an M.Sc. from the London School of Economics. He also did graduate work at the University of California at San Diego and at Peterhouse, Cambridge University.

Source: http://www.cei.org/dyn/view_expert.cfm?expert=125

Why the HELL are unelected and undereducated people like Ebell allowed to manipulate public policy with severe energy, security and species survival implications?

An Atheist’s Prayers

2006-11-21T11:21:00.000-06:00

I think I have finally found what many people in the Christianized West call “prayer.” As I grew up a Christian, making use of your special relationship with God, even if wishing for good things, seemed kind of unfair to the rest of humanity that had to struggle to attain that which is necessary and excellent. And so often, most of my requests seemed for no one else but me, a horribly selfish practice. Thus I could never “pray” much in my thoughts, that is, until I shed Christianity.

Rather than requesting something for myself by grace, or asking some unearned favor, as prayer is mostly used in Western culture today, I should go around “wishing well” upon all that I see. I’ve been practicing doing that while stuck in traffic, and it seems to help my mood at the least. Note that nothing is actually uttered by voice, only in thought. I find no need to specify agency in how these good wishes should come to pass. Also, the recipients of my good wishes hopefully remain unaware of my blessings upon them. I feel such thoughts predispose me toward greater empathy and generosity, which can then make a material difference. For when all increase, only then can someone like me who cares for y’all increase and feel good about it.

Geographical note: There is a Pray, Montana with Zip code 59065 (pray n.d.).

I’ve always considered the word “prayer” a bit funny. In recent society, it is common for a noun to become a verb, e.g. “A computer keyboard” => “to keyboard quickly and accurately.” Well, that tradition may go back a while, e.g. “Metal type” => “to type quickly and accurately”, but still… “Prayer” seemed to me to be the opposite case. “Pray” is a verb meaning to make earnest supplication, entreat, beg, plead, implore, beseech, or importune. “Pray” seemed to add the “–er” suffix serving as the regular English formative of agent nouns.

I see that I was wrong from the etymology. “Pray” comes from the Medieval Latin precari, consonant with today’s meaning. But “prayer" in the Old Latin is not the one who prays, but precaria, that thing which is obtained by requesting favor. Modern Western Christians might be more correct to term their fossil-fueled loads of booty (the positive results of praying to their God) as “prayer”, derivation of “prayary”, meaning obtained by entreaty. I suppose the imputation of the concepts of mercy or grace only came upon the results of prayer with the renaissance reformation and one of my namesakes, Martin Luther. The words “pray” and “prayer” are judicial terms, and still show up in modern courtroom documents.

Etymological notes:

On “Prayer”: [Origin: 1250–1300; ME preiere ≪ OF ≪ ML precāria, n. use of fem. of precārius obtained by entreaty, equiv. to prec- (s. of prex) prayer + -ārius -ary; cf. precarious]
On “Pray”: [Origin: 1250–1300; ME preien ≪ OF preier ≪ L precārī to beg, pray, deriv. of prex (s. prec-) prayer; akin to OE fricgan, D vragen, G fragen, Goth fraihnan to ask]
On “Precarious”: [Origin: 1640–50; ≪L precārius obtained by entreaty or mere favor, hence uncertain. See prayer]
(Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006).

It seems that the words pray and prayers are not so ancient, only arriving in the medieval age. Talk about the convergence of church and state! Above I highlighted the gothic English fricgan (to ask) to remind me of the older usage whenever I might utter “friggen” or “fricken” as euphemism for derogative “fucking” today. (I looked up “prairie” too, just for the fun of it. Though it shares the suffix “-ary”, the Latin root prat is completely different, meaning meadow.)

Reference
pray. (n.d.). U.S. Gazetteer. Retrieved November 21, 2006, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/pray

Elton John Hates Religion

2006-11-13T07:26:00.000-06:00

Finally!

It took us six years to screw the courage up to do what I've been saying since before George W. Bush was, against the popular will of the people, appointed leader of the free world.

Now the U.S. government has been restored to some semblance of balance and humanity with the Democratic takeover of congress. Now visible figures are calling for less religious incitement to hatred and conflict.

I had left the Church and turned to interfaith dialog during the relentless run-up to war after President Bush's ascension. In 2002-2003 I could not believe the sermons I was hearing from every pulpit, about how the Church has never taken a stance in questions of war. "Some support war with passages from scripture, some oppose war with verses from the same Bible."

People who voted simple-minded pro-life platforms were already guilty of assembling the most heinous imperialist government in American history. But when it came down to real questions of the quick and the dead, why only then did the Church choose to lose a grip on reality and become nothing but a spiritual, ethereal bystander?

The only thing I thought I had in common with Elton John until recently was admiration for his prolific songwriter and musical output such as "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road." Now Elton John has criticized religious leaders for failing to do anything about conflicts around the world.

"Why aren't they having a conclave? Why aren't they coming together?"

John blamed those in his own field for being similarly lax.

"It's like the peace movement in the '60s. Musicians got through to people by getting out there and doing peace concerts, but we don't seem to do them any more," he said. "If John Lennon were alive today, he'd be leading it with a vengeance." Source: MSN

Imagine!

on crisis convergence: OpEdNews 8/31/06 reprint

2006-09-04T19:51:00.000-05:00

Despite the seeming gloominess of the situation, however, there is clearly fundamental dissent about the current trajectory of American and Western policy at the highest levels of power. The source remarked that "humanity is on the verge of a precipice, and either we'll all just drop off the edge, or we'll evolve. I'm not sure what that new human being might look like, but it will clearly have to involve a completely new set of ideas and values, a new way of looking at the world that respects life and nature."

August 31, 2006 at 08:09:08
US Army Contemplates Redrawing Middle East Map to Stave-off Looming Global Meltdown

by Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed
http://www.opednews.com

In a little-noted article printed in early August in the Armed Forces Journal, a monthly magazine for officers and leaders in the United States military community, early retired Major Ralph Peters sets out the latest ideas in current US strategic thinking. And they are extremely disturbing.

Ethnically Cleansing the Entire Middle East
Maj. Peters, formerly assigned to the Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence where he was responsible for future warfare, candidly outlines how the map of the Middle East should be fundamentally re-drawn, in a new imperial endeavour designed to correct past errors. "Without such major boundary revisions, we shall never see a more peaceful Middle East," he observes, but then adds wryly: "Oh, and one other dirty little secret from 5,000 years of history: Ethnic cleansing works."

Thus, acknowledging that the sweeping reconfiguration of borders he proposes would necessarily involve massive ethnic cleansing and accompanying bloodshed on perhaps a genocidal scale, he insists that unless it is implemented, "we may take it as an article of faith that a portion of the bloodshed in the region will continue to be our own." Among his proposals are the need to establish "an independent Kurdish state" to guarantee the long-denied right to Kurdish self-determination. But behind the humanitarian sentiments, Maj. Peters declares that: "A Free Kurdistan, stretching from Diyarbakir through Tabriz, would be the most pro-Western state between Bulgaria and Japan."He chastises the United States and its coalition partners for missing "a glorious chance" to fracture Iraq, which "should have been divided into three smaller states immediately." This would leave "Iraq's three Sunni-majority provinces as a truncated state that might eventually choose to unify with a Syria that loses its littoral to a Mediterranean-oriented Greater Lebanon: Phoenecia reborn." Meanwhile, the Shia south of old Iraq "would form the basis of an Arab Shia State rimming much of the Persian Gulf." Jordan, a US-Israeli friend in the region, would "retain its current territory, with some southward expansion at Saudi expense. For its part, the unnatural state of Saudi Arabia would suffer as great a dismantling as Pakistan." Iran too would "lose a great deal of territory to Unified Azerbaijan, Free Kurdistan, the Arab Shia State and Free Baluchistan, but would gain the provinces around Herat in today's Afghanistan." Although this vast imperial programme could be impossible to implement now, with time, "new and natural borders will emerge", driven by "the inevitable attendant bloodshed."

As for the goals of this plan, Maj. Peters is equally candid. While including the necessary caveats about fighting "for security from terrorism, for the prospect of democracy", he also mentions the third important issue -- "and for access to oil supplies in a region that is destined to fight itself".The whole thing sounds disturbingly familiar, especially to those who have read the musings of then Israeli Foreign Ministry official Oded Yinon.

Keeping the World Safe... for Our Economy
Despite trying to dress up his vision as an exercise in attempting to selflessly democratize the Middle East, in a contribution to the quarterly US Army War College journal Parameters almost a decade ago, he acknowledged with some jubilation that: "Those of us who can sort, digest, synthesize, and apply relevant knowledge soar--professionally, financially, politically, militarily, and socially. We, the winners, are a minority." This minority will inevitably conflict with the vast majority of the world's population. "For the world masses, devastated by information they cannot manage or effectively interpret, life is 'nasty, brutish . . . and short-circuited.'" In "every country and region", these masses who can neither "understand the new world", nor "profit from its uncertainties... will become the violent enemies of their inadequate governments, of their more fortunate neighbors, and ultimately of the United States." The coming clash, then, is not really about blood, faith, ethnicity, at all. It is about the gap between the haves and the have-nots. "We are entering a new American century", he says, in a veiled reference to the Bush administration Project of the same name founded in the same year he was writing. In the new century, "we will become still wealthier, culturally more lethal, and increasingly powerful. We will excite hatreds without precedent."In predicting the future course for the US Army, Maj. Peters argues that: "We will see countries and continents divide between rich and poor in a reversal of 20th-century economic trends." In this context, he says, "we in the United States will continue to be perceived as the ultimate haves", and therefore, "terrorism will be the most common form of violence", along with "transnational criminality, civil strife, secessions, border conflicts, and conventional wars." Meanwhile, "in defense of its interests", the US "will be required to intervene in some of these contests." And then he sums it all up in one tidy paragraph:

"There will be no peace. At any given moment for the rest of our lifetimes, there will be multiple conflicts in mutating forms around the globe. Violent conflict will dominate the headlines, but cultural and economic struggles will be steadier and ultimately more decisive. The de facto role of the US armed forces will be to keep the world safe for our economy and open to our cultural assault. To those ends, we will do a fair amount of killing."

So what's prompted Maj. Peter's decision to air his vision for the Middle East in the Armed Forces Journal at this time in the wake of the latest Middle East crisis? A number of critical developments.

Source: Imminent Global Crises Converge
According to an American source with high-level access to the US military, political and intelligence establishment, Western policymakers are in no doubt that the world faces the imminent convergence of multiple global crises. These crises threaten not only to undermine the basis of Western power in its current military and geopolitical configurations, but also to destabilize the entire foundations of industrial civilization.

The source said that the latest petroleum data indicates that "global oil production most likely peaked two years ago." This is consistent with the findings of respected geologists such as leading oil depletion expert Dr. Colin Campbell, who in the late 90s predicted that world oil production would peak in the early 21st century. "We have come to the end of the first half of the Oil Age," said Dr. Campbell, who has a doctorate in geology from the University of Oxford and more than 40 years of experience in the oil industry. Similarly, Kenneth Deffeyes, a geologist and professor emeritus at Princeton University, estimates the occurrence of the peak near the end of last year.

The source also said that leading US financial analysts privately believe that "a collapse of the global banking system is imminent by 2008." Although the warning is consistent with the public findings of other experts, this is the first time that a more precise date has been estimated. In a prescient analysis drawing on highly placed financial sources, US historian Gabriel Kolko, professor emeritus at York University, concluded in late July that:

"All the factors which make for crashes – excessive leveraging, rising interest rates, etc. – exist... Contradictions now wrack the world's financial system, and a growing consensus now exists between those who endorse it and those, like myself, who believe the status quo is both crisis-prone as well as immoral. If we are to believe the institutions and personalities who have been in the forefront of the defense of capitalism, and we should, it may very well be on the verge of serious crises."

The source also commented on the danger posed by rapid climate change. Although most conventional estimates suggest that global climate catastrophe is not due before another 30 odd years, he argued that the multiplication of several "tipping-points" suggested that a series of devastating climatic events could be "triggered within the next 10 to 15 years." Once again, this is consistent with the findings of other experts, most recently a joint task-force report by the Institute for Public Policy Research in the UK, the Center for American Progress in the US, and the Australia Institute, which said in January last year that if the average world temperature rises "two degrees centigrade above the average world temperature prevailing in 1750 before the industrial revolution", it would trigger an irreversible chain of climatic disasters. In its report, the task-force says:

"The possibilities include reaching climatic tipping points leading, for example, to the loss of the West Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets (which, between them, could raise sea level more than 10 meters over the space of a few centuries), the shutdown of the thermohaline ocean circulation (and, with it, the Gulf Stream), and the transformation of the planet's forests and soils from a net sink of carbon to a net source of carbon."

The source also revealed that US generals had repeatedly war-gamed a prospective conflict with Iran, but consistently found that the simulations predicted "an absolute nuclear disaster", from which no clear winner would emerge. The scenarios gamed were so dismal, he said, that the generals briefed administration officials to avoid such a war at all costs. However, the source said that the Bush administration is ignoring the fears of the US military.

In this context, it would seem that the musings of Maj. Peters issue less from a concerted confidence in US power, than from a sense of growing desperation and unease as the political, financial and energy architecture of the global system is increasingly fragmenting under the weight of its own inherent instability.

Despite the seeming gloominess of the situation, however, there is clearly fundamental dissent about the current trajectory of American and Western policy at the highest levels of power. The source remarked that "humanity is on the verge of a precipice, and either we'll all just drop off the edge, or we'll evolve. I'm not sure what that new human being might look like, but it will clearly have to involve a completely new set of ideas and values, a new way of looking at the world that respects life and nature."

nafeez.blogspot.com
Nafeez Mosaddeq Ahmed is the author of The London Bombings: An Independent Inquiry. He teaches courses in International Relations at the School of Social Sciences and Cultural Studies, University of Sussex, Brighton, where he is doing his PhD studying imperialism and genocide. Since 9/11, he has authored three other books revealing the realpolitik behind the rhetoric of the "War on Terror", The War on Freedom, Behind the War on Terror, and The War on Truth: 9/11, Disinformation and the Anatomy of Terrorism. In summer 2005, he testified as an expert witness in US Congress about his research on international terrorism.
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Paradigm Shift

2006-04-05T07:06:00.000-05:00

Last night, in conversation with my wife, I (not the whole world) underwent a paradigm shift. I'll try to outline it for you, my gentle reader.

01:23 4/5/06

I must shift
from
Ends-based thinking-driven planning
to
Moment-based wisdom-driven action

from
All of us must shift course with me
to
I must shift course with all of us

from
Reality is determined by predictable, immutable fate
to
Reality is the resultant of all actions of its constituent parts

from
The invisible hand of God
to
That invisible hand of ours

Is violent aggression endemic to human culture?

2006-03-30T18:29:00.000-06:00

I'll try to be brief. The question needs to go beyond our predilection for violent "solutions" and vicarious role-playing, to the basis of our current civilization. Is not the world view of many who simply accept war and aggression as part of "human" nature based on the concepts of scarcity and a malevolent, or at least, impartial universe?

Our whole world is economically basing its decisions on relative shares of finite goods, including that addictive sweet crude oil the American infrastructure is geared to require. What will help humanity to move beyond scarcity and hording, to abundance and sharing?

Our whole world is rife with future expectations, current examples and historical records of dogs eating dogs, might making right, and extinction of the unfit as seen through the periscopes of those who survived. What will help humanity to move beyond opposing an evil "other" or even "fighting the whole world" toward more open love in meeting its simultaneous desire for more dominion and greater ease?

I'm sure the answers to these questions are global and local, progressive and historical, systemic and personal. These are the cultural questions I wish we could see more creation around.

2006-03-16T17:47:00.000-06:00

A personal message to my Honorable Senators about 3 things:

First, I thought the issue of drilling ANWR had been decided...against! For the sake of a few more days' oil, do you want the Alaskan Nature and Wildlife Reservation to end up looking like the pock-marked deserts of Arizona/New Mexico/west Texas? I hope not.

Second, let's not extend the President's blunder to include placement of permanent bases in the middle of a civil war that is our ultimate responsibility. Either we stay or we go. Let's not permanently retreat to desert bases in an attempt to have it both ways.

Third, please begin paying attention to mitigating, if still possible, or at least adapting to global warming. It will take unimaginable effort to successfully relocate every coastal community that lies 120' or less above sea level before the meltwaters of Greenland and Antarctica come surging in beneath hurricanes!

first blogspot post

2006-02-14T23:41:00.000-06:00

Hey, Hey it's me, Paul, at my new blogspot. My former blog locations were #1:
http://linuxboxchatter.livejournal.com/ where I may crosspost; #2: http://linuxboxchatter.yafro.com/, a picture camera blog, where I have cool friends; and #3 Be my friend in MySpace I plan to consolidate to blogger, so I'm glad you found me. Drop me a line (it's all out there under the - About Me - link).

Here's my link to
photobucket:
http://photobucket.com/albums/e123/paulsuckow/.

Umm, don't hunt with anybody from the Bush administration if you know what's good for you.
Oh, and Happy Valentine's Day.

Paul Suckow - About Me -
Signature by LinkTiles.com