In high summer the fireflies would settle in the trees after their dipping twilight mating flights and just pulse, their yellow glow contrasting with the thick icy white of the Milky Way. Late at night the whippoorwills would wake us up with their loud, repeating cries. In winter, you could often see the barred owl who lived nearby, and through the bare trees there were always a couple of turkey vultures circling in the pale sky.

As I said in the comments, David’s posts usually make me want to move into the city. This one makes me want to move away from it.

Bluegreen Corp., a Florida-based real estate development company, is looking to turn some unique land along the Haw River into a gated community and golf course. The land is unique because it’s the key to expanding the fledgling Haw River State Park.

If the developers get their way, 100,000 gallons of water per day will be diverted from the headwaters of Haw River for the purpose of irrigating their golf course. At the moment, the outcome hinges to a large degree on the Guilford County Board of Commissioners, who are supposed to have a hearing on rezoning the land for the development in December. Normally, I would say that doesn’t bode well for this turning out in favor of the park, but public sentiment – and that of some of the board members – seems to be leaning heavily towards not allowing the rezoning to go through.

There are well over 200 golf courses in North Carolina, but only one place where Haw River State Park can gain a more solid foothold.

More info:

Citizens for Haw River State Park
“Guilford at a Fork in the River” (Ed Cone)

A bit oversimplified, as he admits, but it’s an interesting argument. He addresses some criticisms here, here, and here.

(Via The Talent Show)

As a believer:

• that human-caused global warming is a moral, ethical, and spiritual issue affecting our survival;
• that home energy use is a key component of overall energy use;
• that reducing my fossil fuel-based home energy usage will lead to lower greenhouse gas emissions; and
• that leaders on moral issues should lead by example;

I pledge to consume no more energy for use in my residence than the average American household by March 21, 2008.�

Many folks are now expressing their moral outrage and righteous indignation at Gore for not saying “yes” to the pledge. Gore may or may not be a hypocrite (it’s hard to tell, since Inhofe was talking over him rather than allowing him to respond), but if he is, it’s not because he refused to sign the pledge – the pledge is obviously a farce.

Here’s a pledge that I’d like to put forth to any conservatives out there who are trembling with joy at Gore’s supposed hypocrisy:

As a believer:

• that terrorism is one of the greatest threats facing our nation, and it is our moral and patriotic duty to fight against it;
• that Middle Eastern regimes are key supporters and enablers of terrorism;
• that our consumption of oil provides money and support to those Middle Eastern regimes; and
• that leaders on moral issues should lead by example;

I pledge to consume no more energy for use in my residence than the average American household, reduce my air and car travel to emergency use only, and to take public transportation whenever possible by March 21, 2008.

Any takers on this pledge? Give me a “yes” or “no” in the comments. Remember, anything other than a simple “yes” means that you are either not serious about fighting terrorism, or that you’re a hypocrite.

How sure is he? Not very, according to James Annan. Annan, a “scientist involved in climate prediction”, has challenged global warming skeptics to put their money where their mouth is – he’s offered to wager on whether average temperatures will be warmer or cooler 20 years from now. Lindzen is one of those skeptics that Annan offered to make a wager with:

Recently, my attention was drawn to some comments attributed to Lindzen: “Richard Lindzen says he’s willing to take bets that global average temperatures in 20 years will in fact be lower than they are now.” (thanks to William Connolley for the tip). Given his widely-promulgated views, I took this quote at face value and contacted him to arrange a wager. A payoff at retirement age would be a nice top-up to my pension.

Now here’s the kicker. Richard Lindzen will indeed accept a bet – but only if offered odds of 50:1 in his favour! He actually started out quoting 100:1 – but came down to 50:1 in what he described as a “special favor” to me. If the temperatures went down, I was to hand over $10,000, but in the event of a rise, I’d get a whopping $200. That’s worth around $8 per year on my pension. Whoop-de-doo. That’s not really quite what I had in mind.

What “50:1 odds” translates to is Lindzen is saying he thinks there’s a 98 percent chance that the average temperature of the Earth will be warmer in 20 years. He sounds pretty sure to me – but not of the skeptical side of the global warming debate.

He also addressed the argument that aggressively persuing more environmentally-sound policies would be harmful to our economy. Pulling up two charts, he showed that our standards for automobile emmissions are actually well below those of many other countries – including China – implying that there is significant room for improvement in that area without sacrificing competitiveness. He also noted that the two main foreign automobile companies that offer hybrids – Honda and Toyota – are actually outperforming their U.S. counterparts who are lagging behind in hybrid technologies. Of course, there are many other areas to consider other than just the automobile industry, but this seems to show that its not a foregone conclusion that addressing the global warming problem will make us less economically competitive.

I’ve been looking for online versions of the charts he used in the movie, but haven’t been able to find them. If anyone knows where they can be found, please let me know.

One of the best ways to cut through the propaganda about the risk of potentially dangerous activity is to look at what businesses with a financial stake in getting it right are doing.

Who has a financial stake in global warming? The insurance industry. The post links to an article in Environmental Science and Technology Online, in which Evan Mills was interviewed:

As the world’s largest industry, the insurance business faces more financial risk from global warming than any other sector of the economy. To better understand how business leaders are dealing with the dilemma, ES&T spoke with Evan Mills, a staff scientist at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

In the past 15 years, Mills has distinguished himself as an expert on the economic risks posed by climate change. In a study in Science last August, he detailed how global warming stands to hurt the insurance industry. He further explicated this work in a recent report released by Ceres, a network of investors and public interest groups that promote environmental stewardship on the part of corporations.

DarkSyde’s post quotes this part of the article specifically:

Right now, the media seems to be caught in a debate over whether hurricanes are becoming stronger because of global warming. What does the insurance industry predict?

Earlier this year, the insurers’ catastrophe [CAT] modelers unveiled their first attempt to incorporate the implications of climate change [...] The net result was an approximately 45% increase in previously expected insured losses due to changes in the physical characteristics of the extreme weather events alone.

Why do the insurance companies buy into the science?

I would say that insurers are better equipped to understand and evaluate the science than most other industries, and they have no particular vested interest in propping up polluting industries. [...] Insured losses from weather-related events in 2005 approached $80 billion (4 times those from 9/11) …

Seems like a pretty sound argument to me – not foolproof, but very suggestive of which side is more likely to be right. Insurance companies are in business to make money, and they can only do that by correctly interpreting the data they look at.

As a side note, the article also mentioned this (emphasis added):

When the U.S. delegation failed to engage in efforts to curb emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases (GHGs) during climate talks in Montreal last December, a group of 25 economists—including 3 Nobel Prize laureates and 1 former member of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers—urged President Bush to drop his opposition to cuts in carbon emissions.

The rising costs from weather damage and agricultural losses far outweigh the price of curbing emissions, the economists wrote to Bush. Geoffrey Heal, an economist with the Columbia Business School, told the Financial Times, “The cost of implementing the Kyoto Protocol is about 1% of GNP. That is about two quarters of growth.�

I’ve heard it said that Kyoto would have “wrecked the economy”. One percent of the GNP doesn’t sound like much of a wrecking ball.

I found it interesting that both sides appeared to see the same problem. However, the pro side had some specific suggestions to begin addressing it now, while the con side seemed to advocate letting the market address the problem as necessary, and not worrying so much in the meantime. It’s true, the end of oil probably won’t be the end of the world. But doesn’t it make more sense to start working now to minimize the pain of the transition?

Oh, and there’s one other thing I’d like to know: Why didn’t either of them say anything about plastic? It’s not just about energy. Plastic is used just about everwhere, and we need oil to make many of the most useful forms of it.

A consortium of utilities has picked two sites in Alabama and Mississippi as possible locations for what could be the first nuclear power plant built in the United States in more than three decades.

The consortium emphasized that no decision had yet been made on whether to seek a license for a new plant from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The group is developing an application for advanced approval of the two sites, which would allow for quicker completion of the project if a go ahead is given.

I think it’s definitely worth taking another look at nuclear power. I only hope that some consideration is given to more safety-conscious designs, such as pebble bed reactors, and that security is taken seriously, with an eye towards the reactor as a potential terrorist target.