zoso wrote on Jun 20^th, 2007 at 3:59pm:


I think the Gold Coast has taken up an initiave or plans to take up an initiative which will see every home require a rainwater tank in the future. In that all new homes built will be built in with a rainwater tank....

With the Gold Coast being the fastest growing city in Australia... (have to check that stat) ... it only makes sense to take such precautions.

In saying that though... the water from rainwater tanks usually looks brown... blargghh.

http://dsc.sp@m/news/2007/08/15/volcano_pla.html?category=earth

Larry O'Hanlon, Discovery News

Aug. 15, 2007 — Emulating the sun-dimming effects of large volcanic eruptions to slow the Earth's greenhouse effect, as some have proposed, may just make matters worse, say scientists studying the effects of nature's recent volcanics.

The eruption of the Philippine's Mount Pinatubo in 1991 shows that the far-flung effects of its sun-blocking particles led to a marked decrease in precipitation worldwide.

An attempt to mimic volcanoes to cool the Earth by blocking solar energy reaching the Earth's surface could have similar short-term effects — which could be worse than global warming.

"They're all designed to cut the incoming (solar) radiation," said climate researcher Kevin Trenberth, referring to various proposals to "geo-engineer" our way out of global warming. But you can't engineer the climate without thinking about the entire flow of that incoming heat, he added.

That heat flow warms tropical oceans, which evaporates lots of water. The water vapor moves to higher latitudes, where it rains down and releases heat that can radiate back into space.

"So if you are changing this flow of energy," said Trenberth, who works at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), "it's going to have an impact."

The immediate effect is less rain falling worldwide. In other words: drought.

Trenberth and his NCAR colleague Aiguo Dai found just such a pronounced drop in precipitation — seen in terms of the world's stream and river flows — after the 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo.

There was a "singular decrease" in river discharges into the oceans, Trenberth told Discovery News. The researchers' work is published in the latest issue of Geophysical Research Letters.

Unlike the more gradual effects of global warming, droughts have been known to cause immediate famines along with political and economic instability.

"There is really a major ethical aspect to it," said Trenberth. "If you can really [dim solar radiation], who is in charge? Who plays God?" After all, he said, it's one thing to accidentally cause the climate to change, as has happened with global warming, and another to deliberately tinker with it.

"Any time you are talking about geo-engineering you have to be very careful," said climate researcher Robert Adler of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. "If you don't understand the system — and we do not fully understand this system — you can get perturbations."

Another problem with mimicking volcanoes is that you have to keep doing it or face potential trouble when the effect wears off in 18 months or so and the climate rebounds, said Trenberth.

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23416151-details/Judge+attacks+nine+errors+in+Al+Gore's+'alarmist'+climate+change+film/article.do

controversial documentary on climate change which has been sent to thousands of schools has been criticised by a High Court judge for being 'alarmist' and 'exaggerated'.

Mr Justice Burton said former US vice-president Al Gore's film, An Inconvenient Truth, was 'one-sided' and would breach education rules unless accompanied by a warning.

Despite winning lavish praise from the environmental lobby and an Oscar from the film industry, Mr Gore's documentary was found to contain 'nine scientific errors' by the judge.

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A High Court judge ruled Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth was 'alarmist' and 'exaggerated'


These inconvenient untruths included the claim that the snows on Mount Kilimanjaro were disapearing and solely due to the global warming and that sea levels will rise up to 20 feet in the near future.



Kent school governor Stewart Dimmock brought the legal action, claiming the film was unfit for schools

Impressed by the film's slick message on climate change, the Government sent copies of the documentary to all secondary schools in England earlier this year, along with two short films and an animation about the carbon cycle produced by Defra.

Ruling that the film could be shown in schools as part of the climate change resource pack, Mr Justice Burton warned it must be accompanied by new guidance notes to balance Mr Gore's partisan views.

The High Court action was brought by a father-of-two who accused Labour of 'brainwashing' children with propaganda.

Kent school governor Stewart Dimmock claimed the film was unfit for schools as it was politically partisan, containing serious scientific inaccuracies and 'sentimental mush'.

Lorry driver and member of the political group, the New Party, Mr Dimmock had sought a court order to ban the documentary after the Government decided to distribute the documentary and four short films to 3,500 schools in February.

Yesterday he said he was delighted with the outcome: "The film contains blatant inaccuracies. It's a political shockumentary, it's not a scientific documentary."

Describing the documentary as 'a powerful, dramatically presented and highly professionally produced film', Mr Justice Burton said it was built round the 'charismatic presence' of the ex vice president 'whose crusade it now is to persuade the world of the dangers of climate change caused by global warming'.

But he said it might be necessary for the Government to make clear to teaching staff that some of Mr Gore's views were not supported or promoted by the Government, and there was 'a view to the contrary'.

Agreeing that Mr Gore's film was 'broadly accurate' on the subject of climate change, he found that errors had arisen in 'the context of alarmism and exaggeration'.

The judge then set out nine errors in the film which went against current mainstream scientific consensus.

actually bullocks and other animals emit more greenhouse gasses than humans

Sprintcyclist wrote on Oct 12^th, 2007 at 3:30pm:



ha ha Id like to see that.

um its true... animals emit more carbon than humans simply because there is so much more of them.

I think cows only emit less than 20% of Australia's emissions. Termites probably less. And that is in a coutnry with a far higher ration of cows an termites to industry than most countries.

in the 1970's everyone was raving on about "global cooling"

No they weren't. A small number of people were onto it, but it was a far smaller problem because the rate of change was far smaller and there was no need for immediate action. To suggest that this indicates some kind of ignorance or folly is wrong.

Only ruminants produce methane in large quantities.

Also, just because animals emit it does not mean humans are not responsible. European farmers introduced cows to Australia. Switching to roos or some other alternative must be considered as a way to reduce greenhouse emissions.