Jan 25 2007
Climate change and CO2
For once when I asked the government a written question I received an answer.
I asked?? <em>"How much carbon dioxide is put into the atmosphere each day ,and what proportion is from human sources"</em>
The answer stated "The amount of carbon dioxide emitted from human sources is small in comparison to natural flows:at around 3% emitted from the land and oceans to the atmosphere"
The Minister also told me "In 2004 the UK emitted approximately 1.5 million tonnes of carbon dioxide per day "(I think from human sources). This compares with?? the "25 billion tonnes emitted each year globally" from human sources and the total emissions of 800 billion tonnes from all sources.
It is just useful to understand the scope of the problem and the UK human component.?? According to the government the UK human component represents 2% of the world total human emissions, or 0.06% of total emissions.
So what should we conclude?
Climate change theorists point out that the human element may be very small, but it is the one which is growing quickly, and at the margin will do the damage. People who follow the precautionary principle say this theory may well be right, so we had better act. Many other people say they believe the theory but do not act - like the Prime Minister who tells us this is a serious crisis, but he has no intention of cutting his air miles.
Common sense suggests that because the UK represents such a small part of the problem, we are going to depend on decisions in India, China and the USA to make a bigger impact on human emissions. Of course our government should seek to influence them, and stress the value of greater fuel efficiency and stricter controls on emissions. We should also continue to cut our own fuel use at home, at work and on the move. Technology can be our ally in this.??Prudence??nonetheless dictates that we should take action now to proect ourselves against the possible bad consequences of??global warming.
There are two main bad consequences put forward for the UK. The first is a possible water shortage in the drier south and east of the country. The second is too much water in some rivers at flood time, and in the sea, leading to inundation.
Government should take action now to build stronger sea defences, especially close to the London conurbation where most people are at risk. This could be paid for by creating new land in the shallows of the Thames estuary, and selling this for development to finance the higher tidal surge barriers we will need.
The government and the water regulator should include a capacity target in the regulatory structure, to require the industry to put in more water capacity - whether by way of mending pipes more quickly or building extra reservoirs - to eliminate anyt possibility of water shortage. The Environment Agency should order works on our main rivers to guarantee better containment of flood water levels, or safe deposit of excess water on flood plain.
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John Redwood has been the Member of Parliament for Wokingham since 1987. First attending Kent College, Canterbury, he graduated from Magdalen College...
“Government should take action now to build stronger sea defences” - the UN’s IPCC leaked report is predicting a possible 17 inch rise in water levels over the next century - this is much lower than their last estimate. So lets save our tax money until we see evidence of rising water levels (over natural post-glacial increases).
If there is a business case for “creating new land in the shallows of the Thames estuary” then do it - it should not be tied to global warming.
I don’t find the argument that we can’t do it alone & therefore shouldn’t bother convincing. This is the argument that we shouldn’t report crime because it won’t stop it unless everybody does.
However it is a moot point because what 3% of total CO2 release proves is that it is far to small to have a significant effect on total CO2, which in turn is almost certainly a lesser part of warming, the main bit being solar variance.
I believe that if I take the opposite stance to Friends of the Earth I won’t be far wrong on global warming. It’s just another device for tax gathering.
better still, leave the eu (to avoid the landfill directive nonsense)
use the land behind the sea walls for landfill and when high enough build houses
if you include the east caost of the uk there should be many centuries of land fill
(the govt thinks this lando is of no value since its decided not to repair sea walls)
kills several birds with one stone
John’s question, and the government’s answer to it, leaves room for confusion about the human effect on climate change. Neil Craig at least, see comment 2 above, has been misled.
The natural world has been busy pumping out huge amounts of CO2 for billions of years. It has also, simultaneously, been absorbing it. It’s the way carbon-based ecosystems work. The carbon emitted comes from the carbon eaten, which comes from the carbon absorbed which comes from the carbon emitted… and so on.
Then, around the time of the dinosaurs, a lot of dead vegetation fell into swamps and didn’t decompose to CO2. Over millions of years it became coal, gas and oil instead. With less CO2 in the atmosphere, the Earth’s temperature dropped substantially.
So the 3% of total emissions that humans are now responsible for is the 3% that the global biological system does not have the capacity to soak up. When we have burnt it all we will be back to the pre-Carboniferous climate. There’s no problem with the other 97% - it is being absorbed by plants as fast as ever.
The alleged demise of the human race unless we DO SOMETHING requires global agreement. Meanwhile here are a few things that could be easily done:
1. Develop an anti-waste attitude in the home.
2. Do we HAVE to keep all the lights in our offices on all night?
3. Importing huge tonnages of hardwood from abroad, encourages people to cut down the rain forests like there is no tomorrow (no pun intended). Cutting down huge swathes of forest must surely be a major contribution to global warming.
4. Intensify our research into hydrogen and other alternative, non polluting, fuels.
5. Resist the Global Warming ‘band wagon’ excuse to invent a new tax raising opportunity.
Why do we still let water run down hill without catching its potential energy for the National Grid? Why is making your own home carbon zero not (stealth) tax zero?
I think all disabled people who need a stair lift and a dishwasher and other gadgets ought to be given a free installed wind turbine, and photovoltaic roof tiles, to offset the cost of running them.
Is joined uop thinking like that too futuristic for Britain? It already happens in Switzerland!
At last a politician (John Redwood) is challenging the convential wisdom about the role of carbon dioxide and so called greenhouse gases in general. Anyone with only a basic knowledge of chemistry would find that there are far more questions than answers. For my part I have never been able to find an explanation of why miniscule quantities of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are responsible for altering the physical process of heat transfer. Does anyone really know anything about the process?
Richard that is simplistic. Vegitation did not spring into existence at 2the time of the dinosaurs” - there has always been coal being formed & released. However the Earth’s living systems are living systems - which means they can easily adapt to using 3% more CO2 - indeed the evidence of tree ring growth is that the rise in CO2 is already meaning that plants are growing better. For those of us who eat food this is not a bad thing.