That is, one can simultaneously see the good-humored fun in kids building an igloo in honor of Al Gore and legitimately question whether the IPCC-backed consensus on global warming - that a climate catastrophe is well-nigh upon us - suffers from serious flaws (
think Himalayan glaciers). And we believe one can support an energy policy that draws on all of America's domestic resources-coal, natural gas, oil, solar, wind, geothermal, nuclear-and that such advocacy can be rooted in prudential concern for cost, jobs, energy security, and reliability, rather than rank corporate shilling.
We lament the fact that Mr. Friedman, justly regarded as he is for the eloquence of his prose and the force of his arguments, categorically dismisses those of a skeptical bent as given to "errors and wild exaggerations." Some may be, but many are not. Such a dismissal is simply incorrect - one thinks of the University of Alabama-Huntsville's John Christy or Australia's Ian Plimer - and contrary to the spirit of open intellectual engagement. Nevertheless, in hope of serious debate, we take issue with several of Mr. Friedman's assertions:
FRIEDMAN: "Avoid the term ‘global warming.' I prefer the term ‘global weirding,' because that is what actually happens as global temperatures rise and the climate changes. The weather gets weird. The hots are expected to get hotter, the wets wetter, the dries drier and the most violent storms more numerous."
RESPONSE: It's appropriate that Mr. Friedman drop "global warming," for the simple fact that there has been "
no statistically significant warming" for the last 15 years. This is not the judgment of a skeptic, but of Phil Jones, the former director of the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit (CRU), who is at the center of the ‘Climategate' scandal (Jones did say that in his view that the overall temperature trend is one of warming).
Moreover, at some point, the notion, suggested by Friedman, that anything and everything-blizzards, heat waves, droughts, hurricanes, floods, and otherwise ‘weird weather'-are caused by global warming becomes unfalsifiable, thereby rendering the catastrophic global warming hypothesis meaningless. We would also caution Mr. Friedman against relying too heavily on the "storms-get-stormier" hypothesis.
Recall that in 2005, Christopher Landsea, of the National Hurricane Center, and one of the nation's foremost experts on hurricanes, resigned in protest from the IPCC. At the time, Landsea wrote, "I am withdrawing [from the IPCC] because I have come to view the part of the IPCC to which my expertise is relevant as having become politicized. In addition, when I have raised my concerns to the IPCC leadership, their response was simply to dismiss my concerns." He wrote further that, "The latest results from the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory suggest that by around 2080, hurricanes may have winds and rainfall about 5% more intense than today...It is beyond me why my colleagues would utilize the media to push an unsupported agenda that recent hurricane activity has been due to global warming."
FRIEDMAN: "Those who favor taking action are saying: ‘Because the warming that humans are doing is irreversible and potentially catastrophic, let's buy some insurance - by investing in renewable energy, energy efficiency and mass transit - because this insurance will also actually make us richer and more secure.' We will import less oil, invent and export more clean-tech products, send fewer dollars overseas to buy oil and, most importantly, diminish the dollars that are sustaining the worst petro-dictators in the world who indirectly fund terrorists and the schools that nurture them."
RESPONSE: Taking out insurance is wise. But Mr. Friedman's insurance policy means exorbitant premiums with no protection in the event disaster occurs. Take the Waxman-Markey bill. According to the National Black Chamber of Commerce, Waxman-Markey would cause a net reduction-yes, even taking into account "green jobs"-of up to 3.6 million jobs. It would reduce GDP by 1.5 percent compared to business-as-usual. And the climate benefit? According to Chip Knappenberger of Master Resource, by the year 2050, Waxman-Markey "would result in a global temperature ‘savings' of about 0.05ºC regardless of the IPCC scenario used." In other words: no climate benefit. Even if one chooses a carbon tax to reduce emissions, the climate impact arguably would be even less, given that reductions are not guaranteed.
There are more economical options, and they are not the work of industry robber barons. We call Mr. Friedman's attention to a 2008 Department of Energy study titled "Combined Heat and Power: Effective Energy Solutions for a Sustainable Future."
As the study noted, the generating capacity of the more than 3,300 US combined heat and power (CHP) sites "stands at 85 gigawatts (GW)-almost 9 percent of total US capacity." In 2006 CHP produced 506 billion Kilowatt Hour (kWh) of electricity-more than 12 percent of total US power generation for that year." According to DOE, if the United States adopted high-deployment policies to achieve 20 percent of generation capacity from CHP by 2030, it could:
- Save an estimated 5.3 quadrillion Btu (Quads) of fuel annually, the equivalent of nearly half the total energy currently consumed by US households;
- Generate (cumulatively through 2030) $234 billion in new investments and create nearly 1 million new highly-skilled, technical jobs4 throughout the United States.
DOE also concluded CO2 emissions could be reduced "by more than 800 million metric tons (MMT) per year, the equivalent of taking more than half of the current passenger vehicles in the US off the road. In this 20 percent scenario, over 60 percent of the projected increase in CO2 emissions between now and 2030 could be avoided."
As an insurance policy, this is something the American people would probably be more inclined to support than taxes that impose all cost for no climate benefit.
FRIEDMAN: "Even if climate change proves less catastrophic than some fear, in a world that is forecast to grow from 6.7 billion to 9.2 billion people between now and 2050, more and more of whom will live like Americans, demand for renewable energy and clean water is going to soar. It is obviously going to be the next great global industry.
"China, of course, understands that, which is why it is investing heavily in clean-tech, efficiency and high-speed rail. It sees the future trends and is betting on them. Indeed, I suspect China is quietly laughing at us right now."
RESPONSE: China is pursuing an all-of-the-above energy policy-exactly what Republicans have been supporting for years. Yes, China is investing in renewable energy, but it is also building advanced coal and nuclear power plants. According to the Energy Information Administration, "Coal consists of roughly three-quarters of [China's] power generation feedstock and the EIA forecasts they will maintain this market share through 2030."
Here in the U.S., green pressure groups and the Obama EPA-and, we suspect, Mr. Friedman-- oppose construction of new, more efficient (therefore lower emitting) coal plants. They might say they have to be equipped with "carbon capture and storage technology"-which won't happen on a commercial scale for years (and assuming environmentalists will even allow construction of the infrastructure needed to support it).
As for nuclear, according to the "Nuclear Street" website, "there are 12 newly-approved" nuclear units under construction in China that will have a combined capacity of 34.76 million kW." We are pleased the Administration has signaled support for new nuclear plants, but by pulling the plug on Yucca Mountain, it fails the consistency test.
FRIEDMAN: "And Iran, Russia, Venezuela and the whole OPEC gang are high-fiving each other. Nothing better serves their interests than to see Americans becoming confused about climate change, and, therefore, less inclined to move toward clean-tech and, therefore, more certain to remain addicted to oil. Yes, sir, it is morning in Saudi Arabia."
RESPONSE: According to a recently released report from the Congressional Research Service, America's combined recoverable natural gas, oil, and coal endowment is the largest on earth. America's recoverable resources are far larger than those of Saudi Arabia (3rd), China (4th), and Canada (6th) combined. And that's without including America's absolutely immense oil shale and methane hydrates deposits. We suspect the "whole OPEC gang" would become more than a little nervous if the U.S. got serious about developing its resources-all of them.
