Excerpted from IPCC's Report on Transport & Infrastructure

[HAVE JUST COPY-PASTED THIS STUFF FOR REFINEMENT AS A BLOG.]

5.3.1.5 Road transport: mode shifts Personal motor vehicles consume much more energy and
emit far more GHGs per passenger-km than other surface passenger modes. And the number of cars (and light trucks) continues to increase virtually everywhere in the world. Growth
in GHG emissions can be reduced by restraining the growth in personal vehicle ownership. Such a strategy can, however, only be successful if high levels of mobility and accessibility can be
provided by alternative means.

In general, collective modes of transport use less energy and generate less GHGs than private cars. Walking and biking emit even less. There is important worldwide mitigation potential if
public and non-motorised transport trip share loss is reversed.
The challenge is to improve public transport systems in order to preserve or augment the market share of low-emitting modes. If public transport gets more passengers, it is possible to increase the frequency of departures, which in turn may attract new passengers (Akerman and Hojer, 2006).
The USA is somewhat of an anomaly, though. In the USA, passenger travel by cars generates about the same GHG emissions as bus and air travel on a passenger-km basis (ORNL transportation Energy Databook; ORNL, 2006). That is mostly because buses have low load factors in the USA. Thus, in the USA, a bus-based strategy or policy will not necessarily
lower GHG emissions. Shifting passengers to bus is not simply a matter of filling empty seats. To attract more passengers, it is necessary to enhance transit service. That means more
buses operating more frequently – which means more GHG emissions. It is even worse than that, because transit service is already offered where ridership26 demand is greatest. Adding
more service means targeting less dense corridors or adding more service on an existing route. There are good reasons to promote transit use in the USA, but energy use and GHGs are
not among them.
Virtually everywhere else in the world, though, transit is used more intensively and therefore has a GHG advantage relative to cars. Table 5.4 shows the broad average GHG emissions
from different vehicles and transport modes in a developing country context. GHG emissions per passenger-km are lowest for transit vehicles and two-wheelers. It also highlights the fact
that combining alternative fuels with public transport modes can reduce emissions even further.


It is diffi cult to generalize, though, because of substantial
differences across nations and regions. The types of buses,
occupancy factors, and even topography and weather can
affect emissions. For example, buses in India and China tend

to be more fuel-effi cient than those in the industrialized world,
primarily because they have considerably smaller engines and
lack air conditioning (Sperling and Salon, 2002).
Public transport
In addition to reducing transport emissions, public transport
is considered favourably from a socially sustainable point of
view because it gives higher mobility to people who do not
have access to car. It is also attractive from an economically
sustainable perspective since public transport provides more
capacity at less marginal cost. It is less expensive to provide
additional capacity by expanding bus service than building new
roads or bridges. The expansion of public transport in the form
of large capacity buses, light rail transit and metro or suburban
rail can be feasible mitigation options for the transport sector.
The development of new rail services can be an effective
measure for diverting car users to carbon-effi cient mode
while providing existing public transport users with upgraded
service. However, a major hurdle is higher capital and possibly
operating cost of the project. Rail is attractive and effective
at generating high ridership in very dense cities. During the
1990s, less capital-intensive public transport projects such as
light rail transit (LRT) were planned and constructed in Europe,
North America and Japan. The LRT systems were successful in
some regions, including a number of French cities where land
use and transport planning is often well integrated (Hylen and
Pharoah, 2002), but less so in other cities especially in the USA
(Richmond, 2001; Mackett and Edwards, 1998), where more
attention has been paid to this recently.
Around the world, the concept of bus rapid transit (BRT)
is gaining much attention as a substitute for LRT and as an
enhancement of conventional bus service. BRT is not new.
Plans and studies for various BRT type alternatives have been
prepared since the 1930s and a major BRT system was installed
in Curitiba, Brazil in the 1970s (Levinson et al., 2002). But
only since about 2000 has the successful Brazilian experience
gained serious attention from cities elsewhere.
BRT is ‘a mass transit system using exclusive right of way
lanes that mimic the rapidity and performance of metro systems,
but utilizes bus technology rather than rail vehicle technology’
(Wright, 2004). BRT systems can be seen as enhanced bus service
and an intermediate mode between conventional bus service
and heavy rail systems. BRT includes features such as exclusive
right of way lanes, rapid boarding and alighting, free transfers
between routes and preboard fare collection and fare verifi cation,
as well as enclosed stations that are safe and comfortable, clear
route maps, signage and real-time information displays, modal
integration at stations and terminals, clean vehicle technologies
and excellence in marketing and customer service. To be most
effective, BRT systems (like other transport initiatives) should
be part of a comprehensive strategy that includes increasing
vehicle and fuel taxes, strict land-use controls, limits and higher
fees on parking, and integrating transit systems into a broader
package of mobility for all types of travellers (IEA, 2002b).
Most BRT systems today are being delivered in the range of
1–15 million US$/km, depending upon the capacity requirements
and complexity of the project. By contrast, elevated rail systems
and underground metro systems can cost from 50 million US$

to over 200 million US$/km (Wright, 2004). BRT systems now
operate in several cities throughout North America, Europe,
Latin America, Australia, New Zealand and Asia. The largest
and most successful systems to date are in Latin America in
Bogotá, Curitiba and Mexico City (Karekezi et al., 2003).
Analysing the Bogotá Clean Development Mechanism
project gives an insight into the cost and potential of
implementing BRT in large cities. The CDM project shows the
potential of moving about 20% of the city population per day
on the BRT that mainly constitutes putting up dedicated bus
lanes (130 km), articulated buses (1200) and 500 other large
buses operating on feeder routes. The project is supported by an
integrated fare system, centralized coordinated fl eet control and
improved bus management27. Using the investment costs, an
assumed operation and maintenance of 20–50%28 of investment
costs per year, fuel costs of 40 to 60 US$ per barrel in 2030 and
a discount rate of 4%, a BRT lifespan of 30 years, the cost of
implementing BRT in the city of Bogotá was estimated to range
from 7.6 US$/tCO2 to 15.84 US$/tCO2 depending on the price
of fuel and operation and maintenance (Table 5.5). Comparing
with results of Winkelman (2006), BRT cost estimates ranged
from 14-66 US$/tCO2 depending on the BRT package involved
(Table 5.6). The potential for CO2 reduction for the city of
Bogotá was determined to average 247,000 tCO2 per annum or
7.4 million tCO2 over a 30 year lifespan of the project.
Non-motorized transport (NMT)
The prospect for the reduction in CO2 emissions by
switching from cars to non-motorized transport (NMT) such as
walking and cycling is dependent on local conditions. In the
Netherlands, where 47% of trips are made by NMT, the NMT
plays a substantial role up to distances of 7.5 km and walking
up to 2.5 km (Rietveld, 2001). As more than 30% of trips made
in cars in Europe cover distances of less than 3 km and 50% are
less than 5 km (EC, 1999), NMT can possibly reduce car use
in terms of trips and, to a lesser extent, in terms of kilometres.
While the trend has been away from NMT, there is considerable
potential to revive interest in NMT. In the Netherlands, with
strong policies and cultural commitment, the modal share of
bicycle and walking for accessing trains from home is about 35
to 40% and 25% respectively (Rietveld, 2001).
Walking and cycling are highly sensitive to the local built
environment (ECMT, 2004a; Lee and Mouden, 2006). In
Denmark, where the modal share of cycling is 18%, urban
planners seek to enhance walking and cycling by shortening
journey distances and providing better cycling infrastructure
(Dill and Carr 2003, Page, 2005). In the UK where over 60%
of people live within a 15 minute bicycle ride of a station,
NMT could be increased by offering convenient, secure bicycle
parking at stations and improved bicycle carriage on trains
(ECMT, 2004a).
Safety is an important concern. NMT users have a much
higher risk per trip of being involved in an accident than those
using cars, especially in developing countries where most
NMT users cannot afford to own a car (Mohan and Tiwari,
1999). Safety can be improved through traffi c engineering and
campaigns to educate drivers. An important co-benefi t of NMT,

gaining increasing attention in many countries, is public health
(National Academies studies in the USA; Pucher, 2004).
In Bogotá, in 1998, 70% of the private car trips were under
3 km. This percentage is lower today thanks to the bike and
pedestrian facilities. The design of streets was so hostile to
bicycle travel that by 1998 bicycle trips accounted for less than
1% of total trips. After some 250 km of new bicycle facilities were
constructed by 2001 ridership had increased to 4% of total trips.
In most of Africa and in much of southern Asia, bicyclists and
other non-motorised and animal traction vehicles are generally
tolerated on the roadways by authorities. Non-motorised goods
transport is often important for intermodal goods transport. A
special form of rickshaw is used in Bangladesh, the bicycle
van, which has basically the same design as a rickshaw (Hook,
2003).
Mitigation potential of modal shifts for passenger
transport
Rapid motorization in the developing world is beginning to
have a large effect on global GHG emissions. But motorization
can evolve in quite different ways at very different rates. The
amount of GHG emissions can be considerably reduced by
offering strong public transport, integrating transit with effi cient
land use, enhancing walking and cycling, encouraging minicars
and electric two-wheelers and providing incentives for effi cient
vehicles and low-GHG fuels. Few studies have analyzed the
potential effect of multiple strategies in developing nations,
partly because of a severe lack of reliable data and the very
large differences in vehicle mix and travel patterns among
varying areas.
Wright and Fulton (2005) estimated that a 5% increase in
BRT mode share against a 1% mode share decrease of private
automobiles, taxis and walking, plus a 2% share decrease of
mini-buses can reduce CO2 emissions by 4% at an estimated
cost of 66 US$/tCO2 in typical Latin American cities. A 5%
or 4% increase in walking or cycling mode share in the same
scenario analysis can also reduce CO2 emissions by 7% or
4% at an estimated cost of 17 or 15 US$/tCO2, respectively
(Table5.6). Although the assumptions of a single infrastructure
unit cost and its constant impact on modal share in the analysis
might be too simple, even shifting relatively small percentages
of mode share to public transport or NMT can be worthwhile,
because of a 1% reduction in mode share of private automobiles
represents over 1 MtCO2 through the 20-year project period.
Figure 5.13 shows the GHG transport emission results,
normalized to year 2000 emissions, of four scenario analyses
of developing nations and cities (Sperling and Salon, 2002).
For three of the four cases, the ‘high’ scenarios are ‘businessas-
usual’ scenarios assuming extrapolation of observable
and emerging trends with an essentially passive government
presence in transport policy. The exception is Shanghai, which
is growing and changing so rapidly that ‘business-as-usual’ has
little meaning. In this case the high scenario assumes both rapid

motorization and rapid population increases, with the execution
of planned investments in highway infrastructure while at the
same time efforts to shift to public transport falter (Zhou and
Sperling, 2001).
5.3.1.6 Improving driving practices (eco-driving)
Fuel consumption of vehicles can be reduced through
changes in driving practices. Fuel-effi cient driving practices,
with conventional combustion vehicles, include smoother
deceleration and acceleration, keeping engine revolutions low,
shutting off the engine when idling, reducing maximum speeds
and maintaining proper tyre pressure (IEA, 2001). Results from
studies conducted in Europe and the USA suggested possible
improvement of 5–20% in fuel economy from eco-driving
training. The mitigation costs of CO2 by eco-driving training
were mostly estimated to be negative (ECMT/IEA, 2005).
Eco-driving training can be attained with formal training
programmes or on-board technology aids. It applies to drivers
of all types of vehicles, from minicars to heavy-duty trucks.
The major challenge is how to motivate drivers to participate in
the programme, and how to make drivers maintain an effi cient
driving style long after participating (IEA, 2001). In the
Netherlands, eco-driving training is provided as part of driving
school curricula (ECMT/IEA, 2005).
5.3.2 Rail
Railway transport is widely used in many countries. In
Europe and Japan, electricity is a major energy source for rail,
while diesel is a major source in North America. Coal is also still
used in some developing countries. Rail’s main roles are high
speed passenger transport between large (remote) cities, high
density commuter transport in the city and freight transport over
long distances. Railway transport competes with other transport
modes, such as air, ship, trucks and private vehicles. Major



5.4: MITIGATION POTENTIAL

As discussed earlier, under ‘business-as-usual’ conditions
with assumed adequate supplies of petroleum, GHG emissions
from transport are expected to grow steadily during the next few
decades, yielding about an 80% increase from 2002–2030 or
2.1% per year. This growth will not be evenly distributed; IEA
projections of annual CO2 growth rates for 2002–2030 range
from 1.3% for the OECD nations to 3.6% for the developing
countries. The potential for reducing this growth will vary
widely across countries and regions, as will the appropriate
policies and measures that can accomplish such reduction.
Analyses of the potential for reducing GHG emissions in the
transport sector are largely limited to national or sub-national
studies or to examinations of technologies at the vehicle level,
for example well-to-wheel analyses of alternative fuels and drive
trains for light-duty vehicles. The TAR presented the results of
several studies for the years 2010 and 2020 (Table 3.16 of the
TAR), with virtually all limited to single countries or to the
EU or OECD. Many of these studies indicated that substantial
reductions in transport GHG emissions could be achieved at
negative or minimal costs, although these results generally used
optimistic assumptions about future technology costs and/or
did not consider trade-offs between vehicle effi ciency and other
(valued) vehicle characteristics. Studies undertaken since the
TAR have tended to reach conclusions generally in agreement
with these earlier studies, though recent studies have focused
more on transitions to hydrogen used in fuel cell vehicles.
This section will discuss some available studies and
provide estimates of GHG emissions reduction potential and
costs/tonne of carbon emissions reduced for a limited set of
mitigation measures. These estimates do not properly refl ect
the wide range of measures available, many of which would
likely be undertaken primarily to achieve goals other than GHG
reduction (or saving energy), for example to provide mobility
to the poor, reduce air pollution and traffi c reduce congestion.
The estimates do not include:
• Measures to reduce shipping emissions;
• Changes in urban structure that would reduce travel demand
and enhance the use of mass transit, walking and bicycling;
• Transport demand management measures, including parking
‘cash out’, road pricing, inner city entry charges, etc.
5.4.1 Available worldwide studies
Two recent studies – the International Energy Agency’s
World Energy Outlook (IEA, 2004a) and the World Business
Council on Sustainable Development’s Mobility 2030 (WBCSD,
2004a) – examined worldwide mitigation potential but were
limited in scope. The IEA study focused on a few relatively
modest measures and the WBCSD examined the impact of
specifi ed technology penetrations on the road vehicle sector
(the study sponsors are primarily oil companies and automobile
manufacturers) without regard to either cost or the policies
needed to achieve such results. In addition, IEA has developed
a simple worldwide scenario for light-duty vehicles that also
explores radical reductions in GHG emissions.

World Energy Outlook postulates an ‘Alternative scenario’ to
their Reference scenario projection described earlier, in which
vehicle fuel effi ciency is improved, there are increased sales of
alternative-fuel vehicles and the fuels themselves and demand
side measures reduce transport demand and encourage a switch
to alternative and less energy intensive transport modes.




In deciding to institute a new fuel economy standard,
governments should consider the following:
• Basing stringency decisions on existing standards elsewhere
requires careful consideration of differences between the
home market and compared markets in fuel quality and
availability; fuel economy testing methods; types and
sizes of vehicles sold; road conditions that may affect
the robustness of key technologies; and conditions that
may affect the availability of technologies, for example,
availability of sophisticated repair facilities.
• There are a number of different approaches to selecting
stringency levels for new standards. Japan selected its
weight class standards by examining ‘top runners’ –
exemplary vehicles in each weight class that could serve as
viable targets for future fl eet wide improvements. Another
approach is to examine the costs and fuel saving effects
of packages of available technologies on several typical
vehicles, applying the results to the new vehicle fl eet (NRC,
2002). Other analyses have derived cost curves (percent
increase in fuel economy compared with technology cost)
for available technology and applied these to corporate or
national fl eets (Plotkin et al., 2002). These approaches are
not technology-forcing, since they focus on technologies
that have already entered the fl eet in mass-market form.
More ambitious standards could demand the introduction
of emerging technologies. Selection of the appropriate level
of stringency depends, of course, on national goals and
concerns. Further, the selection of enforcement deadlines
should account for limitations on the speed with which
vehicle manufacturers can redesign multiple models and
introduce the new models on a schedule that avoids severe
economic disruption.
• The structure of the standard is as important as its level of
stringency. Basing target fuel economy on vehicle weight
(Japan, China) or engine size (Taiwan, South Korea) will
tend to even out the degree of diffi culty the standards impose
on competing automakers, but will reduce the potential fuel
economy gains that can be expected (because weight-based
standards eliminate weight reduction and engine-size-based
standards eliminate engine downsizing as viable means of
achieving the standards). Basing the standard on vehicle
wheelbase times track width may provide safety benefi ts by
providing a positive incentive to maintain or increase these
attributes. Using a uniform standard for all vehicles or for
large classes of vehicles (as in the US) is simple and easy to
explain, but creates quite different challenges on different
manufacturers depending on the market segments they
focus on.
• Allowing trading of fuel economy ‘credits’ among different
vehicles or vehicle categories in an automaker’s fl eet, or
even among competing automakers, will reduce the overall
cost of standards without reducing the total societal benefi ts,
but may incur political costs from accusations of allowing
companies or individuals to ‘buy their way out’ of effi ciency
requirements.
• Alternatives (or additions) to standards are worth
investigating. For example, ‘feebates’, which award cash
rebates to new vehicles whose fuel economy is above a
designated level (often the fl eet average) and charge a fee
to vehicles with lower fuel economy, may be an effective
market-based measure to increase fl eet fuel economy. An
important advantage of feebates is that they provide a
‘continuous’ incentive to improve fuel economy, because
an automaker can always gain a market advantage by
introducing vehicles that are more effi cient than the current
average.
5.5.1.5 Transport Demand Management
Transport Demand Management (TDM) is a formal
designation for programmes in many countries that improve
performance of roads by reducing traffi c volumes (Litman,
2003). There are many potential TDM strategies in these
programmes with a variety of impacts. Some improve transport
diversity (the travel options available to users). Others provide
incentives for users to reduce driving, changing the frequency,
mode, destination, route or timing of their travel. Some reduce
the need for physical travel through mobility substitutes or
more effi cient land use. Some involve policy reforms to correct
current distortions in transport planning practices. TDM is
particularly appropriate in developing country cities, because
of its low costs, multiple benefi ts and potential to redirect the
motorization process. In many cases, effective TDM during
early stages of development can avoid problems that would
result if communities become too automobile dependent. This
can help support a developing country’s economic, social and
environmental objectives (Gwilliam et al., 2004).



The set of strategies to be implemented will vary depending
on each country’s demographic, geographic and political
conditions. TDM strategies can have cumulative and synergetic
impacts, so it is important to evaluate a set of TDM programmes
as a package, rather than as an individual programme. Effective
strategies usually include a combination of positive incentives
to use alternative modes (‘carrots’ or ‘sweeteners’) and negative
incentives to discourage driving (‘sticks’ or ‘levellers’).


Some major strategies such as
pricing and land-use planning are addressed above. Below is a
selective review of additional TDM strategies with signifi cant
potential to reduce vehicle travel and GHGs.
Employer travel reduction strategies gained prominence
from a late 1980s regulation in southern California that required
employers with 100 or more employees to adopt incentives and
rules to reduce the number of car trips by employees commuting
to work (Giuliano et al., 1993). The State of Washington in the
USA kept a state law requiring travel plans in its most urban
areas for employers with 100 or more staff. The law reduced
the percentage of employees in the targeted organizations who
drove to work from 72–68% and affected about 12% of all trips
made in the area. In the Netherlands, the reduction in single
occupant commute trips from a travel plan averaged 5–15%.
In the UK, in very broad terms, the average effectiveness of
UK travel plans might be 6% in trips by drive alone to work
and 0.74% in the total vehicle-km travelled to work by car. The
overall effectiveness was critically dependent on both individual
effectiveness and levels of plan take-up (Rye, 2002).
Parking supply for employees is so expensive that employers
naturally have an incentive to reduce parking demand. The
literature found the price elasticity of parking demand for
commuting at –0.31 to –0.58 (Deuker et al., 1998) and –0.3
(Veca and Kuzmyak, 2005) based on a non-zero initial parking
price. The State of California enacted legislation that required
employers with 50 or more persons who provided parking
subsidies to offer employees the option to choose cash in
lieu of a leased parking space, in a so-called parking cash-out
programme. In eight case studies of employers who complied
with the cash-out programme, the solo driver share fell from
76% before cashing out to 63% after cashing out, leading to
the reduction in vehicle-km for commuting by 12%. If all the
commuters who park free in easily cashed-out parking spaces
were offered the cash option in the USA, it would reduce
vehicle-km travelled per year by 6.3 billion (Shoup, 1997).
Reducing car travel or CO2 emissions by substituting
telecommuting for actual commuting has often been cited in
the literature, but the empirical results are limited. In the USA,
a micro-scale study estimated that 1.5% of the total workforce
telecommuted on any day, eliminating at most 1% of total
household vehicle-km travelled (Mokhtarian, 1998), while
a macro-scale study suggested that telecommuting reduced
annual vehicle-km by 0–2% (Choo et al., 2005).
Reduction of CO2 emissions by hard measures, such as car
restraint, often faces public opposition even when the proposed
measures prove effective. Soft measures, such as a provision of
information and use of communication strategies and educational
techniques (OECD, 2004a) can be used for supporting the
promotion of hard measures. Soft measures can also be directly

helpful in encouraging a change in personal behaviour leading
to an effi cient driving style and reduction in the use of the car
(Jones, 2004). Well organized soft measures were found to be
effective for reducing car travel while maintaining a low cost.
Following travel awareness campaigns in the UK, the concept
of Individualized marketing, a programme based on a targeted,
personalized, customized marketing approach, was developed
and applied in several cities for reducing the use of the car. The
programme reduced car trips by 14% in an Australian city, 12%
in a German city and 13% in a Swedish city. The Travel Blending
technique was a similar programme based on four special kits
for giving travel-feedback to the participants. This programme
reduced vehicle-km travelled by 11% in an Australian city.
The monitoring study after the programme implementation in
Australian cities also showed that the reduction in car travel
was maintained (Brog et al., 2004; Taylor and Ampt, 2003).
Japanese cases of travel-feedback programmes supported the
effectiveness of soft measures for reducing car travel. The
summary of the travel-feedback programmes in residential
areas, workplaces and schools indicated that car use was reduced
by 12% and CO2 emissions by 19%. It also implied that the
travel-feedback programmes with a behavioural plan requiring
a participant to make a plan for a change showed better results
than programmes without one (Fujii and Taniguchi, 2005).

Critique of IPCC's Report on Climate Change

[This is a direct copy-paste from

http://www.geocities.com/carbonomics/MCtfirm/10tf06/10tf06d.html#00

In the next couple of days, I intend to edit this into a post that is more easily understandable.]

AN ECOLOGICAL CRITIQUE OF THE SCIENTIFIC WORKING PARTY OF THE INTER-GOVERNMENTAL PANEL ON CLIMATE CHANGE
Quatermass: What would we do if we found the Earth was doomed by climate change?
Scientist: Nothing but go on squabbling.
(Quote from the film; 'Quatermass and the Pit' 1957).
ONE: THE IPCC REPORT - A WORLD HISTORICAL TURNING POINT?
i) The Establishment of the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
The ipcc was set up by the united nations environment programme and the world meteorological organization in november 1988 to explore the threats posed by the greenhouse effect. The panel was divided into three working groups; the first researched the science of the greenhouse effect; the second explored the impact of climate change on society; and the third examined the need for political measures to minimize the economic costs of the damage which might be caused by the greenhouse effect. Each group produced a report which was debated at the second world climate conference held in november 1990.
ii) The Earth's Current Carbon Status.
The ipcc scientific working group, the ultimate scientific authority on the greenhouse effect,[1] published the final draft of its first report in may 1990. The report pointed out that the rise in the concentration of atmospheric Carbon over the last couple of centuries, but especially since the second world war, had been dramatic. There is approximately 25% more CO2 in the atmosphere today than there was before the industrial revolution[2] but, if all greenhouse gases are taken into consideration, there is the equivalent of 50% more CO2.[3] The ipcc believes this could lead to a correspondingly dramatic increase in global temperatures, “Under the Business-as-Usual scenario emissions of greenhouse gases, a rate of increase of global mean temperature during the next century of 0.3C per decade (with an uncertainty range of 0.2C to 0.5C per decade. This will result in a likely increase in global mean temperature of about 1C above the present value by 2025 and 3C before the end of the next century.”[4]
iii) The IPCC's Draconian Recommendation for Cuts in CO2 Emissions.
The ipcc scientific working party issued a grim warning that the predicted rise in global temperatures could lead to ecological calamities and therefore recommended an immediate reduction in CO2 emissions of 60-80% in order to stabilize the concentration of atmospheric Carbon at the 1990 level, “The long lived (greenhouse) gases would require immediate reductions in emissions from human activities of over 60% to stabilize their concentration at today’s levels.”[5]
This recommendation was far more extreme than anything previously suggested even by supposedly radical environmental groups such as greenpeace, let alone sober, and supposedly scientific, groups such as friends of the Earth. If the world’s leading climatologists had demanded a cut in Carbon emissions of 40% then the global community may have been able to achieve this target through the implementation of dramatic, but nevertheless reformist, measures on the biggest contributors to the greenhouse effect. However, the ipcc’s demand for a cut of 60% implied that the global community would have to implement radical policies which would affect virtually all human activities generating Carbon emissions. It meant, ceteris paribus, that 60% of all cars would have to be taken off the world’s roads; 60% of the world’s power stations would have to be closed down; and 60% of the world’s factories spewing out Carbon emissions would also have to be dismantled, etc., etc.. But recommending that 80% cuts might also be needed was to raise the spectre of a need for a revolutionary transformation of the relationship between humans and the only Planet in the universe on which they can live.
iv) A Scientific Revolution?.
The ipcc scientists’ recommendation seems like a momentous announcement. Never before in the history of science have so many of the world’s leading scientists issued a joint statement demanding that the global community take action to avert a global ecological disaster. It was the severest advice scientists have ever delivered to world political leaders. However, whether it will be regarded in the years to come as a symbol of the fight against the destruction of the Planet is open to question. It is already highly questionable that it will become a world historical turning point.
The political failures of the second world climate conference and, a few years later, the rio Earth summit, were not due solely to ignorant, corrupt politicians; greedy, evil capitalists; nor servile, careerist environmentalists - although of course having these shits decide on the fate of the Earth wasn’t too helpful. One of the major reasons for the failures was scientific - a petty demarcation dispute within the scientific establishment which led to some of the most important features of global warming being left out of the calculations about the scale of the threat posed by climate change.
The ipcc recommendation rested on three, fundamentally flawed, assumptions. These flaws will be highlighted in the next three sections and their solutions outlined in the three sections thereafter.
TWO: THE FLAWS IN THE IPCC’S RECOMMENDATION FOR CUTS IN CARBON EMISSIONS.
i) The Concentration on Carbon Emissions.
The ipcc scientists focussed solely on Carbon emissions even though the level of atmospheric Carbon is determined not merely by the amount of Carbon dumped into the atmosphere but by the Planet’s ability to absorb Carbon through Photosynthesis.
ii) Climate Changes Are Inevitable.
Even if the required cuts in Carbon emissions were achieved immediately, ipcc scientists claimed there would still be a rise in global temperatures because of the huge quantities of Carbon dumped into the atmosphere since the beginning of the industrial revolution, “Even if we were able to stablize emissions of each of the greenhouse gases at present day levels from now on, the temperature is predicted to rise by about 0.2C per decade for the first few decades.”[6] Half the Carbon released during the industrial age is still in the atmosphere and this will produce climatic changes in the decades to come which could have calamitous effects on the Planet’s life-support systems.[7] It will be a century and a half before the Carbon dumped into the atmosphere since the second world war is removed and thus no longer contributing to the greenhouse effect, “Even if all human-made emissions of carbon dioxide were halted in the year 1990, about half the increase in CO2 concentration caused by human activities would still be evident by the year 2100.”[8]
iii) The 1990 Concentration of Atmospheric Carbon Too High.
Finally, even assuming that the concentration of greenhouse gases could be stabilized at the 1990 level, it is simply not known whether human civilization could survive over the long term with this level of atmospheric Carbon.
THREE: RECTIFYING THE MISTAKES.
i) The IPCC Scientific Working Group's Fixation on Carbon Emissions.
One of the peculiarities of the scientific working group’s analysis was that whilst it recommended cuts in Carbon emissions it made no parallel recommendations for an increase in the Planet’s Forest cover[9] even though a number of commentators have postulated that the Earth is one continent short of the Forests needed to maintain climatic stability, “Dysen and Marland have calculated that .. to absorb the 20,000 million tons of CO2 currently emitted every year into the atmosphere, an area of 7 million square kilometres (roughly the size of Australia) would have to be planted.”[10] There seems to have been a convergence of political and scientific interests which led to this bizarre, and dangerous, neglect of the Planet’s Photosynthetic capacity.
Government representatives involved in the ipcc political working parties did not want ipcc scientists to make recommendations for extending/preserving the Earth’s Forest cover because of the huge economic costs. As far as the over-industrialized nations were concerned, Reforesting large tracts of their own land to soak up atmospheric Carbon would not only be expensive but a gross misuse of scarce resources which could be used much more profitably for the construction of new car factories, new office blocks, new roads, etc.. On the other side of the Planet, the disintegrating/industrializing nations didn’t want their Forests commandeered as sinks for the Carbon pollution created by rich countries. There seems, then, to have been a tacit agreement between rich and the poor governments to avoid any agreement over the issue of Forest cover.
The ipcc scientists’, however, had their own reasons for focussing on Carbon emissions. These had little to do with the politics of the global political community but everything to do with the politics of the global scientific community. In the scientific world each discipline acts, very unscientifically, like an intellectual closed shop rigorously defending its area of specialized knowledge and discouraging scientists from straying beyond the confines of their own discipline.[11] The scientists involved in the ipcc scientific working party were meteorologists and climatologists - they were not biologists, life scientists, nor ecologists. As a result they concentrated upon their field of expertise, the atmosphere, and ignored the role played by Plants and Wildlife in determining the atmosphere’s chemical composition. During the final discussions for the ipcc’s second report, published in may 1992 in preparation for the rio Earth summit, one commentator complained about this state of affairs, “At this year’s (ipcc) meeting in China, when the 1992 report was finalized, not a single ecologist took the microphone to put their case among the atmospheric scientists who dominated the meeting.”[12] It seems the ipcc scientists were far from disturbed by the political failure to agree policies for Reforestation.
The consequence of the ipcc scientists’ intellectual closed shoppism was a half baked ecological analysis whose focus on Carbon emissions has led to a global repetition of this nonsense.[13] Far worse is that it has allowed governments around the world to continue ransacking their Forests in the absurd belief that as long as they reduce their Carbon emissions they can continue to deforest their country, and thus the Planet, with climatic impunity. But, even if the required reductions in Carbon emissions are eventually achieved, the level of atmospheric Carbon could go on rising if the Planet’s Photosynthetic capacity continues to be decimated. One commentator blames scientists for allowing governments to go on ransacking Forests and for failing to come to an agreement about the need to increase the Earth’s Forest cover .. “the halting progress of the continuing discussions on forests in the Prepatory Committee of the UNCED. The critical observation .. was that in no case has there been political progress in addressing environmental issues internationally without consensus from the scientific community as to the definition of the problem and an equally clear definition of potential solutions.”[14]
ii) Climate Change Not Inevitable.
Perhaps the ipcc scientists’ most disturbing error was their view that climate change is inevitable because of the current levels of atmospheric Carbon. This error stems directly from their failure to take into account the role of Forests in regulating the climate.
For the sake of simplicity, it can be argued that deforestation boosts global warming in three ways;
firstly, by releasing Carbon emissions which boost the greenhouse effect;
secondly, by reducing the Planet’s ability to absorb atmospheric Carbon and,
thirdly, by changing the Planet’s albedo so that the Earth absorbs more sunlight, “The evaporation of water from forests is part of Gaia's cooling system.”[15]
Conversely, Reforestation could be used to combat global warming in two ways; firstly, by absorbing atmospheric Carbon (thereby decreasing the greenhouse effect) and, secondly, by generating clouds which reflect sunlight back into space (thereby decreasing the heat effect). The point which needs to be emphasized is that whilst the former reduces the greenhouse effect only slowly over the decades and centuries, the latter reduces global warming within years by increasing the Planet's albedo. Reforestation thus has a critical, short term, role in reducing global temperatures. Although it cannot combat global warming in the short term via a reduction in Carbon emissions, it can do so via a reduction in the heat effect, “Changes in the terrestrial biota will also effect the overall albedo of the planet. Lashof believes this to be 'probably the most significant feedback produced by the terrestrial biota'.”[16] There is, therefore, no inevitability about a latent rise in global warming since it could be prevented by Reforestation. Even though the build-up of Carbon emissions will exert a considerable upward pressure on global temperatures this does not mean there will inevitably be a rise in temperatures because Reforestation could create a refrigeration effect which, if extensive enough, could more than offset such pressures.
It is imperative to reduce Carbon emissions and prevent further boosts to the greenhouse effect. However, this does not mean that cutting Carbon emissions is the most important policy for combatting global warming. The most urgent priority is Reforestation.
The consequence of the IPCC climatologists’ closed shop mentality was that it led them, and thereby many politicians and green organizations, to dismiss the priority of Reforestation.[17] The irony is that although the IPCC scientists measured the effect of sea-ice albedo on the climate, they did not measure the role of biomass albedo, “biogeochemical feedbacks such as .. vegetation albedo are generally neglected.”[18] If they had done so it is doubtful whether they would have made such a dangerous mistake.
iii) The Need to Return to Pre-industrial Levels of Atmospheric Carbon.
Politically, the ipcc scientists played safe by recommending that the concentration of atmospheric Carbon should be stabilized at the 1990 level. Given that the current level of greenhouse gases is 50% higher than in pre-industrial times and could have serious climatic consequences, the ipcc scientists should have been courageous enough to risk the ire of the global community by insisting that the concentration of atmospheric Carbon should be reduced to pre-industrial levels to avoid any potential environmental disaster - even if this meant even more draconian action than that entailed by the demand for 60-80% reductions in CO2 emissions.
James lovelock, however, doubts whether even a return to pre-industrial levels will be sufficient to prevent a climatic disaster, “In the last few tens of millions of years the solar output has reached a level where it is becoming increasingly difficult for the CO2 pumping system to operate. To keep cool when the solar output is as high as now requires efficient pumping by the system so that a carbon dioxide level below 200 parts per million (ppm) is sustained.”[19]
Lovelock’s target for the concentration of atmospheric Carbon needs to be put into context. There are currently about 700,000,000,000 tonnes of Carbon in the atmosphere - approximately 350 ppm. Carbon is being dumped into the atmosphere at the rate of about 5-6 billion tonnes a year and, as a consequence, “It is estimated that by the year 2040 it (the concentration of Carbon) will have increased to 560 ppm.”[20] Prior to the industrial revolution there were approximately 270 ppm of atmospheric Carbon. Further back in history, “At the height of the ice age, 18,000 years ago... the content in the atmosphere of CO2 was 210 parts per million.”[21]
In other words, for the sake of the Planet’s health, lovelock recommends a concentration of atmospheric Carbon which is lower than that found at the height of the last ice age. He believes the Earth’s natural state is an ice age, warm periods seem to be geophysiological abnormalities, “The present interglacial warm period could be regarded as a fever for Gaia and that left to herself she would be relaxing into her normal, comfortable for her, ice age.”[22] Given the rapid accumulation of atmospheric Carbon over the last couple of centuries and the rate at which Carbon is currently being dumped into the atmosphere, it should be obvious that attempting to decrease current levels of Carbon to that which existed not merely before the industrial revolution but during the height of the last ice age would require nothing less than a total revolution in humans’ attitude toward the Earth. But, if it is imperative to make a dramatic reversal of current trends in which humans are turning large portions of the Planet into a lifeless deserts, is it necessary to go all the way to the other extreme and actively regulate the climate to encourage the return of ice sheets to the north american and euroasian continents?
FOUR: THE IPCC’S INTELLECTUAL APARTHEID.
i) The Inadequacies of the IPCC's General Circulation Model.
I: The Inadequacies of Computing Power.
The ipcc scientists’ recommendation for draconian cuts in Carbon emissions was derived from forecasts about the Planet’s long term climate produced by computer models, known as general circulation models, (gcms).[23] They simulate the Earth’s past, present and future, climates. At the moment, however, even the most powerful supercomputers and the most sophisticated computer software can measure the Planet’s climate only by aggregating climatic conditions across huge areas of the Earth’s atmosphere, covering tens of thousands of cubic miles - which means they can’t even resolve the climate of the brutish isles. In addition, at present gcms can handle only a limited number of climatic variables. Not surprisingly, a number of factors influencing the Planet’s climate had to be left out of the ipcc's computer model - many of which could boost global warming, “Unfortunately, even though this is crucial for climate change prediction, only a few models linking all the main components of the climate system in a comprehensive way have been developed.”[24]
II: The Failure to Incorporate Phyotomass.
The first major deficiency of the ipcc’s computer model was, as has been pointed out above, the failure to incorporate the role played by terrestrial Phytomass. “Today's (climate) models do not account fully for the removal of CO2 from the atmosphere by land plants, but may overstate the oceans' ability to absorb it.”;[25] “The role of forests in affecting climate has been grossly underestimated by climatologists, largely as a result of too heavy a focus on the role of the oceans. The distortion persists in the recent report of the scientific sessions of the second World Climate Conference held in Geneva (WMO, 1990). The role of forests is acknowledged as potentially contributing to solution of the problem by storing additional carbon through reforestation, but the need to stop deforestation is not emphasized.”;[26] “The weaknesses of current climate models in respect of clouds and oceans arise even before other pieces of the Earth system, like icecaps, vegetation and volcanoes, are incorporated properly.”[27] One of the leading ipcc scientists pointed out that none of the world’s seven major computer models incorporated the biosphere, “Very little has been said in this chapter about the biosphere. The large three-dimensional gcm described in this chapter contain a lot of dynamics and physics but no interactive chemistry or biology.”[28]
The role played by Phytoplankton was also ignored, “The damage done to certain species of plankton by increased ultra-violet radiation .. was highlighted recently by the ozone trends panel of the UNEP but ignored by the IPCC.”[29] “One group of plankton, the Coccolithophorids, are apparently a major source of DMS and their bloom processes would most likely respond, although in uncertain ways, to changes in ocean-atmosphere exchanges resulting from climate change.”[30]
III: The Failure to Take into Account Biotic Feedback Processes.
Much more importantly than the ipcc’s biotic blinkeredness was that no account was taken of biotic feedback processes whereby increases in anthropogenic global warming cause changes to the Earth’s Phytomass which stimulates further increases in global temperatures, “Current gcms contain the key geophysical climate feedbacks, such as changes in water vapour, clouds and sea ice albedo, but biogeochemical feedbacks such as changes in methane emissions, ocean CO2 uptake and vegetation albedo are generally neglected.”;[31] “Several atmospheric feedback processes are well defined in GCM but those relating to ocean productivity are not yet sufficiently well understood to be included.”[32]
The ipcc’s second report failed to remedy this inadequacy, “Biological feedback processes were left out of the IPCC’s climate models.”[33] Two examples of the scale of such omissions can be given. Firstly, the Arctic Tundra contains vast quantities of methane, “About 27% of the world's carbon store is locked up in the peat bogs of the tundra and the boreal forests.”[34] Although the Arctic Tundra is melting and releasing methane, “The IPCC report says this effect has probably been underestimated.”[35]. Since then it has been learnt that the Arctic Tundra is now a net source of methane, “Meanwhile, in February (1993) we learned that the demonstrably-warming Arctic tundra has transformed from a CO2 sink into a significant source of CO2. Biogeochemical feedbacks like this, however, are omitted from most climate models. The dreadful rates of warming the IPCC forecasts may in fact be underestimates.”[36] Secondly, and more worrying, is the failure to take into account the release of trillions of tons of methane currently locked up in polar waters, “Potentially the most important biogeochemical feedback is the release of methane from near-shore ocean sediments.”[37] The escape of such huge quantities of methane could generate a runaway greenhouse effect.
If, as a result of such feedback mechanisms, a quantum leap in the climate took place the likelihood of a global ecological breakdown would increase dramatically. The longer it takes to implement effective policies to combat global warming, the greater the accumulation of atmospheric Carbon, the greater the chance of a quantum change in the Planet’s climate, the greater the difficulties of reversing such a change.
IV: The Vulnerability of Ecosystems.
Another factor not considered by ipcc scientists is a danger highlighted by james lovelock - that an ecological system is likely to collapse if it surpasses a threshold level of damage, “To a planetary physician, by far the most dangerous malady afflicting the Earth is that of exfoliation - destruction of its living skin. In human medicine the loss of skin from whatever cause is a serious threat to life: the loss of more than 70% of the skin by burning is usually fatal. To denude the Earth of its forests and other natural ecosystems and of its soils is like burning the skin of a human. And we shall soon have destroyed or replaced with inefficient farmlands 70% of the earth's natural land surface cover.”[38] If this is the case then the safety margin before an ecological collapse may be much smaller than the ipcc assumed.
V: Research Failures.
It should also be noted that a number of atmospheric pollutants could not be included because their contribution to the greenhouse effect had not been quantified, e.g. “Ground level (tropospheric) ozone (from vehicles) makes a significant contribution to global warming, but is very difficult to quantify. For this reason the IPCC did not include it in its estimates of the contribution that various greenhouse gases make to global climate change.”[39]
ii) Conclusions.
The ipcc’s gcm is not merely inadequate and fundamentally flawed, it is also dangerous because by concentrating solely upon the greenhouse effect they have ignored the contribution which deforestation makes to gobal warming and this has allowed countries all over the world to continue ransacking their Forests. Even worse is that it underestimates the threat posed by global warming. The ipcc have admitted that, “although many of the feedback processes are poorly understood, it seems likely that, overall, they will act to increase, rather than decrease, greenhouse gas concentrations in a warmer world.”[40] The inadequacies of the ipcc’s model meant, “Uncertainty led to 7 of the potentially most alarming factors being left out of the UN's final report.”[41] This led one commentator to criticize the ipcc for failing to warn political leaders about the possibility of a runaway global warming, “The scientists of the IPCC have undersold the worst possibilities outlined in their analysis of global warming.”[42]
The ipcc scientists’ failure to explore biotic factors critical to global warming is partly technological due to inadequate computers and computer software, but mainly a result of the scientific establishment’s creation of intellectual demarcation zones and the disputes between Earth scientists and life scientists; climatologists and biologists; as well as battles between those inside the scientific establishment and those outside, primarily Gaians, who do not subject themselves to the same constraints as the ipcc scientists. Whilst ipcc scientists like john houghton admit that they do not take the biosphere into account when assessing global warming, james lovelock has shown that the climate is regulated by the biosphere. Although it is argued that, “There have been no long term studies of the responses of most of the world’s ecostsyems to elevated CO2 or climate change.”[43] the fact is that huge masses of information about the state of the Earth’s Vegetation cover have been collected from satellites over the last decade or so, “When Tucker and Townsend mapped the vegetation index, season by season, they were able to distinguish broad areas of rainforest, grassland and so on, by the density of vegetation and its seasonal behaviour.”[44]The vegetation index .. “turned out to be a prime measure of the influence of plants in the Earth system.”[45] Only one team of scientists have created a computer model to use this information to determine what is happening to the Earth’s Vegetation. Piers Sellars and his colleagues in Maryland designed a computer model of the climate to interpret the satellite’s data. By 1986 they were feeding the model with vast quantities of information and helping to evaluate a huge segment of the Earth’s Carbon spiral, “Their Simple Biosphere Model takes in conventional weather data and computes changes in leaf temperatures, the rain, and dew wetting the leaves, and the wetness of various layers of soil.”[46] It might have been thought that it should be the highest priority for the ipcc, and the other major climate modellers, to incorporate this simple biosphere model and the vast quantities of information it contains.
Whilst the scientific establishment’s closed shop could have been condoned when the dangers posed by climate change were still in serious dispute, this is no longer the case. It is frightening that climatologists’ self-imposed “intellectual apartheid” has caused scientific misjudgements which have not only ignored the role of the biosphere on the Earth’s climate, but have overlooked the vital priority of Reforestation in combatting climate change, and considerably underestimated the threat posed by global warming.
It seems the ipcc scientists have not so much initiated a full-blown scientific revolution as allowed their own petty rivalries to override a comprehensive analysis of the ecological calamities looming on the horizon. What is certain, however, is that politically they have utterly failed to expose, and then challenge, the frightening ecocidal behaviour of the over-industrialized nations.
In a number of ways the ipcc scientists did take a number of risks in their first report. They could easily have become an object of derision for basing their extreme recommendations for reductions in atmospheric Carbon on such inadequate knowledge of the Earth’s ecological processes. However, by going out of the way to indicate the inadequacies of the evidence, and by admitting the areas of uncertainty, the ipcc not merely followed correct scientific procedures but put pressure on politicians to fund the necessary research for a comprehensive understanding of global warming.
iii) The IPCC’s 1992 Rio Update.
In May 1992 the ipcc scientific working group published an updated scientific report in time for the rio Earth summit. This included new scientific evidence about the greenhouse effect which had emerged in the intervening period. Whilst this led to minor modifications in the understanding of the greenhouse effect it did not require the ipcc scientists to change their views about the threat posed by global warming, and they reiterated their earlier recommendation, “Findings of scientific research since 1990 .. do not justify alteration of the major conclusions of the first IPCC scientific assessment.”[47]
I: The Failure to Incorporate Phyotomass.
In the second edition, the ipcc acknowledged its failure to take Phytomass into account, “Since IPCC (1990) particular attention has focussed on understanding the processes controlling the release and uptake of CO2 from both the terrestrial biosphere and the oceans, and on the quantification of the fluxes. The terrestrial biospheric processes which are suggested as contributing to the (Carbon) sinks are sequestration due to forest regeneration, and fertilization arising from the effects of both CO2 and nitrogen (N) but none of these can be adequately quantified.”[48]
The ipcc has set up a new research programme to develop a common methodology to assist each country around the world in drawing up national ecological inventories. The national inventories of net emissions of greenhouse gases will measure not only Carbon sources but sinks, “In order to support national and international responses to climate change, it is necessary to estimate emissions and sinks at the national level in an agreed and consistent way. The IPCC has established a work programme to:
i) develop an approved detailed methodology for calculating national inventories of greenhouse gas emissions and sinks
ii) assist all participating countries to implement this methodology and provide results by the end of 1993.
An IPCC workshop on National Greenhouse Gas Inventories, held in Geneva from 5 to 6 December 1991, proposed guidance on needed improvements in the draft methodology and priorities for the work programme.”[49]
II: The Failure to Incorporate Biological Feedbacks.
“Biological feedbacks have not yet been taken into account in simulations of climate change.”[50]
III: The New Evidence Concerning Global Warming.
Firstly, as many commentators had suspected, it was confirmed that ozone depletion was counteracting the effects of global warming, “Depletion of ozone in the lower stratosphere in the middle and high latitudes results in a decrease in radiative forcing which is believed to be comparable in magnitude to the radiative forcing contribution of CFCs (globally averaged) over the last decade or so.”[51]
The role of aerosols was elaborated, “In most cases aerosols tend to cool climate. In general, they have a much shorter lifetime than greenhouse gases so their concentrations respond much more quickly to changes in emissions.”[52]This led to a modification of the ipcc’s conclusions, “If sulphur emissions continue to increase, this warming rate is likely to be reduced, significantly in the northern hemisphere, by an amount dependent on the future magnitude and regional distribution of the emissions.”[53]

Some thoughts on the Lacunae of Green politics

[This is a direct copy-paste from
http://www.geocities.com/carbonomics/MCtfirm/10tf06/10tf06c.html#00

However, I hope to refine this post in the next few days and highlight elements that are universally applicable.]

MUNDIMENTALISM
The following article is a contribution to the current debate within the Green party concerning the party's philosophy, policies, methodology, structure, tactics, and future within the green movement.

ONE: GREEN PHILOSOPY
i) Geocentrism.
The green party must make geocentrism - the belief that all value derives from the Earth and that humans are just one species amongst many others - the centre of its philosophy and politics. Philosophically, the most succinct way of doing this is to adopt an anti-speciesist stance. The green party is opposed to racism, sexism, genderism, ageism, etc., but has not yet stated categorically that it is opposed to speciesism. Until it does it will remain just another humanist party pursuing the same types of policies as other political parties and thus destroy, rather than protect, the Planet's life support system.

ii) The Attack on Humanism and Anthropocentrism.
Human activities are destroying an increasing proportion of the Planet's life sustaining processes and, if current trends continue, it is only a matter of decades before this results in a geophysiological collapse. The main cause of this destruction is not capitalism, communism, imperialism, or poverty, etc., but anthropocentrism, the absurd belief that humans are the most important species on Earth.[1] Anthropocentrism entitles humans to treat the Planet in whatever way they wish no matter how destructive this might be. It is imperative, therefore, that the green party does as much as it can to undermine anthropocentrism because of the damage it is causing the Earth.

It is quite staggering that whilst the reputedly most compassionate greens such as eco-socialists, social ecologists, and green anarchists, oppose all forms of human oppression, they totally ignore, if not condone or, even worse, participate in, the human exploitation of Animals. This country murders nearly 800 million Animals every year (and this is just the vertebrates) which represents a tidal wave of exploitation, vile tortures, and brutality the likes of which this country has never seen before.[2] And yet compassionate greens do not seem to regard this gigantic slaughter as being in the least bit politically or ecologically significant. They seem unable to understand that today's level of mass extermination is something quite different from the slaughter which took place in the past. Humans have killed Animals from the earliest of times but the current, industrialized, rate of slaughter is astronomically larger than anything which has happened in the past that it can only be seen as a qualitatively different phenomena.
The oppression of Animals is the biggest and the worst form of exploitation on Earth - far worse than classism, racism, sexism, genderism, etc., and the extermination of Wildlife is a greater moral depravity than nazism or genocide. Greens who have compassion for humans but not Animals are frauds. The crucial issue of our time is not global warming but the dismantling of humanism.

iii) Animals Saving the Planet.
There is another reason why geocentrism should be made the centre of green philosophy. It is a geophysiological fact that Ants and Worms are doing more to protect the Planet's life-sustaining processes than humans. In fact all Animal species are doing more to save the Planet than humans. Humans are the only geophysiologically destructive species on Earth. Why is it, then, that the only Animals on this Planet with votes are those causing ecological destruction?
iv) The Ecological Destruction Caused by the Animal Exploitation Industry.
Finally, another reason for giving top priority to geocentrism is that although it is not yet possible to verify the hypothesis, the evidence points in the direction that Animal exploitation is one of the most ecologically destructive industries on Earth.[3] It is possible that it is even more destructive than the road/car/oil industries, human overpopulation and capitalism. If greens are serious about stopping ecological destruction they must focus their campaigns and propaganda on the most ecologically destructive activities and that means primarily the Animal exploitation industry.

TWO: GREEN POLICIES.
i) Animal Freedom and the Creation of Wilderness Areas.
The green party must give top priority to the creation of Wilderness areas. Globally, greens should demand that a substantial part of the land in each country around the world is put aside as Wilderness for the exclusive use of Wildlife.
It is imperative to go beyond Animal welfare, Animal conservation,[4] Animal rights, and Animal liberation, to promote Animal freedom. The creation of Wilderness zones and the guaranteeing of Animal freedom is not a spiritual matter but partly scientific, since humans cannot survive on Earth without Animals, and partly the need for humans to repay their ecological debts to Wildlife. After all, it was Wildlife which turned the Earth into a habitable Planet. But Wildlife not only created the Earth, they created humans. God did not create humans - Wildlife did. If humans need a god then it ought to be Wildlife.

ii) Immigration.
It is a manifest contradiction for cornucopian decentralists to support the right of local communities/regions to control their own resources and yet also support open borders. Even worse is that the biggest beneficiaries of the creation of a global village would be the rich who could acquire homes in various countries around the world, and travel wherever they wanted, whilst the worst affected are the poor who’d find themselves walking past holiday homes which remain empty for 10 months of the year, and have to suffer transport pollution. The reason that decentralists (and other light greens) fail to understand that all 6 billion, soon to be 8 billion, going on 12 billion, people on Earth cannot own as many homes as they want and travel wherever they want and by whatever means they want without producing an ecological collapse, is because they know very little about ecology. Each region should have the right to choose how many newcomers should be invited to live within its borders. If some regions don't want any additional members then that is their prerogative.

iii) Overpopulation.
Overpopulation is already a considerable ecological danger. Given its (near) exponential rate of growth, it could eventually become the biggest threat to the Planet's ecology. Unfortunately, whilst some greens seem all too willing to talk about, and to promote policies against, overpopulation they seem reluctant to do the same as regards capitalism. Overpopulation is not a single issue but consists of the five Cs:-
* cars (i.e. car overpopulation and the road/car/oil industries);
* kids (i.e. human overpopulation);
* cattle (i.e. livestock overpopulation and the animal exploitation industry),
* capital (i.e. the overconsumption of the Earth's capital resources, the colossal growth in the number of capital construction projects and the huge expansion of wealth) and,
* carnage (i.e. the arms industry and war).

iv) Alternative Energy.

There is a need to make a distinction between alternative forms of energy (solar power, wind, wave, biomass, hydro-electric, etc) and renewable forms of energy (i.e. Photosynthetic resources primarily Trees). Alternative forms of energy are not renewable - new zealand thought it had a 'renewable' source of energy until the winter of 1991-92 when river levels fell so much many of its hydro-electric generators became inoperable. More importantly, the fact has to be faced that alternative energy has the potential to cause vastly more ecological damage than fossil fuels. The colossal hydro-electric power schemes in india (the narmada dam); china (the three gorges project on the yangtse); brazil (the caracas project), and, much closer to home, the construction of tidal barrages around brutish estuaries, will all cause a considerable amount of ecological destruction.
The green party should oppose all forms of alternative energy. At the very least, it should carry out an ecological analysis (see below) of its alternative energy policies and reject those which cause ANY ecological damage.

v) Regulating the Earth's Climate.
If there were no humans around, the Earth would currently be heading back into the next ice age and vast ice sheets would gradually be spreading across the north american and euroasian continents. However, humans have boosted global warming to such an extent they are not merely preventing the return of the next ice age but are threatening to cause a quantum leap in global temperatures which could turn the Planet into a vast desert.
There is little choice about the matter. Humans have got to regulate the Planet's climate to prevent either of these extremes. What is more, humans must regulate the climate not merely to protect the Planet's life-sustaining processes, but to maximize Biodiversity. Green politics must be based on geophysiology, the science of the Earth’s climate. It is transparent that greens need to be far more concerned about globalization than they are with devolution.

vi) The Nature of a Sustainable Planet.
The green party should advocate the need for global institutions to regulate the Planet's climate and to protect the Earth's Biodiversity. Whilst the green party has formulated national policies it still hasn't outlined the nature of a sustainable Planet. It is necessary to specify the structure, functions and purpose of the global institutions needed to maintain a sustainable planet.

THREE: A GREEN METHODOLOGY.
The Green party should adopt, as part of its manifesto for a sustainable society (mfss), a geophysiological analysis; a Carbon methodology; a global Carbon budget; and Carbon costed policies:-

i) A Geophysiological Analysis.
This would:-
* outline the scale of the ecological devastation happening around the Earth and thereby determine the imminence of a global ecological collapse;
* assess the major social/political/economic/cultural forces causing ecological destruction; and
* determine which ecological calamity poses the biggest, and most immediate, threat to the survival of life on Earth, e.g. acid rain, ozone depletion or global warming.
Answers to these questions should provide the Green party with a more accurate understanding of:-
* which policies should be given the highest priority;
* the rapidity with which these policies must be implemented to prevent an ecological breakdown; and,
* which industries would need to be reformed, or abolished, in order to prevent a global ecological collapse.

ii) A Carbon Methodology.
A geophysiological analysis entails measuring and comparing the impact of the diverse phenomena mentioned above on the Planet's global Carbon cycle. For example, it is possible to measure the relative destructiveness of the road/car/oil industries, human overpopulation, the Animal exploitation industry, capitalism and carnage, etc., by exploring their contribution to global warming. It is imperative therefore for the green party to adopt a Carbon methodology.
The global Carbon cycle, however, is only one of the Earth's many natural cycles e.g. hydrogen, oxygen, sulphur, etc.. It is clear that any geophysiological analysis which confines itself solely to Carbon will, eventually, prove to be inadequate. But, given the all pervasive presence of Carbon on the Earth and its central role in the life process, it would give the best approximation of the damage being inflicted on the Planet.

At the very least, a Carbon methodology would be a model of the type of analysis that needs to be carried out for all the Planet's major natural cycles. There is no getting away from the fact that the green party is going to have to carry out this type of scientific work if it is to present itself as a credible, ecologically knowledgeable, organization which understands the Planet's geophysiology and knows how to protect it.

iii) A Global Carbon Budget.
If humans are to regulate the Planet's climate and steer clear from either an ice age or a heat age, they will need to control the concentration of atmospheric Carbon. The amount of Carbon in the atmosphere is determined by Carbon emissions and the Planet's Photosynthetic capacity, i.e. primarily its level of Forest cover. Carbon is the Planet's thermostat and the concentration of atmospheric Carbon determines the Earth's global average temperature. It should be possible for humans to turn up the heat to avoid an ice age, or decrease the heat to avoid global warming, by varying the amount of Carbon dumped into the atmosphere emissions and by increasing/decreasing the scale of the Planet's Forest cover. A global scientific body such as the inter-governmental panel on climate change should be given responsibility for drawing up a global Carbon budget and then setting the concentration of atmospheric Carbon by fixing firstly, a ceiling for global Carbon emissions and, secondly, the scale of the Planet's Forest cover.
Once the green party has adopted a global Carbon budget, preferably with the co-operation of all other green parties around the world, it should then be possible to determine what brutland's national Carbon budget should be - there should also be national Carbon budgets for every other country around the world. In turn, national governments would give each of their regions a Carbon budget within which they would have to live. National and regional governments would have to face the rigours not of cash limitations but of Carbon limitations.

iv) Planetary Policies Determine National Policies Not Vice Versa.
At present, all countries around the world are altering the Earth's climate, to a greater or lesser extent, by dumping Carbon pollution into the atmosphere and by ransacking their Forests. One hundred and fifty countries are, in effect, trying to create 150 different global climates and, if this continues, there will be a geophysiological breakdown. If humans want to create a stable climate which is sustainable and maximizes Biodiversity then all countries must co-operate (on an equal basis) to produce a specific concentration of atmospheric Carbon.
The need to set a global Carbon budget to create a specific climate and to implement global policies to create a sustainable Planet, means that it is not possible to put forward policies to create an ecologically sustainable community (or region or nation) without showing how these policies fit in with this global context. Only when a global Carbon budget and ecologically sound global policies have been created would it be possible to create ecologically sound communual (or regional or national) policies. In other words, Planetary policies determine national (and regional) policies and not, as at present, the other way around because this latter state of affairs, as should be all too obvious, is leading to a global ecological breakdown.
Given that the Planet is a unitary geophysiological entity then, in effect, there are no local environmental problems. All green problems are geophysiological, that is global, in scope and can be solved only within a global context. It is theoretically impossible to work out what an ecologically sound policy is for a community, region or nation without global ecological policies and a global Carbon budget. Without a global Carbon budget to create a climate which maximizes Biodiversity, and Planetary policies to create an ecologically sustainable Planet, then green policies are just so much green sounding wishful thinking. The policies put forward in the green party's manifesto are irrelevant because they are not located within such a global context.[5]
Nationalists who support national sovereignty (and decentralists who support communal sovereignty) believe they have the right, in effect, to create their own climate. But, whilst it may be possible for countries (or communities) to become economically self-sufficient, or achieve resource self-sufficiency, it is not possible to achieve ecological self sufficiency. There is only one climate.

v) Carbon Costed Policies.
The creation of a global Carbon budget (and correspondingly national/regional Carbon budgets) would mean that all governments would have to assess policies in terms of their Carbon implications i.e. their effect on Carbon emissions AND net primary production (i.e. Photosynthesis). Once governments had Carbon costed their policies, they would have to make choices about which ones they could afford within the limitations of their national Carbon budgets.
The green party should evaluate all of its policies in the mfss (and policy proposals) in terms of their Carbon costs and then discard those which would exceed the national Carbon budget. If it does not adopt global, and national, Carbon budgets and Carbon costed policies, the green party could find itself advocating environmentally friendly policies (e.g. alternative energy) which lead not merely to considerable, but perhaps even critical, ecological damage.

vi) The Politicical Advantages of a Carbon Methodology.
The Carbon theory of value provides an invaluable device for measuring the ecological implications of political policies and the seriousness of the Planet's ecological predicament. Donella meadows recently called for the introduction of a simplistic, ecological, measuring device to replace gross domestic product as a guide to a country's well being. Carbon may be the most suitable device. Another major advantage of the Carbon theory of value is that it supplies some excellent weapons for political propaganda.

vii) Conclusions.
Without an geophysiological analysis and a Carbon methodology the Green party will never be able to determine which are the most urgent issues and which policies should be given priority. Without a global Carbon budget it would not be able to prevent a global warming disaster. Without Carbon costed policies, it will end up damaging the Planet's geophysiology. It is doubtful whether the public would support the green party if it didn't have clear answers to the crucial ecological issues of our time.

FOUR: THE STRUCTURE OF THE GREEN PARTY.
Most of this section has already been highlighted in the previous article.
i) The Leadership Issue.
The Green party needs a national leader.
ii) A Green Party Shadow Cabinet.
The regional council is vital for the success of green politics.
iii) The Policy Community.
The policy community has been very useful for encouraging greater participation in the Green party and has a valuable educational role.

FIVE: GREEN TACTICS.
i) The Limitations of Media-ism.
The green party cannot afford to concentrate solely upon publicizing its message through the media. The media forces greens to censor themselves; to concentrate upon short term issues; to conform to prevailing values; and to extol boundless optimism. These pressures are completely antithetical to the green party which needs to tell the truth about the grim state of the Planet's ecology; to promote long term policies; to tell consumers how much they are going to have to change to lead a sustainable life; and to express its fundamental pessimism that if humans, primarily consumers in the over-industrialized nations, continue to act in the way they are doing at present then there is not the slightest doubt they will cause a global ecological collapse.
The value of the media is also overestimated. Although the media industry continues to grow the proliferation of media outlets means that each one is left with a smaller and smaller share of the audience. What is more, it is virtually impossible to convince people of the merits of virtually any green policies when a large proportion don't even understand the role of Trees in the Planet's ecology. Many people believe Trees are nothing more than ornaments - usually unwanted ones because they have a bad habit of blocking out sunlight, undermining building foundations, causing hazards to motorists, etc..
ii) The Limitations of Community Politics.
After doing community work for seven years[6] I have concluded that the current prospects for grassroots' politicization are minimal. External forces are far too powerful for fragile communities - not so much capitalism as coronation street and all powerful one party local states. Such an observation is probably commonplace amongst decentralists who don't spend most of their time in national politics.

iii) Extra Parliamentary Action.
Given the limitations of the previous two tactics there is little alternative but to use extra-parliamentary activities. There are not many decades left before an ecological collapse so greens must go on the offensive. The ratification of the gatt treaty is nothing less than a formal act of war against the Earth.

iv) Preparing for the Worst.
The gap between where humans are now and a sustainable green future is so huge that it might well be beyond the powers of persuasion to shift people's attitudes sufficiently to win their support for the establishment of a green world. If an ecologically sound Planet cannot be created through democratic means then it will have to be done dictatorially. The Earth is more important than democracy.

SIX: A NEW GREEN PARTY.
i) The Need for Factions.
There is an exhilerating profusion of ideas, beliefs and theories within the green party. What helps to stir up this melting pot is the lack of any guidelines from the science of ecology which is still in its formative period. Indeed, it can be argued that green politics, as opposed to environmentalism, began with lovelock's theory of gaia and the establishment of the ipcc. The lack of certainty about the nature of the Planet's life support system makes the process of policy formulation that much more difficult. Despite the increasingly desperate ecological predicament greens need patience. The green party's teething problems are virtually unavoidable given that green politics is still at an embryonic stage.

Given the inadequacy of green science the green party should allow its factions to flourish in the hope of fostering the more rapid spread of scientific ideas and the formulation of new policies based on these new insights. The green party should allow its factions to organize and develop their own policies - as long as each one abides by nationally agreed policies.

ii) The Case for Separation.
However, ever since the 1989 euro-elections the green party has collapsed into a black hole of its own making with green 2000 and decentralists wasting each other's time, money, effort, and patience. There are irreconcilable divisions between green 2000 (whether in its old or its eco-political form) and the decentralists. Some of these divisions are political or philosophical so even if a new piece of scientific evidence was discovered which could overcome some of these divisions it would not bridge the gulf between the two factions. It is pointless for both sides to go on suffocating each other in private when such differences could be aired in public between competing parties so that voters could choose between them. When people are spending more time stopping others from doing things rather than doing anything themselves then this is time for a divorce.

A Call to Arms

There is a myth that we all are subscribing to, and this is the myth of UNLIMITED ECONOMIC GROWTH. We all believe that barring a few minor hiccups ('corrections’ in stock-market jargon), a steady rate of GDP growth can be indefinitely sustained even as human population growth can be indefinitely sustained.

In other words, our learned economists really do believe that year after year, the goodies that we consume can grow in volume and quality, and our lives can get better and more luxurious. They base all their projections on this theory. And we ordinary folks believe in this myth propagated by our economists and our governments.
The theory of nuclear energy or solar energy replacing fossil fuels as a source of UNLIMITED ENERGY TO FUEL UNLIMITED GROWTH is a corollary to the previous myth.
Folks, these are myths! Let's face it!

Global Warming is a real emergency! We really must stop hiding our collective heads in the sand, and look at the real solutions. Not just small adjustment-type solutions like 'Let us educate more people, learn to switch off the lights, conserve bathwater and see what happens'!

The key is: WE ALL NEED TO CUT BACK ON CONSUMPTION ON A LARGE SCALE!

And yes, that is defintely gonna hurt. Like the muscle-boys say while working out in gyms, if it ain't hurtin', it ain't workin'.

Cutting back consumption means coming out of our addiction to credit cards, private vehicles, packaged goodies, the mania for owning the 'latest model' of every electronic toy designed for adults -- such as camera-phones, flat-screen televisions and more swish cars.
Of course reduced consumption by all those of us who are overconsuming resources (and putting several tonnes of CO2 into the air every year) will definitely mean NEGATIVE ECONOMIC GROWTH RATES!

But this is a necessary shot of bitter medicine, and we have to take it, like it or not!

It also means PUTTING OUR CAREERS on back-burners. Let us forget our obsession with maintaining a nice gradient of promotions, salary raises and increases in quarterly profits, please!

Can some of us please start petitioning our governments to STOP REGISTERING NEW PRIVATE TRANSPORT VEHICLES, which compete with public transport and lower their efficiencies? We need to cap their numbers and then reduce their numbers every year while swiftly stepping up PUBLIC TRANSPORT INFRASTRUCTURE to enable more energy-efficient movements.
We also need to petition airlines to STOP REWARDING FREQUENT FLYERS. We need to fly around less! Let’s try to make do with internet, tele-conferencing, video-conferencing and email-groups, for Chrissake! We need to benchmark so that the numbers of journeys by flights and all means of transport are brought down.

We need to petition banks to stop rewarding BIG CREDIT-CARD SPENDERS and indeed, to cap the growth of credit cards at existing levels! We need to consume what requires less manufacturing, less packaging and less transportation. For instance, let us replace that bottle of coke with a nice home-brewed cuppa chai!

And last but not least, citizens of developed and developing nations need to take the lead in forcing their governments to ACTIVELY SEEK NEGATIVE ECONOMIC GROWTH RATES for a few years as a way of shaving the head off the CO2 emissions, and reducing the rampant consumerism that we all are habituated to!
I’m looking for thinking people to join me in actively triggering and leading a movement to spread this mindset of cooling down our individual and collective economic habits. (I already have a small group that includes a professor of climatology and a young entrepreneur. I am also on the Global Warming Committee of a chamber of commerce, and I've been talking my head off at all sorts of fora... but we need lots more to generate a momentum for activism.)

I am not talking merely about spreading awareness; there's that, but we need to do lots more, and we need to do it NOW! Please let us stop pretending that this is a problem that we can deal with at our leisure, post-retirement.

People in all cities are urged to contact me, but I really am hoping to network most actively with people who are in Mumbai.

I'm giving you folks my gmail address and mobile number to tell you that I really do mean business, and have no time for pussy-footing around this issue. If you stand convinced that this is an urgent problem that is crying out for action, please contact me now. (friendlyghos@gmail.com, mob:
98215 88114)

Warm Regards,
Krish (a.k.a. Friendly Ghost)
Mumbai

Diwali Prayers & My Non-Human Goddess

Happy Diwali, fellow Indians!

At this time of the year, we pray for wealth to the Goddess in the fond belief that She is a kind, generous Indian woman who shares our love for wealth and gold, and therefore understands.

I too pray. However, my Goddess barely resembles a human being or even a vertebrate creature. He/She/It has no reason to even remotely value gold, currency or luxuries like cars and houses; my genderless God stares coldly at me as I pray for wealth. “53,737 species are going extinct this year on your planet my dear, thanks to your never-ending quest for all sorts of stuff… and their death groans are all that I hear,” my God says, responding non-verbally. I squirm and shuffle in discomfort.

Then I proceed to pray for the health and welfare of my family, but I hear my God saying, “You have stashed enough to provide for your family for your foreseeable future. That’s quite enough my boy, because that’s more security many times over than most creatures on earth can even imagine having.”

And then my God turns the many points of His/Her/Its consciousness -- which resembles that of no other creature that I have every known or interacted with -- to something else.

What prayers shall I utter? I am tonguetied, and so I fall silent. I shall pray no longer but shall reflect on the nature of humankind and its cockeyed perception of divinity.

Chief Seattle said in 1854, speaking on the demise of the Red Indians in America:

“Your God is not our God! Your God loves your people and hates mine! He folds his strong protecting arms lovingly about the white man and leads him by the hand as a father leads an infant son. But, He has forsaken His Red children-if they really are His.

Our God, the Great Spirit, seems also to have forsaken us. Your God makes your people wax stronger every day. Soon they will fill all the land. Our people are ebbing away like a rapidly receding tide that will never return.
The white man's God cannot love our people or He would protect them. They seem to be orphans who can look nowhere for help. How can then we be brothers?

How can your God become our God and renew our prosperity and awaken in us dreams of returning greatness? If we have a common Heavenly Father He must be partial, for He came to His white children. We never saw Him. He gave you laws but had no word for His red children whose teeming multitudes once filled this vast continent as stars fill the firmament.”

When I read Chief Seattle’s speech recently, what I heard in my mind was not a Red Indian leader. I heard the voice of somebody speaking on behalf of the billions of creatures that we humans are continually driving to extinction by colonizing the lands and oceans that belonged to them for billions of years. Like the Red Indians, the flora & fauna on earth should wonder whether God is only the God of humans, and has forsaken other creatures.

Students of philosophy are warned to beware of a logical bias called anthropo-morphism -- the tendency to think of all things, including nature and God, as being shaped like humans. It is extremely difficult not to think of everything in human terms.

The so-called People of the Book – Jews, Christians and Muslims – staunchly believe that ‘God made Man in His own image’. Other religions hold this belief in varying degrees. Actually, it is man who has imagined God in his own puny image. Human imagination fails to comprehend the grandeur and complexity of Creation/Reality, and therefore satisfies itself with human-like imagery.

I doubt there are many educated people who think that God is ACTUALLY like a big Ram, Krishna, Ganesha or Jesus figure in the sky looking at earth. But even those who see God as a formless super-mind think that He/She has human qualities and cherishes human values like love, charity, compassion for the weak, respect for those who are older and more knowledgeable, rules that enable everybody to live in harmony etc. So we can't help thinking that human-beings are God's favourite creatures.

This is natural human subjectivity and tribal mentality at work. Throughout history, each religious sect or ethnic group has fondly believed that God is their God – that He was on their side and wanted them to win and prevail over all the other human beings on earth, and all odds of nature. Hence the stories like that of the Red Sea parting to let Moses and the Jews escape, and then coming together to kill the pursuing troops of Pharaoh.

Admittedly, most of my own spiritual thinking is anthropomorphic and anthropocentric. Most of the time, I too relate to God as a rather human-like figure. I too am guilty of fondly believing that human behaviour and human thinking are important from a God’s-Eye View.

My sincere good wishes to you all this Diwali! Please join me in wishing that the world prospers, and that prosperity is not of humans alone.

Let us hope that the concept of Prosperity has some meaning to creatures like dolphins, trees and coral polyps. Let us hope that prosperity of all creatures on earth is a possible concept.

Otherwise, speaking for myself, I would like to forget and forgo prosperity, and drop that word from my dictionary. If prosperity of humans only means exploitation, deprivation and death of numerous fellow-inhabitants of earth, I don't want it.