The Australian continues its deplorable coverage of global warming, in this editorial which contains more errors and misleading claims than it is possible to count, following on from an equally bad news story at the weekend.
The factual basis of the story is that the IPCC has confirmed the reality of anthropogenic global warming, tightening the error bounds around its earlier estimate of a 3 degree warming by 2100. Obviously, when you tighten error bounds, you raise the minimum estimate, but the Australian manages to mention this once in passing in its news story and not at all in its editorial.
The rest of the editorial contains allusions to all the denialist claptrap the Oz has been pushing for years now: claims that climate change is really natural (the IPCC confirms that the change we are observing is anthropogenic), suggestions that the report refutes the ‘hockey stick’ (it confirms it, even more strongly than the 2001) report, misleading references to the Medieval Warm period and so on.
At least, having publicly relied on the IPCC, the Oz might stop publishing the conspiracy-theory opinion pieces suggesting that the whole thing is a hoax.
The Australian’s coverage of this issue has been a disgrace. As a paper, it cannot be taken seriously on any scientific issue.
John Quiggin 
Out of interest which newspapers can be taken seriously on scientific issues?
I read the article in question and interpreted it as a face saving retreat. With a wiff of victory in the air for your camp I think you should be gloating more than cursing. Of course you may just be posturing.
The Oz keeps trotting out this furphy:
Once in the lead story and again in the editorial.
Anyone who has actually read the ABARE report can tell you that ABARE examined six scenarios, most of which show significant reductions in GHG emissions with minimal impacts on the economy. The Oz has plucked the scariest number from most extreme ABARE scenarios and presented it as the likely impact of any attempt to reduce GHG emissions.
The fact is, ABARE’s modelling shows that significant reductions could be achieved with just a 0.07% percentage point reduction in the annual rate of GDP growth. Minor correction made by JQ
Read more here:
Howard spins ABARE’s report on carbon taxes
Howard attacks Labor’s ‘hidden’ plan for a carbon tax
Strangely, the 600% increase in electricty and gas prices Howard mentioned in Parliament last month has never been heard of again.
FYI: Here’s a list of links to the climate change stories in the Weekend Australian. The first three push the “the evidence is not conclusive” line or the new “its really not that bad after all” line. The last three stories are more balanced, including a favourable write up on Al Gore.
Too vital for guesses (Bob Carter gets more oxygen!)
Science tempers fears on climate change
Editorial: It’s not the end of the world
More balanced stories:
Winning from the sideline
Let’s get down to business
Travel goes radical for the carbon conscious
When I read the Oz’s report, I was left wondering if they have confused climate senstivity to a doubling of CO2 with projections of warming in 2100.
I could very well be incorrect about this (you need to ask a climate guy that knows about statistics), but I think that the error they are talking about is structural error, and not parametric error, so getting rid of error in this case doesn’t neccesarily change the minimum estimate, although it did in their case — it just means you have a better model (it makes you more sure that your estimates are good vs. necesarily changing the estimates of the various bounds that are calculated). So it isn’t like, say, a confidence inteveral, where you just specify an upper and lower bound — it is more like an r2 that tells you what perecentage of the variance your model captures, and hence whether you can trust the information from the equation (or in their case multiple equations) that were used.
JQ,
As someone who’s clearly not as passionate about climate change as an issue as you…. I clearly haven’t followed the debate as closely. When reading the Australian editorial I thought it sounded reasonably balanced – can you be more explicit on where the errors are?
I thought the editorial (and article) clearly acknowledged that climate change was caused by CO2 emissions (therefore caused by man) – it certainly didn’t seem to be denialist.
By the way – is it true that Australian is on track to meet the emission targets we didn’t sign up to in the Kyoto treaty?
Yes we are, but only because Australia negotiated a Kyoto target that is 8% above 1990 levels, which the Howard government refused to ratify anyway. Virtually all of Australia’s “reduction” in CO2 emissions has been achieved by reduced land clearing in Queensland, not by reducing emissions from electricity generation, industry or transportation.
My main objection to the editorial (and I suspect JQ’s) is that the Oz has always found a reason to argue that no action is required on climate change. First it was “its not happening”, then it was “the evidence is not conclusive”, then “global warming is not anthropogenic”, then “Australia can make no impact on a global scale” and now “its really not that bad after all”.
Agree with JQ and carbonsink. The stock in trade of the Murdoch press and the rest of the greenhouse denialist/inactionist gang is to seize any weapon at hand (and to hell with intellectual consistency) to throw up against the view that climate change is real, has a major anthropogenic component, and can be minimised (if not averted) by appropriate policies.
I was actually going to write to the Oz stating that the IPCC assessment boiled down to saying that the worst-case scenario got better, the best-case scenario got worse, and the most likely scenario is basically as bad as it always was. But my fellow Green James McConville beat me to it http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/letters/index.php/theaustralian/comments/more_resources_vital_in_the_search_for_definitive_answers/. James is the Greens candidate for Yeerongpilly in the Queensland State election this weekend. Just sayin’…
Andrew,
the science in the editorial is very poor. This is bad, especially given that it is based of an article by Matthew Warren, the Oz’s environmental reporter. The editor should have used Leigh Dayton (the science reporter) as a source.
While The Australian is playing up their exclusive draft, it isn’t that exclusive. For example, I’ve got a copy of some of the interesting chapters. For a while, it could be downloaded by anybody.
The temperature comparisons are all muddled up. The editor has confused climate sensitivity (which is a measure of how much warming will occur if CO2 levels doubles and is used to compare climate models against one another) with projected warming (how much warming is projected to occur by 2100 AD).
For the record, the IPCC’s range of future temperature projects is 1.8 – 5.8 degrees, not 3 degrees. This is identical to the 2001 report.
When the editor writes It is also further evidence that such alarmist scenarios such as the “hockey stick” theory (so named for the shape of the line on the graph it is taken from) are, well, overheated he really doesn’t know what he’s talking about. The Hockey Stick is a reconstruction of past temperatures, and consequently, future temperatures don’t say a thing about its validity.
Implicit in the “doing something about Greenhouse gas emissions will be costly” argument is the presumption that not doing anything will not be costly. Whilst it’s possible to make projections of future costs of various policy options with ours and the international economy going on as per usual. estimating the costs of more numerous and more severe weather events (droughts, floods and storms), rising ocean levels with loss of arable lands, dislocation of populations and the local, and international conflicts that will arise in their wake is much more difficult. To claim there will be no economic downside (or simply to fail to mention any out of short term political expediency) is gross deception.
I saw the article and was stunned at the inconsistency between The Australians headline and analysis and the information the article actually presented. In fact I was a little offended that they expected me to swallow the line that a worse best-case scenario would somehow ‘temper my fears’.
I must admit that since I’ve been reading this blog I see The Australian in a whole new light. Keep on keeping those bastards honest JQ.
Ken, I think the agenda here is to head off any attempts at social action (which in our society means Govt. action) to either mitigate or adapt to climate change. The costs are to fall on the most helpless.
As I said in my post in Weekend Reflections, I have bought my last Australian. They cannot be taken seriously on almost any issue these days. I am not really quiet sure what the editorial staff and management think they are producing except fictionalised opinion. Shame really, they seem to have well and truly lost the plot as a national broadsheet.
The report referred to is a draft only, the scientists who have a copy have been asked not to comment publicly. I see they also dragged out the perennial rock loon to provide scientific balance. Shoddy, shoddy work.
Ken,
Doing nothing may be costly, however the early modelling seemed to suggest that doing Kyoto would not achieve much. Over a century it would defer warming by a few years at most. As such doing nothing looks like offering a pretty good return on investment in relative terms.
Most hard core advocates of Kyoto really believe in something we might call Kyoto-plus. And whilst the benefits of Kyoto-plus will be peace on earth as well as health, harmony and happiness for all, the cost of this thing called Kyoto-plus has not been calculated.
As it stands the costs of Kyoto are modest, however so are the benefits. And the precedent set by such a system of global regulation is on some levels quite scary, especially for those of us that are cynical about large centrally organised governing bodies.
It is not meaningful to compare the costs and benefits of “doing nothing” versus the costs and benefits of “doing something” unless the latter is properly defined such that both the costs and benefits can be determined. It is certainly not acceptable to make a comparison on the basis of what it costs to “doing something” coupled with the benefits of “doing something else”.
Regards,
Terje.
One wonders what their position will be in the upcoming nuclear power debates. I’m willing to bet money on them taking a pro-mining position, but whether they end up being pro-fossil fuel or pro-uranium is up for grabs. Maybe the current softening up on global warming isn’t so much concession to reality as strategic withdrawal prepatory to a pro-uranium assault.
Ken – “When I read the Oz’s report, I was left wondering if they have confused climate senstivity to a doubling of CO2 with projections of warming in 2100.”
I think they have as I read this from another AGW denier, Andrew Bolt, and he seems to have done the same thing:
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/modified_alarm/
It seems to be a common thing.
It would seem that the Murdoch press is only interested in the party line.
I assume you (carbonsink) mean ‘0.07% less GDP growth per annum than if we did nothing’ rather than a 0.07% reduction in GDP per annum?
Otherwise going from 3% growth to 0.07% reduction is a big deal!
I’ve fixed this minor error in carbonsink’s comment – JQ
Terje, might I suggest you read carbonsink’s blog post on the effects of what is essentially Kyoto-plus, according to ABARE. GDP growth ends up being cut by about 0.1% per year; real wages growth is cut by about 0.17% per year. By 2050, GDP is about 3.2% lower than it otherwise would have been, and real wages about 7.5% lower. And that assumes no use of geosequestration or nuclear power.
They are not small costs, but they are hardly disasters either.
Terje, this blog has had at least a dozen posts looking at the costs of Kyoto-plus, most recently here which covers the same ground as carbonsink, cited by rm.
As noted, the costs are small.
Tom Davies – Yes, you are correct. Apologies for that. I meant GDP growth would be 0.07% less that it would otherwise have been under ABARE’s business-as-usual reference case.
As a few poster have pointed out, ABARE’s report does not take into account the possible costs of climate change (e.g. reduced agricultural production through droughts, damage from cyclones, costs of new water infrastructure in cities, loss of tourism income resulting from snowless winters in skifields, coral bleaching on the Barrier Reef etc)
I wish I could edit my post! Prof Q?! Done! – JQ
Ender, I’m not convinced that there really is a party line at the Oz*. I suspect that the story goes more like this; reporter misreads IPCC draft report** and writes poor quality story, then the editor + Bolt jump on board, unaware that they are now in line with what the IPCC.
I’m actually finding the whole thing quite funny.
* for example, Leigh Dayton, is quite a good science writer, and doesn’t appear to follow the peusdoscience script.
** his story contains other errors, such as the sea level rise. The range which he quotes is only from one scenario, not all of them.
Its not all bad. See today’s story by Matthew Warren:
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,20346904-2702,00.html
And that’s the AIGN too!
Editorials today seem as relavent as printing stock market prices or shipping lists. Who writes the Oz editorials? I presume it is mostly Chris Mitchell but sometimes they read like Wood or Sheridan?
John, A valuable post – really should go as a letter or op-ed to Oz. They should be made to explain or recant. This kind of scrutiny is socially valuable.
Harry – I thought global warming “will be a hickup without long-term consequence” (see your comment in the Peak Oil thread) which is more or less what the Oz is saying in its editorial.
Crikey! The guys that responded to Hurricane Katrina are looking after Global Warming! Pass the icecubes!
What I have said was that the cost of dealing with global warming will be low – contrary to the views expressed in the Australian above but consistent with John’s views. The costs of dealing with the problem will be equivalent to foregoing a few year’s economic growth at most. This isn”t what the Australian is saying at all – either in its newsarticle or its editorial.
Peak oil issues will similarly be met with resource substitutions which currently seem daunting but which ex post will be seen as small.
John,
My reaction to the WOZ splash was that the paper may be shifting its stance away from climate change denial, albeit slightly. That’s a positive, I think.
I haven’t read the editorial.
My letter to The Oz … which I’m not expecting to be published …
Congratulations to The Australian for running an editorial which both disputes anthropogenic climate change and proposes a nuclear fix to this (non-)problem (A climate change report helps separate fact from hype, Sept 4). It takes guts to run an argument as laughable as that.
The editorial parrots claims from the Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics that a halving of greenhouse emissions by 2050 would cut real wages by 20 per cent. But ABARE is infamous for inviting fossil fuel interests onto its climate change steering committee for a fee of $50,000, a practice which the Commonwealth Ombudsman later criticised.
The editorial ought to have drawn attention to the 2003 report of the Australian Ministerial Council on Energy, which found that energy consumption and greenhouse emissions in the manufacturing, commercial and residential sectors could be reduced by 20-30% with the adoption of commercially-available technologies with an average payback of four years.
To generate greenhouse reductions of that magnitude by replacing coal with nuclear power would involve start-up costs of tens of billions of dollars and result in the production of thousands of tonnes of high-level waste in the form of spent nuclear fuel.
harry clarke – Sorry I misunderstood what you are saying.
I’d love to share your optimism, especially on the cost of resource substitution for liquid fuels. The way I see things Peak Oil will most likely drive us towards solutions that are even more carbon intensive than what we have now, unless we see some major intervention in the market (in the form of a carbon tax). IMO, the only long term solution is to electrify transportation and power it with renewables.
Hardly surprising when economic modelling is fashionable too. Neither human activity nor climate can be modelled mathematically.
So it is hardly surprising the supporters of economic quackery also support climate quackery,
Must…resist…temptation…to…weigh..in…on…nuclear….can’t…
Jim, might I suggest you’re on shaky ground arguing that nuclear plants should be prohibited because they’re too expensive.
On those grounds, we should immediately ban the use of rooftop solar panels.
John,
With respect I have not seen any useful comparison of both cost and benefit for any single mitigation strategy. The post that you link to (which I read the first time) talks about the low cost, or rather the not high cost of a certain scenerio. However in that particular post you did not quantify the benefits.
Also for instance Robert indicated above one scenerio (call in scenerio-X) in which the cost in 2050 would be a lowering of wages by 7.5% (relative to what they would have been). It would be useful in the same breath to discuss how many years scenerio-X would defer warming or whether it would halt climate change. If it delays warming by 12 months I would say don’t bother. If it delays warming by 50 years then there would be a strong case for action. Although of course it would be even better to qualified benefits of defered warming in terms of impacts mitigated.
I know this is probably more a concern about style and the packaging of the solution on sale. However I don’t know how anybody can sign up to a given solution if they are only told the costs or only told the benefits. Surely any sane buyer wants to hear a narrative about both costs and benefits for the given solution. To often it seems like a game of bait and switch where the benefit of action is cast in terms of avoiding all the disasters of warming whilst the cost is outlined for something that won’t achieve the originally advertised benefits. Its a bit like being shown a mansion and then been told the price for a cottage.
As I said the first time, none of this does not mean such a comparison does not exist. It is just a personal reflection on the fact that I have not yet encountered it here.
Regards,
Terje.
P.S. Following earlier discussions on this topic I concede the point expounded by you previousky that political discussion needs to proceed on the basis that AGW is the overwelmingly dominant explanation for the current climate trend. Further political debate about whether AGW is valid no longer deserves as much air time.
Al Gore’s film “An Inconvenient Truth” was screened in the Parliament House cinema last night, courtesy of the Government’s Parl Secretary fro the Environment, Greg Hunt (see entry on my blog for more). There was a reasonable turnout, although it certainly wasn’t a full house.
Perhaps a few of the commenters are right, and this latest mix of articles by The Oz represents a dying flurry before reality sets in? One can only hope, but while it would be nice, there’s no point waiting around for them to catch up. There’s more and more people doing plenty of things in the right direction, and we have to find ways of knitting all of those things together as effectively as possible.
Louis – “Neither human activity nor climate can be modelled mathematically.”
No really??? Damn all those computers are just useless aren’t they.
Andrew – “Al Gore’s film “An Inconvenient Truthâ€? was screened in the Parliament House cinema last night,”
Don’t suppose the Minister for the Environment was there?
Real Climate comments on the Oz story here:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=346
George Soros talked about this issue in one of his books. In a nut shell I think that physical systems like climate are more open to calculation because they are more likely to be deterministic physical systems (biosphere complicates things). Human systems are far less open to predictive calculation because humans exhibit what Soros calls reflexivity. In other words the way that an electron will respond to a proscribed force is deterministic whilst the response that a human will have to a proscribed force will depend on the humans internal belief systems about what the force means, why it is being applied etc. And those that seek to proscribe forces to change human behaviour arrive at the table carrying their own belief system baggage.
Terje wrote:
As John Howard, Peter Beattie and others are so keen to point out, it would make precisely zero difference to climate change if Australia slashed its GHG emissions by half tomorrow.
Exactly the same argument could be applied to California. With ~37 million people California represents around 3% of the world’s GHG emissions. If California halved its GHG emissions tomorrow it will make bugger all difference on a global scale, so is Arnie mad to punish his own economy with the recently passed Global Warming Solutions Act? As Howard said on 4 Corners last week:
You can extend the Howard argument to every person on the planet. Should I punish myself by switching off a few lights or turning off the heater when I know the people across the road have 10kW air-conditoner running 24 hours a day?
At some point you have to say, we all have a responsibility to do something, whether its a country, state, city, town or individual. There is no exit clause from responsibility just because you’re small.
Prof Q: thanks for editing my post.
Terje, aren’t you going to give credit to economic theoreticians in the area of analytical economics and discard the ‘crusaders and persuaders’, who carried “their own belief system baggge” to the tables of ‘economic rationalism’, ‘supply side economics’, Thatcherism, Reagonomics?
So called ‘free market economics’ was introduced in Chile by military force.
Carbonsink,
You are essentially stating that the nature of the problem forms the basis for a global public policy response rather than an individualistic response. Even so there is no logical reason why any recommendation of international public policy can not be articulated in such a way as to account for benefits as well as costs. Or at least to include a comprehensive narrative about both in the context of a given solution.
One such solution is the Kyoto protocol. John Quiggin has outlined previously that the costs of implementing Kyoto are not high. I think his anaylisis seems sound. From memory his estimate is that implementing Kyoto would defer GDP growth by a few months each decade. However it also only defers global warming by a few years over a century. Not really worth the economic pain.
If you take the view that Kyoto is a down payment on a larger policy plan then that is fine and good. However a cost benefit analysis of a new house does not take the costs to be merely the deposit required up front by the bank. If you want the full benefits then you will need to pay the full cost.
Let me restate that this is predominately an issue of presentation. However if you wish to sell people on a concept and get them to sign up you need to polish the presentation. So far the presentations I have seen here are good at looking at costs for some scenerios and good at talking about benefits of other scenerios. What I have yet to see is the marriage of these discussions around a single scenerio.
Of course some people think that the correct approach to public policy is to just start laying bricks and see what happens.
Regards,
Terje.
P.S. If you vote you should know that it will make approximently zero difference. However even in nations where voting is optional large numbers of people still choose to vote, either out of a sence of civic duty or else some delusion about it making a difference. A delusion I should hasten to add that I frequently find myself subject to.
Terje – ok, you want a cost-benefit analysis? Here goes…
First you should read the ABARE report, then read my thoughts on the various scenarios modelled and the costs and benefits of each:
Howard spins ABARE’s report on carbon taxes
Howard attacks Labor’s ‘hidden’ plan for a carbon tax
I think you can safely ignore any of the scenarios that include use of CCS (Carbon Capture and Storage) because the technology is at least 20 years away and there are big question marks about whether it will actually work. Similarly, you can ignore scenarios that include using nuclear power because that’s not going to happen in Australia within 20 years (~10 years of NIMBY issues over location + ~10 years to plan, design and build).
Since we are talking about acting on climate change now, and not in 2030, that eliminates scenario 1, and since it is extraordinarily unlikely that Australia would take unilateral action and cut its emissions to 50% below 1990 levels, I’ve excluded scenario 2d.
Unsurprisingly Howard (and the Oz) only quote the economic impacts of scenario 2d and none of the other scenarios.
So I’ve focussed on scenario 2b (no nukes, no CCS, no deep unilateral cuts) as by far the most likely of the early action scenarios. In this scenario Australia produces GHG emissions in 2050 that are 40% lower than ABARE’s reference case, with GDP 3.2% lower than the reference case. IMO, 3.2% over 40 years seems like a small price to pay.
Would GHG emissions that are 40% lower than business-as-usual slow global warming? Definitely, if similar measures were applied globally. Would it be enough to stabilise CO2 levels in the atmosphere. Possibly not, I don’t know. As I understand it, the climate scientists say we need to reduce GHG emissions to well below 1990 levels to stabilise the atmosphere, and that would require the more draconian measures detailed in ABARE’s scenario 2d.
Carbonsink,
Thanks for attempting to address my point.
You say you have focused on scenerio 2b. However can you tell me which scenerio you actually advocate? Your final sentence infers that you advocate 2d.
Regards,
Terje.
Terje – 2b short term (because its virtually painless according to ABARE) and 2d long term (if 2b doesn’t stabilise CO2 levels in the atmosphere). Obviously, the measures described would have to be applied globally to have any effect.
Given that Australia’s economy is very carbon intensive (we have the highest CO2 emissions per capita in the world) I would assume that if Australia can achieve a 40% GHG reduction relatively painlessly, it should be even easier for other countries.
Ender: “Don’t suppose the Minister for the Environment was there? (at the screening of an Inconvenient Truth)”
I couldn’t tell Ender – the cinema was dark and I wasn’t checking out the crowd too closely. Still the Parliamentary Secretary for the Environment out the film on, which can’t be a bad thing.
Lets presume they are right.
Given the presumption above you seem to be saying 2d. The fact that 2b is virtually painless should not ignore that it may also be virtually without much significant benefit (ie doesn’t stop global warming or defer it by much). On the face of it you seem to be playing the same old game of wanting the 5 star benefits whilst paying for an economy class ticket. If you believe that the 5 star benefits are what we need then you should be prepared to defend expenditure on a 5 star ticket.
In any case I will try and read the ABARE report tonight.
And thankyou again for actually attempting to address my point.
I disagree completely! A 40% reduction in GHGs worldwide would be hugely beneficial and would slow global warming considerably. What’s more, if ABARE’s figures are correct, it is politically feasible.
Since when did this become a digital matter? Are you saying our only options are zero GHG emissions tomorrow –OR– business-as-usual? What utter nonsense!
The best way forward at this point in time is a price signal for carbon that delivers meaningful reductions in GHGs while allowing the economy to function relatively normally. The carbon tax can be ramped up over time, which is part of the ABARE modelling anyway.
Ender,
only robots can be modelled mathematically – humans not. My position remains.
Oh well its just an extension of Fox News. I expect future guest columnists will be Bill O’Reilly followed by Condi, Dick and Carl Rove. “We bias and you decide” – blah blah blah.
Carbonsink,
I started reading the ABARE report on the PDA on the train home. It wasn’t too sucessful so I will try and find a printer sometime today. I would point out however that the foreword to the ABARE report seems pretty explicit about not analysing benefits. It seems to be a cost comparison of alternate scenerios that all get to the same end point in 2100. Thats all well and good but it seems that it is not a cost benefit analysis, but merely a cost analysis. However I still intend reading it.
Regards,
Terje.