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Published online 21 November 2008 | Nature | doi:10.1038/news.2008.1250
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Climate researchers 'should cut their carbon footprint'
Jet-setting scientists responsible for substantial greenhouse gas emissions.
Climate change researchers and the agencies that fund their work should do more to cut the community's carbon footprint, says an atmospheric chemist who has calculated the carbon emissions of his colleagues.
Andreas Stohl examined all the work-related emissions of his fellow researchers at the Norwegian Institute for Air Research, Kjeller, in 2005, 2006 and 2007.
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The whole purpose of this "the sky is falling" industry is to generate evidence to justify their research grants. In the process evidence to the contrary, that climate change is not the result of CO2 emissions, is shovelled under the carpet. Never in historical evidence have global temperatures moved in lock step with CO2 percentages. Yet now this is taken to be gospel truth without question. That the infamous hockey stick was fabricated as "proof" of this contention is now concealed as irrelevant.
It is an interesting challenge to suggest that people concerned with carbon emission issues should set the stage for more innovative ways to do business differently, rather than as usual. However, the intellectual cross-pollination that occurs as a result of conference travel, collaborative work and presentations has such great value, that inhibiting such could have the unintended consequence of inhibiting progress towards scientific advancement. Some climate change activists and researchers that I know of are making commitments to reduce their personal carbon foot prints in other ways - especially in the transportation choices on a daily basis, rather than the 24 days a year of airline travel they use. Perhaps a continuing discussion of net effects would be worthwhile?
Well scientist are also human beings like us ,so the figure given in this is solely though is concerned with pollution related to aviation ,nobody in te US cares about the pollution caused in the public motorway.However , as it is not of the etiquette to be Ban-Ki-Moon talking about poverty in Somalia ,and at the same time not to ride in the luxurious SUV ,hence we can give a free ride to these environmental scientists as well.
"Perhaps a continuing discussion of net effects would be worthwhile?" - Actually it would be worthless, as the rest of the pointless discussion and research. We are discussing the aftermath of an alleged crime when in fact no such crime has taken place. Can anyone answer one basic question? - How can the current global warming be the result of increased atmospheric CO2 levels when there has always been a lag of 200 to 1,400 years between the time atmospheric CO2 levels rose to when the global temperatures started rising. The converse has also been true. There has been a lag of 200 - 1400 years between the times when global temperatures started falling and the CO2 levels started falling. This phenomena would easily be explained if increased atmospheric CO2 levels were the effect rather than the cause of global warming.
Dear Richard Dawson: In the event that you are actually open to hearing ideas that disagree with your own, please direct your attention to the following website, which specifically addresses and destroys your claim: http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/04/the-lag-between-temp-and-co2/ It's really not complicated. While an increase in temperature can cause atmospheric CO2 levels to rise slightly (by the reduced solubility in the oceans), we've pumped a ridiculous amount of CO2 into the atmosphere over the past 250 years! The temperature has gone up. As for this article, did the researcher take into account how much each of his colleagues recycles? How about whether they, individually, drive hybrid cars? Does he know whether they heat their homes with natural gas or wood stoves? If so, why has he been stalking his colleagues? And (more probably) if not, then how can we be so sure that your average climate researcher has a SMALLER footprint than the average person? I'd imagine these folks are quite conscious of their impact. Sure they fly a lot but they fly in the name of solving the climate crisis! In fact, the solution is not for them to fly less but for more people to become climate researchers, so we can solve the problem more quickly!
I do some climate research and am involved in international projects but I am also very concerned about the emissions coming from flights, so I am succesfully trying to reduce them down to no more than one or two (return flights) per year, and within Europe. On line congresses like this one (www.climate2008.net), and emails can do for most of the exchanging needs, trains should be used whenever possible instead of airliners. Climate scientists are of course not responsible for global warming but they must show a particular attention to their own personal emissions, and not only from flights.
Dear Matt Johnson, the website that you have "directed" me to does not "destroy" my "claim", as you put it. The only "evidence" that global temperatures move in lock-step with atmospheric CO2 levels is Mann et all's infamous "hockey stick". Which is not "evidence" at all but a truly miraculous conjuring trick of mathematical modelling. In one stroke it does away with the medieval warming period and the little-ice age and replaces it with a rock steady horizontal line of unwavering global temperatures for thousands of years, followed by an exponential, run-away global warming in the last couple of decades, coinciding precisely with the increase in CO2 levels. Out with nature in with man ? We done it! However there seems to be some disagreement amongst you true believers. You feel that researchers must fly more - to quickly "solve the problem" and have our designer climate. Vittorio Marletto, on the other hand, believes that researchers should fly less and "show a particular attention to their own personal emissions" - good idea! - eat less spice and pass less methane. Just kidding - the globe is warming this we know, 'cause Al Gore tells us so, concerned scientists to him belong, their evidence is weak but he is strong. The cause is CO2 we all know 'cause Al Gore tells us so, little minds to him belong ? they are weak but he is strong. CO2 has caused us misery, generated by you and me. Yes CO2 hates us, yes CO2 hates us, yes CO2 hates us, Al Gore tells us so ....
Don't all these maverick hotshots know about videoconferences? Or would that be to efficient, boring and devoid of glamour?
Hello Richard, there's a basic question i'd like to ask to you. What is the difference between the CO2 increases in the past and the one we witnessed in the last 200 years? Does this difference allow for a clearcut comparison, in your opinion?
Dear Richard, Matt and others, CO2 acts to trap heat in the atmosphere. The lag in the ice-core records tells us that in the past something (almost certainly changes in the Earth's orbit/tilt - so called Milankovitch cycles) initiated the warming, which was then amplified by CO2 (a feedback mechanism). For a nice discussion see the article on RealClimate.org: http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2004/12/co2-in-ice-cores/.
We all know that many of these meetings are unnecesary, especially with rapid communication through the internet. One good conference every two years is plenty to keep up in any field with today's information technology, especially in a field like "global climate change" where very little real scientific data are generated in 100 years let alone 1 year.
They should build a solar-powered, hydrogen-filled climate research airship. The airship could cruise around the world, and researchers could be ferried up to it as it approaches their areas. On board would be conference rooms and labs for performing climate experiments.
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