Archive for April, 2008

« Older Entries

Pols Who Don’t Get It About Ethanol

Wednesday, April 30th, 2008

By David L. Brown

Here is a brief follow-up to my recent postings about ethanol. Just over a week ago in my essay “Ethanol Producers Feeling the Pressure,” I suggested that the makers of fake fuel are in deep trouble. I have predicted that pressure is building to remove the government subsidies that help “fuel” this atrocity, the practice of turning food into fuel while poor people around the world face famine.

Today in an Investor’s Business Daily report (link to it here) we see the beginnings of some discussion about that trend. But far too few actually are getting the message. Barack Obama, for example, seems to think that the government needs to do more to encourage this crime against humanity. The IBD story quotes him as saying:

Family farmers and local ethanol producers have set an example for how to embrace new technologies to lessen our dependence on foreign oil,” Obama said. “We are at a critical time in the history of our renewable fuels industry, and we need to fix the imbalance in the market that’s working against locally owned plants.”

It adds: “It’s time to free ourselves from the tyranny of oil and stop funding both sides in the war on terror,” Obama said Friday.

To which I reply: What planet is he from? Don’t any of his advisors realize what a huge backlash is building against the practice of diverting food from its proper place? Doesn’t he realize that, no matter how much economic justification can be brought forth, when people are hungry it just does not do to be seen producing fake fuel from food, and particularly not with government subsidies? That at its root this is a moral issue, not an economic one? Apparently not.

Hillary Clinton also favors support of the ethanol industry, as do most other politicians from both parties. It is just too tempting to see money being handed out to farmers in return for votes while supposedly sticking a thumb in the Saudi’s eye. Yes, except that when the pictures start to come in on CNN showing starving and dead children, the evil result of using food for other than its proper purpose will be seen for what it is: The result of moral decadence and economic opportunism.

Thankfully there is one politician who thinks differently. Last year John McCain ran in Iowa, the Corn State and a nexus of ethanol frenzy, speaking out against farm subsidies in general, and in particular for ethanol. Here is what the Investor’s Business Daily says about McCain’s position:

“I oppose subsidies,” McCain said. “Not just ethanol subsidies. Subsidies. And not just in Iowa either. I oppose them in my own state of Arizona. I am proud of the conservative tradition that the government can sometimes best serve the interests of the American people by knowing when to stay out of their way.”

McCain may be preaching conservatism, but at least as far as biofuels are concerned, he may have some strange bedfellows. Anti-hunger groups are blasting Washington’s ethanol policy for surging food prices. Environmental groups have warned about a negligible — or negative — impact on curbing greenhouse gases.

As president, McCain would seek to end the 51-cent-a-gallon subsidy paid to fuel blenders for using ethanol. That subsidy will cost $4.5 billion this year.

McCain also would end the 54-cent-a-gallon tariff on ethanol imports from places such as Brazil, which makes ethanol from sugarcane.

The IBD report points out that corn prices have tripled since 2006; that ethanol producers are seeing their profits squeezed by high corn prices; that the practice helped push up food prices by 4.5% in the U.S. last year; that that represents grocery bills higher by $15 billion; and that according to the World Bank “almost all of the increase in global corn output went for bio-fuels production in the U.S.” The report warned that biofuels production in the U.S. and elsewhere has contributed to a rise in food prices that threatens to undermine global poverty gains made in the past decade.

The IBD report also included this:

Ethanol mandates are “causing environmental harm and contributing to a growing global food crisis,” wrote Earth Policy Institute president Lester Brown and Jonathan Lewis of the Clear Air Task Force in a Washington Post op-ed last week.

They noted that by using one-fourth of its corn crop for fuel last year, the U.S. cut oil consumption by a mere 1%.

The harm that is being done to the world economy and security, and the building tidal wave of repugnance that is soon going to break over the U.S. political scene, is immense. It just does not make sense to continue any further down this road. What should be done is to stop all new production of ethanol distilleries and shut down those already in production until they can find some way to make fake fuel from something besides food.

I will once more quote what is becoming my personal mantra for this subject:

“The mythic teacher Jesus is said to have turned water into wine, but only a living Satan would turn wine into water or food into fuel.”

Well it’s far too long to make a bumper sticker, but wouldn’t it look good on billboards around the Washington Beltway? Probably won’t happen, but I do think that this issue will be ripening like a roadkill raccoon in the middle of the road to the White House as the presidential campaign unfolds. Whether Obama or Clinton faces McCain, they will have to do some fast back pedaling to distance themselves from this atrocious example of greed and avarice. And those Iowa farmers who despise McCain might be better served to just STFU and go back to the important task of feeding the world.

Posted in Age of Oil, Agriculture Issues, Politics | 3 Comments »

The Unbearable Truth About Global Warming

Tuesday, April 29th, 2008

By David L. Brown

A Federal District Court judge in California has rejected the Bush administration’s request to delay making a decision on whether to order the Interior Department to decide whether or not to list the polar bear as an endangered species. The basis for the ruling would be that the bears are threatened because of disappearing sea ice in the Arctic Ocean.

94b323a3-dd5f-4ead-917e-bc6c57ce63bbnewsaporg.jpg

There is much heat being generated by this issue. Environmentalists are firmly behind the movement to list the bears as endangered. Opponents say it would give special interest groups the right to go to court to push for dramatic reductions in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions that are a root cause of global warming. Three groups that led the movement are The Center for Biological Diversity, Greenpeace and the Natural Resources Defense Council. The organizations admit they are seeking to have the polar bear listed as endangered “in part to force the Bush administration to take more serious steps toward combating global warming, such as imposing federal limits on greenhouse gas emissions,” according to this story in the Los Angeles Times today.

Conservative talk show host and blogger Hugh Hewitt, who is also a law professor, has covered this developing story. Here is an excerpt from a piece he posted about a month ago on his web site, warning against what he calls “polar bear induced paralysis”:

A variety of environmental groups orchestrated the tsunami of testimonials to the desperate condition of the polar bear because they understand—as much of the public and Congress does not—that a listing of the polar bear will have vast implications, and may in fact be a backdoor to implementation of the Kyoto protocol.

By way of background, I have practiced natural resources law since I left the Reagan Administration in early 1989. Wetlands, jurisdictional waters, and endangered species are my areas of expertise, and if you ever need a lesson on the Stephens’ kangaroo rat, the Delhi sands flower-loving fly, the California gnat catcher, the Desert tortoise or any of a couple dozen other plants and animals throughout the west that are protected under the federal or state Endangered Species Act, drop me an e-mail.

All of those species and many more have fairly predictable aftermaths of their listing –a period of great confusion about where they live and breed, what can and cannot be done near them, and lots of meetings and negotiations with federal officials over habitat conservation plans, Section 7 consultations etc. There are lots of landowners and businesses that lose a lot because of this law, but in the past, the impact zone of a listing was at least limited to the area in which the listed species lived.

In the case of the polar bear, as Hewitt makes clear, there is no direct connection between the animals’ habitat and the source of the damage. But neither is there a specific connection to the United States of America. It would be grossly unfair for the U.S. to be encumbered by draconian regulations to limit GHG emissions while China, India and other emerging industrial economies continue to belch out CO2. But then, who says the world has to be fair?

Now as my readers know, I am a staunch advocate of responsible actions to reverse the steady trend of global warming. But that does not make me a tree hugging “environmentalist” that would sooner see the human race go back to living in caves. In my mind, extremists from both side of the issue are to be viewed with equal suspicion.

If indeed the fears of the right, that the U.S. economy could be brought to its knees by environmental court rulings that would ban virtually all activities that generate GHG, that could be either good or bad depending upon how it is implemented. I suggest several factors that should be considered:

First, court rulings that are measured and responsible could help accelerate the switch from technologies that cause global warming, while reducing our nation’s dependence upon imported oil and gas. That could be a “good” outcome.

On the other hand, draconian and unreasonable precedents that would force the virtual shutdown of entire swaths of our economy would be not only “bad,” but particularly stupid and self-destructive. One can hope that Federal judges would act with a sense of balance and economic common sense.

The situation with the polar bears raises several questions. First, the fears of the opponents seem to be based on the idea that global warming is a reality, but that is ironically something that many of them explicitly deny. If global warming does not exist, or if it is not caused by GHG emissions, then the opponents of listing the polar bear as endangered should have nothing about which to worry since the courts will decide on the causative issues. (Which is it, deniers? Is global warming real, or is it a myth dreamed up by Al Gore?)

Most experts agree that no matter what is done the Arctic sea ice will disappear, taking with it the traditional ecology that supports the polar bear. The question is not if or whether that will happen; it is happening. The real question, then, is whether the bears can adapt to an Arctic Ocean that is free of ice during the Summer. Early evidence seems to indicate that they cannot, especially as the tundra in bordering regions thaws and turns to bogs. They have probably already slipped past the edge of inevitable extinction.

So if the polar bear is already doomed, wouldn’t it be strange to anticipate heroic efforts to “save” the species? To achieve the impossible? The forces of extinction may sometimes seem cruel, but they are at least even handed and in keeping with the Laws of Nature. There is nothing that mere humanity can do to stay the hand of Gaia

But here is the sixty-four trillion dollar question: What is the real issue here? Why it’s really quite simple, although you are not likely to hear very many voices speaking up to explain it. It is not really the polar bears that are under threat; they are only a symbol. In reality, it is civilization and the human race itself that face possible extinction. If we continue down the present path, allowing increasing amounts of GHG to enter the atmosphere and push the global warming cycle further and further toward vital tipping points, our very own species may face extinction.

Ponder that the next time you chuckle upon hearing about some amusing species being listed as endangered — some unimportant insect, mollusk, or weed. The most endangered species of all might be Homo Sapiens, “the wise ape.” That would be us, and should we end up on the list it might be time to consider coming up with a new scientific name for humanity. In a previous posting, “Overshoot-and Collapse: A Model for Our Future?” posted August 6, 2006, I suggested a possible candidate should we end up as prime examples of extinct species: Homo Stupidus. Let’s hope we turn out to be smarter than that.

Posted in Climate Change, Politics | 1 Comment »

Rock and Hard Place for World’s Poorest

Saturday, April 26th, 2008

By David L. Brown

There is a Chinese proverb that begins “The best time to plant a tree is twenty years ago.” Much can be gleaned from this aphorism about the present state of the world food crisis. The “solution” to the emerging problem, we are told, is to simply turn on the power of science and develop new crops that can feed the hungry masses. But to be of use today, that is a “tree” that must have been planted at some time in the past.

And the trouble is that agricultural scientists already have been laboring long and hard for decades to boost farm productivity. We have planted plenty of metaphorical trees and it is of no use to expect that we can start all over again as if there were a blank slate of opportunity to re-create the Green Revolution.

In the April 19-25 edition of The Economist, the emerging world food crisis was featured as the cover story under the heading “The silent tsunami: The food crisis and how to solve it.” Unfortunately, the inside article, headlined “The new face of hunger,” is long on “crisis” and short on solutions.

For one thing, the writers put a comforting interpretation on the whole thing. After reporting “some of the sharpest rises in food prices ever,” the magazine ominously adds: “But this year the speed of change has accelerated. Since January, rice prices have soared 141%; the price of one variety of wheat shot up 25% in a day.”

That is pretty strong stuff, but then the articles goes on to state:

The prices mainly reflect changes in demand—not problems of supply, such as harvest failure. The changes include the gentle upward pressure from people in China and India eating more grain and meat as they grow rich and the sudden, voracious appetites of western biofuels programmes, which convert cereals into fuel. This year the share of the maize (corn) crop going into ethanol in America has risen and the European Union is implementing its own biofuels targets. To make matters worse, more febrile behaviour seems to be influencing markets: export quotas by large grain producers, rumours of panic-buying by grain importers, money from hedge funds looking for new markets.

Soothing words indeed in the face of alarming rises in food prices. It’s not “problems of supply,” but all due to demand. Well, yes, and one might expect a magazine that calls itself after the very art of economics to know that supply and demand are linked like Siamese twins. When demand goes up, supply must either rise to fulfill the increased demand, or prices will go up until the excess demand is quenched. It is the latter that is happening now, and the reason is that food supply cannot be so easily or quickly increased, or perhaps not increased at all.

This poses a problem, because we are dealing with human lives here. As food becomes more dear, it is pricing the poorest people in the world out of the market. Supply cannot meet the rising demand, and unless it can vast numbers of people will face famine. It is an economic Catch 22.

The Economist actually does recognize that there are serious difficulties. The article notes that “Ideally, a big part of the supply response would come from the world’s 450 [million] smallholders in developing countries, people who farm just a few acres.” It goes on to note the advantages of this approach, but concludes:

Unfortunately, no smallholder bonanza is yet happening. In parts of east Africa, farmers are cutting back on the area planted, mostly because they cannot afford fertilisers (driven by oil, fertiliser prices have soared, too). This reaction is not universal. India is forecasting a record cereal harvest; South African planting is up 8% this year. Still, some anecdotal evidence, plus the general increase in food prices, suggests that smallholders are not responding enough. “In a perfect world,” says a recent IFPRI report, “the response to higher prices is higher output. In the real world, however, this isn’t always the case.” Farming in emerging markets is riddled with market failures and does not react to price signals as other businesses do.

You see, there is more to it than can be addressed by idealistic “solutions.” The fact is that the increased demand is the result of continued growth in human population. That has been made possible by the era of cheap petroleum and industrial agriculture that is now coming to an end. Without cheap and abundant oil, there can be no cheap and abundant food. And unfortunately for them, about a third of the world’s people have been able to exist only thanks to cheap and abundant food, much of it heavily subsidized by governments and shipped to the needy through food aid packages.

(more…)

Posted in Agriculture Issues, Essays and Opinion, Famine | 1 Comment »

Economics 101 and the Coming Famine

Thursday, April 24th, 2008

By David L. Brown

There is growing concern about the building “silent tsunami” of famine (as The Economist calls it). One response is to spend more money to provide food for the hungry poor, but that ignores the fact that the problem is not lack of money but shortages of food. Another predictable response takes the form of calls for more research into how to grow more crops, presenting the expectation that we can repeat the Green Revolution. An article in the latest issue of Science decries budget cuts in funding for agricultural research, with the implication that if only we could spend more money there the problems of food shortages would go away.

Well, that may have been true in the past when researchers were able to launch the so-called Green Revolution. The GR rode on the back of abundant and cheap natural resources. It was not and never could have been a permanent solution to the problem of feeding humanity, because while human numbers continued to grow higher, the resources of the Earth are finite and being rapidly depleted.

That was then and this is now, and the Law of Diminishing Returns assures that history cannot be expected to repeat; there will be no Green Revolution Redux. A similar economic fact is colloquially known as “TANSTAFL,” an acronym for There Ain’t No Such Thing As A Free Lunch, a lesson we are beginning to see demonstrated in the real world of actual economics.

Unfortunately, the Green Revolution was a one-shot deal and any follow-up effort will of necessity be a far more expensive and less productive process. It will not be “deja vu all over again” as Yogi Berra so famously stated.

There are a lot of reasons why there can be no new Green Revolution, at least not in any way that is comparable to the original. For one thing, the world population has approximately doubled since the Green Revolution began. For another, the world’s resources of land, water, minerals and energy have been reduced and are becoming more expensive thanks to the law of supply and demand.

The Law of Diminishing Returns was ironically pioneered by, among others, Thomas Malthus, a leading economist of the 18th and early 19th century. He and David Ricardo laid the groundwork for this concept. Here is what the Wikipedia says about this:

Malthus and Ricardo … were worried that land, a factor of production in limited supply, would lead to diminishing returns. In order to increase output from agriculture, farmers would have to farm less fertile land or farm with more intensive production methods. In both cases, the returns from agriculture would diminish over time, causing Malthus and Ricardo to predict population would outstrip the capacity of land to produce, causing a Malthusian catastrophe.

Well, as you can see, the Law of Diminishing Returns has its roots right in the heart of the subject that is of serious concern today. The term “Malthusian catastrophe” refers to the well-known prediction by Malthus that human numbers would someday outstrip potential food production. That is what we are witnessing today.

(more…)

Posted in Agriculture Issues, Economics, Famine | 1 Comment »

Rice Rationing in US: New Harbinger of Famine

Wednesday, April 23rd, 2008

By David L. Brown

The onrushing food crisis is gaining momentum, as reflected in the news story below from FoxNews.com. I am including the entire online article because this is important. Unfortunately, Fox didn’t think it was, playing it way down in their news site.

The specter of famine is rapidly developing as the biggest story of the 21st Century, but meantime the news media think it is more important to alert us to the latest shenanigans of important world figures such as Tom Cruise and the latest “American Idol” wannabe, a report of a grizzly bear attack, and a number of other sensationalist stories worthy of the National Enquirer, all of which got top play this morning on the FoxNews site.

Here’s the story that Fox buried way down as the fifth item under “Business”:

Wal-Mart Rations Rice, Warns of “Supply and Demand” Concerns

Wal-Mart, the world’s largest retailer, said on Wednesday that it would ration the amount of rice each customer can purchase at its Sam’s Club warehouse stores because of recent “supply and demand trends.”

“We are limiting the sale of Jasmine, Basmati and Long Grain White Rices to four bags per member visit,” the company said in a statement. “This is effective immediately in all of our U.S. clubs, where quantity restrictions are allowed by law.”

Wal-Mart is the second-major grocer to limit the purchasing of a commodity because of the recent run up in prices. The company said it is not limiting the purchase of other basic food products like flour or oil.

The price of rice, which is the primary foodstuff for the majority of the human population around the world, rose to $894 a metric ton according to the Thai Rice Exporters Association. That’s compared to the $327.25 a ton average price in the same month last year.

In Chicago, the price of export-quality rice rose to $24.745 per 100 pounds on Tuesday.

The run up in price in rice is primarily related to poor harvests and countries curbing exports. Thailand, Asia’s largest exporter of rice, said it may curb exports.

The World Food Program called the recent run up in prices of rice and other basic commodities a “silent famine.”
Wal-Mart did not say when the rationing would end, but it was “working with our suppliers to address this matter to ensure we are in stock, and we are asking for our members’ cooperation and patience.”

Costco, the nation’s largest warehouse retailer, said yesterday according to Reuters that it had seen increased demand for basic food staples as well like rice and flour. The company had put limits on purchases as well.

Well, whoops! As I wrote here just a few days ago in my essay “Consumption Pushing the Limits for Rice,” posted April 17, the outlook for what is the staple food for about one-third of the world’s people is dim and growing more dire by the day.

A sense of deep-rooted fear is beginning to set in as the prospects for famine spread dark wings around the globe. As mentioned above, many nations are shutting off exports to in effect hoard their home-grown supplies of rice. That is pushing up the price of wheat and other grains as well, leaving many of the poorest people without the ability to buy enough food to survive. As many as a billion human beings have already been living on the edge, in a state of perpetual malnutrition. Now they are being pushed over the brink into what is rapidly becoming outright famine.

The world has experienced famines before, but never one like this. In the past, before the global economy that we now enjoy, famines were local or regional events. This one is different because it involves the entire world, from America to Zambia.

The latest issue of The Economist that arrived in my mailbox yesterday features as its lead article in-depth coverage of what they call “The Silent Tsunami,” their analogy for the spreading danger of famine. I will study that in detail and may give a report here later. But a first glance at the related articles, which purport to tell us what can be done about the problem, gives me pause. One obvious “solution” is to provide more money to the UN food aid programs.

Well, as I have pointed out here recently, money is not the answer when demand exceeds supply, which is now the case for food. In fact, follow this line of reasoning to see the extent of the problem:

1 – Country A is plagued by widespread hunger and starvation. Money is allocated to buy food to sustain the residents of A and UN agencies go to the world grain markets to buy that food.

2 – Supply is short so the more demand there is, the higher prices will rise. Purchases of rice or other grains for UN food aid will bid up the price even more. Prices rise beyond the expanded UN budgets, requiring even more money to be allocated to food aid programs.

3 – A runaway cycle will continue, with more panic causing nations to block exports and individuals to hoard food. The richest nations will continue to buy the diminishing supplies and the cycle will continue.

4 – The continued demand combined with hoarding will price food beyond the reach of even more people, dragging them into the spreading whirlpool of famine. This cycle will continue to kick up to higher and higher levels as bidders continue to push food prices higher. And if 2008 should happen to see widespread drought and heat, the situation could reel completely out of control into a global famine event such as never before seen.

Gotta go for now, but this is perhaps the most important developing story of our time so I will be sure to follow it closely. Meanwhile, Allah help those who are turning food into fake fuel. Should there be a Hell, I suspect Satan may have to devise some new and even more horrible punishments for those evildoers.

Posted in Agriculture Issues, Famine | Comments Off

Ethanol Producers Feeling the Pressure

Monday, April 21st, 2008

By David L. Brown

An outfit called the Renewable Fuels Association is attacking claims that ethanol is a factor in the rising cost of food in the world. The members of this group are those who make and market ethanol and other biofuels. You can visit their web site here.

They claim that the real reason why food is becoming more expensive is because of high oil prices, which are the fault of the Saudis and other petro-hogs. And, of course, biofuels can be credited with holding down the cost of oil so ethanol producers are the Good Guys in this story. So there!

Hmm, let me understand this. Just because the members of the RFA are diverting food from the world markets and using it to make fake fuel doesn’t mean it’s their fault that people are going to starve en masse in the Third World. And in fact, as they make clear, it’s probably all the fault of the evil Saudis who are charging too much for their oil.

The president of the RFA, Robert Dinneen, recently went so far as to address a letter to the Saudi Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources complaining about the minister’s recent statement that biofuels “do not decrease dependence on petroleum, do not increase energy security and do not reduce pollution”. Here is part of what Dinneen said in his letter:

For the Saudi Oil Minister to assert that biofuels are not an effective energy alternative is no different from the wolf complaining that Little Red Riding Hood was interrupting his dinner plans.

What is also galling about your statement is the claim that biofuels negatively impact the “food market.” The evidence demonstrates that the number one negative impact on the food market is the high price of your primary export — oil. One hundred dollar per barrel oil has driven up the cost of everything from fertilizer to diesel oil used to transport food, to plastics used in food packaging. You must also be aware that growing demand for food in rapidly industrializing countries like China and India are putting additional pressure on food prices as are adverse weather conditions in growing regions, like Australia. Blaming high food prices on ethanol is deliberately misleading.

Well, Dinneen has thrown up a cloud of (mostly) indisputable facts — but the effect is to divert attention from the realistic fact that turning food into fake fuel when there are hungry people in the world is an atrocity. Yes, we have or will soon pass the Oil Peak and the end of cheap energy is well and truly over. But there is little evidence that present biofuels programs in the US are effective or economic answers to the problems that raises. Some estimates reveal that more energy is used in the process of making ethanol than is produced when it is burned. Meanwhile, it is a government subsidized bonanza for farmers who could equally as well be cashing in on the rising food prices due to the inflationary factors to which Dineen refers.

Understand, I am no fan of the Saudis but they have been allowed to place the West in the present position of oil dependence through our own lack of foresight and courage to develop alternatives. It is ill-judged to point the finger of blame for our addiction to those who supply the addictive substance.

The RFA also has attacked the recent TIME magazine cover story that I discussed in my essay “Wine to Water: Unveiling the Ethanol Con,” posted here on April 1. It is amusing to read the list of quotes they present to rebut the article, starting with one from Dinneen himself who says in part that “to dismiss the important role biofuels must play in our quest to reduce oil independence and mitigate global climate change in favor of questionable science and overheated rhetoric is foolhardy.”

Gee, there are a lot of “givens” in that statement. It is presented that we “must” rely on biofuels (says who?), and that objections are based on “questionable science” and “overheated rhetoric.” That reeks of blatant propaganda and Orwellian logic.

(more…)

Posted in Age of Oil, Agriculture Issues | 1 Comment »

Why Don’t Deniers Understand Climate Change?

Sunday, April 20th, 2008

By David L. Brown

What is it about “climate change” that global warming deniers don’t understand? There is a new outburst of claims that the Earth is cooling, not warming, thus proving that greenhouse gas from human action is a chimera and should be ignored. The basis for these claims appear to be of the sort that reveal complete misunderstanding of just how complicated the issues are. In fact, they follow the pattern of “there was an unusually cold winter in (fill in place), therefore global warming is false. in particular, heavy winter storms and snowfall in large areas of Asia are being invoked, along with the fact that the past winter was relatively mild in much of the U.S.

The people who make these and similar claims seem unaware that global warming does not occur as a general, overall increase in temperature. If that were the case, the approximate 1 to 2 degree C. increase in global temperatures that is taking place would perhaps have a modest effect on the planet. Even a worst-case scenario increase of up to 4, 5 or even 6 degrees might not be too hard to take … if the increase were to be evenly spread out.

But that is not the case, nor did any reputable climate scientist ever imply that it is. In fact, the changes that are taking place are causing weather patterns to change in regional ways. For example, the far North has warmed far more than other areas of the globe, with the resulting decline of the Arctic sea ice and melting tundra. As more open water appears during Summer with its 24 hours of Midnight Sun, the Arctic will grow even warmer.

Meanwhile, other places are bound to become cooler. We have heard of the possibility that warming Arctic waters could stall or even reverse the Atlantic conveyor that carries warm tropical water to heat Western Europe and Scandinavia. Those regions are as far north of the equator as Siberia, and with a reversal of the Atlantic warming they might well enter into a new era of cold, even ice age-like conditions.

Global warming deniers leap on facts like that as evidence against global warming, failing to realize the regional climate change would be a direct result of that very global warming trend that they are denying.

Severe winter conditions in China and other places are quickly pointed out as evidence of global cooling. And yet, the facts remain that the planet is indeed warming, on an average, overall basis.

Yes, some places did experience a cold winter … but look at these recently released statistics from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) for the most recent month of March, 2008, as reported here on the ScienceDaily web site:

  • The average global land temperature last month was the warmest on record, 3.3 degrees F. above the 20th Century mean temperature. Ocean temperatures were 13th warmest due to cooling by the La Nina cycle in the Pacific, but total global surface temperature for both sea and land was the second highest since records began being kept in 1880.
  • Also during March, temperatures more than 8 degrees F. above average covered much of Asia. In the Eurasian continent, following the greatest January snow coverage on record the unusually high temperatures resulted in rapid snow melt resulting in March snow cover that was the lowest on record.

Deniers pointed to the heavy snow pack in Asia and Europe as evidence against global warming, but one might interpret this as climate change instead. And how do they explain the rapid meltdown that turned the January snow into a March runoff? Not by invoking global cooling, surely.

Also reported this week was the fact that the North American jet streams have been migrating northward for some time now. This is another marker of climate change. Jet streams influence weather patterns in significant ways.

Meanwhile, look at this NOAA illustration of March precipitation patterns in the U.S.

080418112341-large.jpg

As can clearly be seen, a broad swath from Oklahoma to Vermont experienced rainfall that was “much above normal,” while California, Arizona and New Mexico saw precipitation “much below normal.” Relatively few states appear in white, denoting normal conditions. The overall picture is one of deviation above and below what has been considered normal from past records, offering further evidence that the effects of global warming are not smoothly distributed but may result in changing weather patterns and more extremes.

There is an old chestnut that says if you were to stand with one foot in a bucket of cold water and the other foot in a bucket of hot water, on the average you would be comfortable. That may be true for a given point in time. But if the average is rising over time, i.e. the water in both buckets is growing warmer, that trend should be taken seriously.

Taking another example, it is said that if you place a frog into a pan of cool water and begin to heat it, the frog will not jump out because it senses only gradual change and is not alarmed. The ultimate result, of course, is quite detrimental to the frog’s future plans. Thus, too, for climate change deniers.

Posted in Climate Change | Comments Off

Consumption Pushing the Limits for Rice

Thursday, April 17th, 2008

By David L. Brown

For many of the world’s people, rice rather than wheat is the “staff of life.” Who can imagine an Asian meal that is not based on this staple grain? About three billion people, or nearly half the world’s population, rely on rice as their staple food.

And like other primary foodstuffs, rice is becoming scarce, pushing prices steadily upward. According to a recent report from BBC.com, the price of the grain has risen by as much as 70% in just the past year, and is expected to keep on rising.

Factors behind the ballooning prices include depletion of stocks; poor weather conditions such as flooding and extreme cold; hoarding; rising demand as some Asian standards of living increase; and curbs on exports that are being imposed by some nations that fear running out of the staple grain.

The following bar chart shows the tight race between supply and demand for rice in major Asian nations. As you can see, only Thailand and Vietnam produce significantly more than they consume. Bangladesh, Indonesia and the Philippines consume more than they produce and most other nations are running close to the bone.

_44537486_rice_production_gr466.jpg

There are already some serious repercussions from the increasing scarcity and higher prices of rice and it seems likely that the problems will continue to get worse. The following snapshots are extracted from a survey by BBC.com. You can read the full report here.

INDIA —India is the second largest rice grower in the world behind China. With rice the staple food for 65% of the country’s one billion plus people, much is consumed domestically.

But the International Rice Research Institute says that the sustainability of rice farming in India and beyond is threatened by overuse of fertilisers and soil health.

Stocks have come down over the last three years as agricultural growth has failed to match the rest of the economy.

And because of the low purchasing power of India’s poor, even a small increase in prices can cause a sharp fall in real incomes.

BANGLADESH — Spiralling rice prices have left the people of Bangladesh facing their worst food shortages since the major famine of 1974.

Over the last year, prices have nearly doubled to about 35 taka (50 cents), while there has been no corresponding increase in wages.

Hundreds of poor families are now surviving on one meal a day, and spending 70-80% of their budget on food. The problem is most acute in urban areas where aid agencies say they are very concerned about infant malnourishment.

PHILIPPINES — Once self-sufficient in rice, the Philippines is listed by the US Department of Agriculture as the world’s top importer of milled rice for 2007, ahead of Nigeria, Indonesia and Bangladesh.

Over the past 20 years or so, the country lost nearly half of its irrigated land to rapid urban development.

Domestic demand has risen as the population has grown, pushing up prices.
President Gloria Arroyo has asked authorities to crack down on hoarders. Officials have said they could be charged with economic sabotage – a crime that carries a life sentence.

CHINA — Chinese consumers have been have been eating less rice as their income has risen, according to the [UN Food and Agriculture Organization].

Instead, they have been switching to meat and dairy products.

But the government, highly conscious of social or political tensions caused by food inflation, has moved to protect consumers by restricting exports.

JAPAN — Instead of importing rice, Japan heavily subsidises its rice farmers, paying them as much as four times the market price and restricting imports.

This policy is defended by a farming community with considerable political weight, and many Japanese agree home-grown rice tastes best.

Food security is seen as politically important and the country keeps a large stockpile of rice – even though it is probably wealthy enough to buy on the international market even if prices continue to rise.

As we have discussed at length here on Star Phoenix Base, the world is entering a phase of growing food shortages and rising prices in general. That means that there will not be much leeway for replacing rice with other grains such as wheat or corn. The costs of those commodities have also been rising as demand outstrips supply and only the wealthier nations will be able to replace rice with other grains. In the case of China, switching from a rice-based diet to one more dependent on meat and dairy products will even further exacerbate the problem, since the livestock consume feed grains that also are in diminishing supply.

I should not even have to mention the evil practice here in the U.S., Europe and elsewhere of converting food to fake gasoline. We have covered that subject in depth here and will continue to do so. In due time this will be looked back upon with the kind of horror associated with the Holocaust.

I have made the point in previous essays that increased prices for basic staple foods have an extremely harsh impact on the very poorest among humanity. That point is well demonstrated by the example mentioned above of Bangladesh, where rice prices have nearly doubled in a year and many families are eating only one meal a day while spending up to 80% of their income for food. These people are living on the edge of a cliff and are about to be pushed over the edge.

There are no practical solutions to the emerging famine in the Third World. Money used to be the universal lubricant, but it cannot help if there is too little food to go around. Cheap government-subsidized crops used as food aid in the past are no longer in the pipeline.

Meanwhile, the world’s population continues to climb — but for how much longer? Not, I suspect, for too many years or even months as the human race lurches into the great Overshoot-and-Collapse event that is looming in our future.

Posted in Agriculture Issues, Economics | 1 Comment »

It’s OK Now — There Is No Global Warming

Wednesday, April 16th, 2008

By David L. Brown

This will be a brief posting. There is a letter being disseminated around the Internet that addresses the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), demanding that they “retract” their conclusions about global warming as reported in the IPCC’s fourth assessment report released last year. The letter claims that the world is actually cooling (apparently based on the fact that we had an unusually cold winter) and presents an actual graph that “proves” it beyond any doubt whatsoever.

Here is a link to a stupid blog that features the letter while gloating about using it to “crush your global warming alarmist friends.” (It would be a good idea to hold your nose while accessing this link and reading the letter.)

The letter is posted around the Internet under headlines such as: “Nobel Winner Calls on UN: Admit Climate Errors.” Well, the IPCC isn’t the UN, but nevermind that small factual error. The important news is that this claim apparently is being led by an actual Nobel Prize winner, to wit, one Svend Hendricksen. According to the letter, Hendricksen “shared” a Nobel Prize. Pretty impressive stuff. And almost certainly, for this claim to have any credibility, he must have earned the prize for something related to chemistry, physics or another hard science. Right?

Well, not exactly.

Thanks to a quick Google search, here is the “inconvenient truth” about this latest attack on the threat of global warming: Hendriksen “was once part of the United Nations Peacekeeping Forces, which collectively received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1988.”

Wow! He sure did “share” that Nobel Prize — with tens of thousands of other serving men and women who were “once part” of an organization that “collectively” won the prize. Gee, if the entire human race were to win the Peace Prize some year (fat chance, because it is usually reserved for people like Arafat and Jimmy Carter), you and I and all our friends would be Nobel Prize Winners! We’d have a good time then, for sure.

Talk about phony baloney that’s way past its use-by date! I have neither the time nor inclination to Google up some details about the rest of the gang of presumed idiots that signed this letter. I did notice that the first signer was identified by the words “analytical chemist” and “mMensa,” which I presume means that he is a member of Mensa, the organization of self-congratulating high-IQ idiots (and, yes, you can be both high-IQ and an idiot, a condition I have witnessed many times!).

Wow! Nobel Prize Winner! Mensa! Gee, that is SO much more impressive than the work product of hundreds of actual climate scientists who labored for years to produce the IPCC report. I am just absolutely … well astounded is the word. Yes, astounded.

So go back to sleep now, and don’t give another thought to global warming. It was nothing but a hoax perpetrated by Al Gore for his own personal enrichment, you see. Both a Nobel Prize winner and a member of Mensa say it, so it has to be true.

Umm … Maybe not.

If you want to read more about these morons, here is a link to a blog that deconstructs the whole disgusting thing, including doing the Googling that I didn’t on the other signers of the letter who (surprise surprise) are, well, strange to say the least. And here is more about the qualifications of the Nobelist leading the attack against global warming. According to blogger Page Van Der Linden of the DeSmogBlog, Nobel Prize winner Hendricksen:

“…is the publisher of a website,”The Greenland Art Review,” in which he presents some of his art history theories, as well as his views as a global warming denialist.” Van Der Linden goes on to say: “[Hendricksen] presents a rather, um, unusual analysis of An Inconvenient Truth. He claims that the film has ‘Rorschach phenomenon and hidden messages’. To say the least, it’s unconventional, verging on the bizarre.”

Well, yes. Bizarre seems to fit. Maybe you better not go back to sleep after all.

PS: I apologize for the fact that what I intended to be a “brief” posting turned into my usual long rant. Mea culpa. I am reminded of the writer (I think it was Mark Twain) who apologized for sending a long letter to a friend, explaining that he didn’t have time to write a short one. On the other hand, the subject of climate change is so important, and needs so much attention, that I feel compelled to explore as many facets of the subject as I can.

Posted in Climate Change | 1 Comment »

Bush’s “New Direction” on Climate Change.

Wednesday, April 16th, 2008

By David L. Brown

President Bush today made a speech in the Rose Garden on the administration’s policy toward climate change. At first glance from on-line news reports it sounds like too little, too late and politics as usual.
CNN.com headlines it: “Bush Shifts on Climate Change.”

FoxNews.com says: “Bush Unveils ‘Realistic’ Climate Strategy …”.

BBC.com plays it this way: “Bush Sets New CO2 Emission Target.”

None of these news sources gives the story very much play, and when you look at what Bush is quoted as saying there seems to be little substance. There seems to be much suspicion that the comments are aimed more at heading off action than calling for more, and apparently the administration isn’t even trying to cover up that fact. According to the CNN.com report:

The new goal for curtailing greenhouse gas emissions is an attempt to short-circuit what White House aides call a potential regulatory “train wreck” if Congress doesn’t act on climate change. The president’s speech is aimed at shaping the debate on global warming in favor of solving the problem while avoiding heavy costs to industry and the economy.

Commented the BBC after quoting Bush: “However, there was no indication of any new legislation to target emitters, and his statement warned Congress not to pass laws that could ‘impose tremendous costs on our economy and American families’.”

This is not a new approach but only continues the argument that nothing should be done that would cause undue inconvenience to America’s economy. There is a reason why Al Gore called his film and book “An Inconvenient Truth,” and that is his point. This situation is truly inconvenient, something that humanity can ignore only at serious risk. To wait-and-see while giving lip service to “solutions” that are economically neutral is not a realistic response at all. The threat of global warming is potentially an enormously serious threat to civilization and to continue to dither and pass the problem on to future generations is irresponsible and dangerous.

While not giving any details or a plan of action, the thrust of Bush’s comments was that increases in U.S. greenhouse gas emissions should be brought to a halt by 2025. He further suggested emissions from electric power plants should peak in 10 to 15 years, then decline.

And Bush gave himself a big escape hatch by suggesting that all the world’s major economies must agree to the same targets. According to the FoxNews.com report, he said “We’re willing to include this plan in a binding international agreement, so long as our fellow major economies are prepared to include their plans in such an agreement.”

Well, what does that mean? Does it mean that if every other country doesn’t get on board, the U.S. won’t follow through to reduce emissions? If so, it sounds like the same Mexican standoff game that we played with the Kyoto Accords. However, that facet of Bush’s speech does recognize the plain fact that climate change is a global problem and that we can no longer give emerging economies such as China a “get out of jail free” card on this issue, as Kyoto did. China it appears has now surpassed the United States as the world’s No. 1 contributor of greenhouse gas to the atmosphere.

Critics of the administration were quick to condemn Bush’s plan. According to the BBC.com report:

Carl Pope, the executive director of the largest US environmental group, the Sierra Club, said: “Under the president’s plan we’ll need a real miracle to save us from global warming.”

CNN.com quoted Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA), who said the proposal is “the height of irresponsibility,” and provided this statement from Tony Kreindler, a climate specialist at the advocacy group Environmental Defense: “The key is whether the president supports a mandatory cap on emissions. You never achieve any real reductions in pollution without legal limits. That’s what we’re going to be looking for.” So far, the administration position has been against cap-and-trade programs and has called merely for “voluntary” steps to reduce emissions.

That is like if the police were to take the radar cars off the streets and wait for drivers to voluntarily obey speed laws. In other words, it ain’t gonna happen, at least not without some external motivation.

Well, perhaps it doesn’t much matter what the President thinks or says, or what Congress may or may not do about climate change. The fact is that events are catching up with rhetoric like a freight train bearing down on a mouse. The developing story of world famine; quite “inconvenient” prices for oil; spreading desertification and loss of glaciers and ice sheets; the looming certainty of a new pandemic; the growing numbers of failed nations — all these and many more are the signs that the Earth is taking things in hand.

Perhaps Bush understands that if we do nothing now, Nature will soon straighten out the mess we humans have made of our planet. Or perhaps he knows that nothing we can do now will save us, because it is too late and too many tipping points have been or soon will be reached. I sincerely hope he does not have that knowledge, but it is not beyond possibility.

Posted in Climate Change, Politics | 1 Comment »

« Older Entries