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phenergn January 8, 2009 10:30 AM

The new Richmond scheme relates to meter parking away from peoples homes. I'm sure they would argue that it will persuade those with high emitting cars to leave them at home and go to the shops by bus, or on foot, or with their lower emitting second car, thus reducing CO2 output. They are probably wrong in this respect, and it's more of a policial statement, but that's still their case and there is at least some slender logic behind it.

I know Richmond also charge more for residents parking permits for high emitting cars. Again they'd probably argue that it's designed to affect peoples purchasing decision - however unlikely that may be.

horseandcart January 8, 2009 10:43 AM

From Richmond's 'Green Parking Plan':

www.richmond.gov.uk/parking_chrages_consultation1.pdf

"By implementing revised parking permit charges based on C02 emissions, the Council wants to:

• Continue to introduce measures to help tackle climate change issues

• Continue to have sufficient funds to enable it to provide transport services e.g. for elderly and disabled people

• Carry out maintenance and management of the on and off-street car parking facilities in the borough and to finance a programme of parking studies.

and most importantly secure revenue for our councillors' expenses, chief exec's mega wages, and bullet-proof pension plans all round."

Note the crappy puctuation in the first sentence too. Could spend money on hiring literate staff rather than fleecing residents under a green scam.

Come on Mr Keohane, you hide behind the 'scientific consensus' and 'many scientists are unwavering...' wording but what is your view?

Arctic sea ice is greater this winter than ever; no GW has taken place since 1998; 2007 was one of the coldest years in the last century; CO2 increase in the atmosphere follows temperature change not the other way around - it's an effect not a cause; Al Gore has been predicting the melting of the arctic ice cap within five years since 2003!?! and his 'Incovenient Truth' DVD bovine excrement, which is now compulsorily forced down the throats of British state school kids, at taxpayers' expense; Hansen the NASA GW nut has even admitted that AGW/Climate Change is being used by rich, powerful people to make more money and exert more control over ordinary people with schemes like carbon credits trading; sunspot activity is way down presaging a likely global cooling period; etc, etc..

I don't care if overpaid, underbrained idiots in Royal Richmond wish to salve their phony green consciences by shelling out an extra few bob to park their chelsea tractors but I do care that such a mega lie can get such traction and such pc conformity in the population at large, who will pay through the nose and lose more mobility freedoms through this vicious scam. The cost of higher electricity bills alone for the end customer from 'green' energy will run into the tens of billions, or hundreds of pounds per household per year, dwarfing even the cost of residency parking permits for the generally privileged denizens of loony Richmond.

The Colonel January 8, 2009 11:14 AM

Local authorities have no business dealing with climate change.  All they are employed to do is provide a narrow portfolio of social services...yes they should go about that in the least wasteful way possible, but it should only be done for the benefit of the reisdents and businesses in terms of saving money and resources.

They could make a start in saving money and resources by only painting yellow lines where one can park rather than cannot.

Councils like Richmond do serve a very strong purpose though...they are a constant reminder why Liberal Democrats should never get the keys to No.10, no matter how the other two manage to *** it up.

andymartin75 January 8, 2009 11:46 AM

Increasing the rates won't stop people in Richmond buying high-polluting cars, they'll just pay it. I have no issue with paying higher taxes to combat climate change as long as that is where the money goes. Unfortunately, it's more likely to go straight into some admin, pen-pusher, health and safety executive.

According to most actuaries, the biggest long-term threat to this country is climate change altering the gulf-stream, thereby giving us a Moscow style climate. When it's -40 and the country is frozen solid will you still be saying things like, "Despite our recent sub-zero temperatures many scientists are unwavering in their belief in climate change".

Come on, Ed. We're all petrolheads on this thing but at some point we've all got to wake up and smell the fairtrade coffee.

Ed Keohane January 8, 2009 12:09 PM

The point I was trying to make was that we get sensationalist non-scientific news reports from 'kitchen climatologists' linking each hurricane or a mild winter to accelerating climate change, but as soon as there's some snow they shut up. The climate scientists themselves have a more moderate and stable message.

andymartin75 January 8, 2009 1:10 PM

Yep, point taken Ed.

It's those muppets that make it into the media because, like most minorities, they shout loudest. I think most reasonable, reasonably educated people will agree that it's happening and would happily make sensible steps to help combat it.

Personally, I'm looking forward to the next generation of fun, eco-friendly motors. Stuff you can drive and not worry so much about huge depreciation, monumental fuel/tax/insurance costs and taking dirty looks from white people with dreadlocks.

Hopefully they'll be a whole lot better looking than the Prius clan. Always makes me think I'm drving my mum's car and, if most girls' reactions are to go by, is a first class method of birth control.

horseandcart January 8, 2009 1:27 PM

"The climate scientists themselves have a more moderate and stable message."

- really?

You've just said above, that:

"Despite our recent sub-zero temperatures many scientists are unwavering in their belief in climate change" and "There is a scientific consensus that increasing CO2 levels will warm the planet."

Come on Ed you're flying in behind 'the consensus' but refusing to declare/fly your colours. You obviously believe in man-made GW/Climate Change or at least chose to fall in-step with the crowd for career reasons.

You're wrong anyway. There is no scientific consensus. There is a consensus of vested interests only.

The media, which your are really a part of, has trimmed its position to 'Climate Change' from Global Warming. They had to do this in the face of ten years of non-warming. Now we get next to zero coverage on severe winter weather stories in UK, Europe or N.America as it contradicts GW/CC. The BBC/Meteorological service keep on lying about warmest years, 2008, warmest autumns, winters etc. rather than just forecasting the weather as they are handsomely paid to do by UK taxpayers. Even your fellow petrolhead Clarkson wrote in the Sunday Times a few weeks back about the BBC/Meteorology Dept.'s lies and how people get into real danger through this deceitful garbage - look it up.

You, your kind and the people behind you who benefit from this, no other word for it, scam, like the most obvious one Gore, the Nobel prize winner, ha ha, are getting desperate. The truth has become too apparent. Even the little people are sceptical, whilst anyone with a trained, inquisitive mind is openly hostile to the continuation of the perpetration of this foul deceit on the world. Consequently, the propaganda is being stepped up in the media outlets. This in turn will be counterproductive as the non global-warming continues. Therefore it becomes necessary to rebut any cold events as just 'weather' whereas the spell or consensus of GW/CC remains unbroken as it deals with 'climate'. It ain't working susnshine. Maybe time to get smart and hop the fence before the public doubts of even the high-priests like Dr Hansen at NASA encourage a mass departure of the vested interest disciples. I give it a maximum of two years before the game's plainly up and anyone supporting 'the consensus' looks about as credible and smart as a flat-earther.

Colonel Snappy January 8, 2009 3:22 PM

On the contrary, it's the climate-change deniers who are the flat-earthers. And since you're accusing the BBC of lying, presumably you have some proof? Clarkson doesn't count, BTW ... his head is as firmly in the sand as yours ...

horseandcart January 8, 2009 3:59 PM

Come off it snappy military man, you dismiss what Clarkson says, but this is hardly the Royal Society debating forum.

www.timesonline.co.uk/.../article5374360.ece

"The Met Office, which claims to know what the weather will be like in a hundred years but cannot tell what it will do tomorrow morning, now seems to be incapable of saying what it was like yesterday either.

It announced last week that thanks to patio heaters and Top Gear, the past decade has been the warmest on record even though temperatures have been falling since 1995 and Britain has been suffering from the coldest start to winter for 30 years.

And because the weathermen tell us it’s warm outside and will get warmer still until we all burn in hell, people get dressed in a T-shirt and shorts and then die of hypothermia while scraping 6ft of sheet ice from the windscreen of what the Met Office calls a polar bear-killing, Arctic-melting, carbon-emitting, greenhouse-creating star-destroyer but you and I know as a Ford Fiesta."

- entirely suited to this level of debate. The Met Office/BBC lie. Clarkson knows it too and says so in an indirect way. He concentrates on the Met Office rather than the BBC for obvious reasons but does not the BBC use the Met Office for all its weather information services and allied GW propaganda?

And as for your crack about deniers, I hope you meant that in relation to deniers of a round planet and not of holocaust denial because if you are you're treading on thin ice.

Some misguided person, 'andymartin' I think made the point that a diverting of the gulf stream was the biggest long-term threat to the UK. No, the biggest threat to the UK is the increasing gullibility of its citizenry. One needs only to read Goebbel's words on 'the big lie' to see where concerted, sustained propaganda can land a once healthily sceptical people.

Colonel Snappy January 8, 2009 4:13 PM

You still haven't provided a source for your claim that the BBC and Met Office are lying ...

Dan McNeil January 8, 2009 6:24 PM

Poor old horseandcart, it seems a bit worked up today.   Probably had to wipe the spittle from the screen.

horseandcart January 8, 2009 7:50 PM

McNeil person, bravo, excellent contribution. Obviously the recent unseasonal heat has gone to your head. Now look up 'ad hominem' attack.

Oh, and if you were ever to be alight, through runaway GW, not only would you not get my 'spittle from the screen' you wouldn't get my... ...work it out danny boy.

Bobafari January 9, 2009 8:19 AM

That's why the correct term is now climate change not global warming.  For example short term global warming may end up causing an ice age in the long run (or making the next one happen several millennia earlier) depending on how things like ocean currents are affected.  There are so many global equilibria that are affected by CO2, that it's not really possible to predict with any certainty which equilibria will interact as positive feedback loops, and which will be stabilising negative feedback loops.  In other words if we push climate too far away from its current sweet spot who knows where the next one may be - hotter/colder? centuries/millennia?  This ambiguity is where a lot of climate sceptics get their ammo.   They are crazy.  **HALF-BAKED ANALOGY ALERT** You are are having fun playing on a rickety swing (as I'm sure we all like to do) but then notice that it is becoming ever more rickety.  You are 99% sure that it is your swinging that is making it worse.  Below the swing is a polar bear pit, an alligator pond (stay with me on this one!) and a dividing wall between the two that it may or may not be possible to land on if the rickety swing breaks.  What do you do? Obviously a sensible person doesn't take the risk (even though he's still having lots and lots of fun) and slowly comes to a standstill so that he can hopefully, probably, lower himself down to the safety of the wall.  If he is a keen swinger(!) he'll probably try and find a more sustainable swing.  The crazy CO2 sceptic reasons that he is uncertain that it is his swinging that is making the swing more rickety (small chance that increase in global temperature and CO2 is just a coincidence), and also reasons that there is a chance that he will land on the wall anyway if the swing breaks (climate change might not have any serious implications and might be reversible).  He therefore stubbornly refuses to stop swinging until a scientist has definitively proven that it is he who is damaging the swing (not the pixies).  Even when everyone laughs at him ("cos pixies are good not evil, silly") he challenges the scientist to tell him whether he'll be eaten by polar bears (ice age) or alligators (runaway global warming) if the swing breaks.  The scientist replies that there is no way of knowing: nobody's ever fallen off that swing before so there's no reliable data, and there are too many unknowns to do a calculation from first principles (wind speed, swinging velocity, which part of swing will break...). So the crazy sceptic just carries on swinging, not seeing the fallacy of his ways.  If the swing breaks what does he care - he'll be dead anyway.

Bobafari January 9, 2009 8:33 AM

Do you know what the Gulf Stream is?

Bobafari January 9, 2009 8:36 AM

Or the "El Niño" effect?

Bobafari January 9, 2009 8:48 AM

Also obviously when they were talking about global warming back in the day they meant it on an aggregate, global level.  Wow! Really? So that's like, on average is it? So if, like, most places became warmer most of the time does that mean that one small island could have a cold snap for a few weeks and not upset the trend?  Is that like maths or sumfink, wiv dem numbers and dat?

Dan McNeil January 9, 2009 10:04 AM

Good analogy Bobafari.

And yes, it's always amusing when the brain-damaged climate change deniers start mumbling and grunting in their zombie fashion about how it's been really cold recently; ergo, climate change must be a myth.  Er no, the only myth is the supposed intelligence of the climate change denier.  As for the Gulf Stream and El Nino, I suspect most climate change deniers think that the former is an executive jet and the latter a 1970s American car.

horseandcart January 9, 2009 11:02 AM

Danny boy, shouldn't you be in class? Or do the special needs schools have longer breaks?

Dan McNeil January 9, 2009 11:15 AM

Poor old horseandcart.  It always aims for mediocrity in its prose, yet consistently fails to attain it.

The Colonel January 9, 2009 11:18 AM

"That's why the correct term is now climate change not global warming. "

That's not quite right.  In the recent debate (last 15 years or so) it has always been climate change.  Global warming has since been the doom laden label that the media has prefered to use for its headlines, and which government has happily gone along with to grease the wheels for their green policies and taxation.  This is the reason why a cold snap leads to consternation in the subject.  You cannot blame the layman for the confusion.

The IPCC has never used the term Global Warming in any official capacity:  Global Warming Potential has however, which is the index that describes the radioactive characteristics of the mixture of greenhouse gases relative to CO2 levels, over time.

Our official bodies dealing with climate change cannot even agree on what the causes of climate change are.

The IPCC do not know for certain if climate change occurs naturally or because of human factors, or what level of either is attributable.

The UN (through the FCCC, which is the basis for the Kyoto Protocol - dictating government environment policy since 1998) is absolutely certain that climate change is caused by humans (either directly or indirectly), prefering climate variability as a term for natural occurance.  Does anyone really believe that the climate, which is no doubt changing, is doing so exclusively because of human activity?  

Really?

Bobafari January 9, 2009 1:55 PM

upload.wikimedia.org/.../Co2-temperature-plot.svg    Colonel, I think you're splitting hairs here... If you look at this chart I think you'll find it quite compelling.  We're already in uncharted territory, and we can't just wait and see if we're in an irreversible positive feedback loop as by then it will be, by definition, too late.  My point is that it's irresponsible to say that as we're only amplifying a natural phenomenon then that's fine we can keep on doing it as much as we like.  It's a bit of a childish stance really: "But Miss! They stole some cookies first!" Although having said that I do agree that empty political gestures are silly, and indeed can be counter-productive.

The Colonel January 9, 2009 3:30 PM

Not splitting hairs at all, I just think that when it comes to talking about climate change and global warming all too often the terms have been seen as interchangeable and it leads to confusion, and as such we have the "Global Warming??? Nah, bloody freezing out there mate" type of comment, not just from people we all know, but on the TV, Radio and in the press.

The reaction to this, from some, is somewhat hectoring, abusive even, not unlike the stance that governments (national and local) take in their efforts to combat this.

I am in no doubt that the climate is changing.  I am in no doubt that average global temperatures are rising, for the time being.  By how much, for how long, and exactly why is not certain.

My main issue is one of approach.  To go back to your excellent Bear/Alligator/Swing analogy, of course the sensible thing to do is dismount from the swing and descend gently to the wall.  No-one will allow exactly that to happen though, prefering instead to ensure you are slammed into the wall.

All we ever get is an over-dry urge to "reduce your CO2 emissions".  I defy anyone that does not work in pollution/environmental science, to accurately describe what 292g/km of CO2 actually is.  What is it?  You can't want to do something about something you have no tangible concept of.

So, we have the "Reduce your CO2 emissions" tag.  Local authorities fining people for having a bin ever-so-slightly overfilled, or put in the wrong bag by mistake.  Supermarkets restricting/removing use of carrier bags (while persisting with superfluous packaging).  Over-priced under-efficient rail services that are supposed to help us out of cars.  Militant reaction, from some authorities (not just the tree-hugging type), to any proposed enhancement in fossil fueled transport (road schemes/airport expansion etc).   Blanket increased tax/parking fees for higher polluting vehicles, regardless of age/use.  Retention of Dartford Crossing Tolls.  I could go on.

Never have I seen, heard or read of a high profile government scheme which encourages people to reduce car use, recycle waste, use less water, gas and electricity, grow your own, because IT WILL SAVE YOU MONEY; because it will keep your immediate local environment (that area you have an actual idea about and affinity with) looking good.  Both, to me, are far more sensible and tangible notions to encourage the individual to reduce their impact on the environment, which added together, make a difference...for me, simply handing over several tens of thousands pounds worth of tax to the government every year...for what?, isn't enough.  But that is what happens.  Not only do you land on the wall with something of a thump, you get beaten with sticks on the way down, and more-so after you've landed.

A friend of mine is the Sustainability and Environment Director of a large, UK multinational company...very well known outfit..and a full, card-carrying environmental scientist.  He was an attendee at the Earth Summit +5 in New York in 1997.  The first half of the first day (it was only three days long) was spent deciding who was going to sit next to whom at lunch and dinner.  Many of the people there then are still calling the shots now, and despite a low level of achievement since Rio five years earlier, they were still more concerned about making sure delegate A didn't sit next to delegate B.  And that cost us money.

Bobafari January 10, 2009 1:08 PM

"when it comes to talking about climate change and global warming all too often the terms have been seen as interchangeable and it leads to confusion, and as such we have the "Global Warming??? Nah, bloody freezing out there mate" type of comment, not just from people we all know, but on the TV, Radio and in the press."   yeah, that was my pretty much my point

horseandcart January 11, 2009 4:24 PM

"There is a scientific consensus that increasing CO2 levels will warm the planet."

- have you got an open mind Mr Keohane?:

'2008 was the year man-made global warming was disproved'

www.telegraph.co.uk/.../2008-was-the-year-man-made-global-warming-was-disproved.html

- just a thousand odd comments to peruse.

horseandcart January 11, 2009 4:29 PM

Colonel Snappy January 8, 2009 4:13 PM

You still haven't provided a source for your claim that the BBC and Met Office are lying ...

- 'Ever shriller and more frantic has become the insistence of the warmists, cheered on by their army of media groupies such as the BBC, that the last 10 years have been the "hottest in history" and that the North Pole would soon be ice-free – as the poles remain defiantly icebound and those polar bears fail to drown. All those hysterical predictions that we are seeing more droughts and hurricanes than ever before have infuriatingly failed to materialise.'

www.telegraph.co.uk/.../2008-was-the-year-man-made-global-warming-was-disproved.html

Knock yourself out snappy man. The BBC's a joke. An expensive, pay the licence tax and swallow our propaganda or go to jail joke. Pravda of Soviet Union days would have blushed.

horseandcart January 11, 2009 4:35 PM

"There is a scientific consensus that increasing CO2 levels will warm the planet."  - really?

“I am a skeptic…Global warming has become a new religion.” - Nobel Prize Winner for Physics, Ivar Giaever.  

“Since I am no longer affiliated with any organization nor receiving any funding, I can speak quite frankly….As a scientist I remain skeptical.” -  Atmospheric Scientist Dr. Joanne Simpson, the first woman in the world to receive a PhD in meteorology  and formerly of NASA who has authored more than 190 studies and has been called “among the most preeminent scientists of the last 100 years.”  

"Warming fears are the worst scientific scandal in the history…When people come to know what the truth is, they will feel deceived by science and scientists.” - UN IPCC Japanese Scientist Dr. Kiminori Itoh, an award-winning PhD environmental physical chemist.  

“The IPCC has actually become a closed circuit; it doesn’t listen to others. It doesn’t have open minds… I am really amazed that the Nobel Peace Prize has been given on scientifically incorrect conclusions by people who are not geologists,” - Indian geologist Dr. Arun D. Ahluwalia at Punjab University and a board member of the UN-supported International Year of the Planet.  

“The models and forecasts of the UN IPCC "are incorrect because they only are based on mathematical models and presented results at scenarios that do not include, for example, solar activity.” - Victor Manuel Velasco Herrera, a researcher at the Institute of Geophysics of the National Autonomous University of Mexico  

“It is a blatant lie put forth in the media that makes it seem there is only a fringe of scientists who don’t buy into anthropogenic global warming.” - U.S Government Atmospheric Scientist Stanley B. Goldenberg of the Hurricane Research Division of NOAA.

“Even doubling or tripling the amount of carbon dioxide will virtually have little impact, as water vapour and water condensed on particles as clouds dominate the worldwide scene and always will.” – . Geoffrey G. Duffy, a professor in the Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering of the University of Auckland, NZ.

“For how many years must the planet cool before we begin to understand that the planet is not warming? For how many years must cooling go on?" - Geologist Dr. David Gee the chairman of the science committee of the 2008 International Geological Congress who has authored 130 plus peer reviewed papers, and is currently at Uppsala University in Sweden.  

It would appear that despite the United Nation's and IPCC's insistence, the debate is far from over.

www.examiner.com/x-219-Denver-Weather-Examiner~y2008m12d10-Climate-summit-underway-in-Poland-but-doubters-remain

touchwood January 15, 2009 3:43 PM

horseandcart please accept a metphorical hug.

Bravo - keep up the good work.

The BBC's use of non-confirmed alarmist theories is only exceeded by it's preoccupation with trying to create "the news" rather than just reporting the facts.