Carter reckons that just about wraps it up for global warming

Today's Australian has a Bob Carter opinion piece attacking the Stern report. Carter lets fly with his usual over-the-top rhetoric:

the Stern review is destined to join Paul Ehrlich's The Population Bomb and think tank the Club of Rome's manifesto, Limits to Growth, in the pantheon of big banana scares that proved to be unfounded. It is part of the last hurrah for those warmaholics who inhabit a world of virtual climate reality that exists only inside flawed computer models.

Carter sounds like the Creationists who claim that evolution is a theory in crisis.

But what is going to prove all the global warming science is unfounded? (Links added by me.)

Stern has surely accepted his IPPC-centric science advice in good faith, yet that turns out to be his fatal mistake. Because there is copious evidence that the advice is untrustworthy. For instance, participants at a recent international climate conference in Stockholm were told that the hockey-stick depiction of temperature over the last 1000 years, an IPCC favourite, has been discredited; that pre-industrial atmospheric carbon dioxide levels were higher, and fluctuated more, than is indicated by the averaged ice core measurements; that global temperature has not increased since 1998, despite continuing increases in carbon dioxide; that the Arctic region is no warmer now than it was in the 1930s; and that climate models are too uncertain to be used as predictive policy tools.

Carter calls it an international climate conference, I would call it a conference set up global warming skeptics because they couldn't make it in a real climate conference.

These considerations undercut the core IPCC arguments for dangerous human-caused warming, as contained in its 2001 assessment report. Yet early drafts of the forthcoming fourth assessment report reveal that IPCC thinking does not consider these deep uncertainties, and neither does Stern.

Yes, the IPCC relies on peer-reviewed journal publications, not dodgy skeptic conferences. What a surprise.

And there really are reasoned criticisms you can make of the climate science in the Stern report, but Carter doesn't make them.

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Carter requires a stunning lack of perception to not notice that what once took one of the strongest El-Ninos in 150 years (1998) now only takes normal conditions. (I'm talking about what it takes to get the global average temperature of 1998.) I don't know what Carter himself has studied but most people entitled to call themselves a geo"physicist" haven't even done Physics 101.

By Chris O'Neill (not verified) on 02 Nov 2006 #permalink

Carter requires a stunning lack of perception to not notice that what once took one of the strongest El-Ninos in 150 years (1998) now only takes normal conditions.

No.

What he requires is a stunning abundance of shill to ignore this.

Let's not kid ourselves. Denial doesn't run that deep.

Best,

D

Once again the Limits to Growth gets misquoted. If you actually refer to the outputs of the World3 run done for the first Limits to Growth study in the early 1970s even the most pessimistic scenarios did not have collapse occurring before 2015.

So saying that they are proven wrong requires Dr Carter to be prescient.

More about the model can be found at

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World3

By Doug Clover (not verified) on 02 Nov 2006 #permalink

well i've heard of Carter who's a geologist and full of wit and wisdom on matters outside his field like human effects on climate, but who is this Lomborg fellow who teaches at a business school somewhere in Europe?

As someone who could call themselves a Geologist or geophysist by training, I have to take some issue with the comments above!

Chris -

Carter's idea that 'temperatures have been constant since 1998' is not a case of a non-physisist being wrong, but a case of someone who would't even pass 'science for drama students 101a'.

Sleepy -

Acually, geology and especially the climate record contained therin gives us an excellent set of data as to how the climate can change. For instance, it shows us that the climate is not 'set in stone' (sic); if the geological record showed a constant global average of 288K for the past 10 million years, for instance, we could safely dismiss global warming. However, the fact that global average temperatures have been all over the place in the past 10ma in fact shows that the climate does change significantly in response to GHGs, Albedo changes and circulation changes.

Any trained geologist who denies AGW is either:

(a) About to recieve a Nobel Price for their groundbreaking, paradigm changing discoveries in paleoclimatology,
(b) Paid off, or
(c) Senile..

Take your pick..

By Andrew Dodds (not verified) on 02 Nov 2006 #permalink

As usual, the corporate media dredges up 'know-nothing' Lomborg as the 'authoritative voice' to debunk the Stern report. Here's a guy who probably can't tell a mole cricket from a giraffe, and he's called on again to put on his rosy colored glasses, cross his fingers, and say crap like, 'We all want a better world' in the face of the structural violence being perpetrated on much of the developing world through free market absolutism and predatory unaccountable capitalism (e.g. the 'Washington Consensus'). Most of the world is enduring a 'neoliberal nightmare', which is concentrating wealth in fewer and fewer hands, and this twerp claims that 'We all want a better world'. No wonder the establishment - the privileged groups that dominate society and the state - lap up this garbage.

As for Carter claiming the Paul Ehrlich was wrong, he is only correct insofar as Paul was out by 20-30 years in his predictions. There are two main reasons for this. First, some technologies have temporarily forestalled the deleterious effects of human actions on the biosphere, and second, warnings from scientists like Paul and others were taken seriously enough by governments to implement policies that mitigated the effects he was talking about. So its completely out of line for someone like Carter to shoot his mouth off without a basic understanding of at least the rudimentary facts.

The fact remains that humanity is headed for a Godalmighty wall if we continue on the present course, living off of capital rather than income. The massive ecological debt that we are accruing will have to be paid, and nature will 'bite back' at some point (it already is), and scientsts such as myself are fully aware of the fact that there are no technological substitutes for most of the critical ecosystem services that we are destroying. We have no idea how far natural systems can be simplified before they are unable to sustain themselves and, ultmately, us. But the current trends are indeed very worrying. Climate change just may be the 'straw that breaks the camel's back', to use an old adage. The arguments of the sceptics are sinking fast, albeit not fast enough for my liking.

By Jeff Harvey (not verified) on 02 Nov 2006 #permalink

Andrew Dodds: "Carter's idea that 'temperatures have been constant since 1998' is not a case of a non-physisist being wrong, but a case of someone who would't even pass 'science for drama students 101a'."

and you would not pass literacy #1. Carter never said that. 1998 was hot and until 2006 it was cooler. Both years are El Ninos.

By Tim Curtin (not verified) on 03 Nov 2006 #permalink

Tim Curtin,

I'm not sure why you're trying to stick up for Carter's bizarre assertions.

Carter' words on this subject:

"For instance, participants at a recent international climate conference in Stockholm were told......that global temperature has not increased since 1998, despite continuing increases in carbon dioxide"

That is the only reference to 1998 in this context and 2006 isn't even mentioned, wierd that. El Nino is never even mentioned, again strange of him not include all the facts. Carter clearly tries to imply that rising CO2 won't further increase temperature, is this some form of prescience or some form of BS?

Carter and Lomborg are both laughingstocks: first Carter writes this classic comedy line: "Participants at a recent international climate conference in Stockholm were told that the hockey-stick depiction of temperature over the last 1000 years, an IPCC favourite, has been discredited". What he doesn't say is that it was hardly an 'international conference' but an assemblage of shills - the usual suspects. Qualified climate scientists were not there. They wouldn't be seen dead with the motley crowd that showed up.

Then there is this howler by Carter: "Lomborg accuses Stern of cherry-picking statistics to fit the argument". Lomborg, one of the world's most expert cherry pickers, accusing someone of cherry picking? Talk about calling the kettle black....

By Jeff Harvey (not verified) on 03 Nov 2006 #permalink

Tim Curtin said: "1998 was hot and until 2006 it was cooler. Both years are El Ninos."

If you look here http://www.cdc.noaa.gov/people/klaus.wolter/MEI/mei.html you will see that while we may be just starting to head into an El Nino, much of this year has actually had a negative "multivariate ENSO index". At any rate, in 1998 this index reached a value of nearly 3 whereas since 1998, it has only made it a little bit above 1 once for a very brief period.

What Carter's claims regarding the temperature since 1998 amount to is simply the fact that in a series of numbers that have a steadily-increasing average value but also pretty large fluctuations, it is quite likely that if you cherry-pick an anomalously high value (and 1998 was a doozy in that regard, lying head-and-shoulders about any previous year) you will not see another value exceed it until several more numbers in the series have gone by. Carter should be intelligent enough to know this elementary fact and therefore he should not be using it to support a claim that he ought to know it can't support. I think we really have to start calling these people out for the liars that they are.

By Joel Shore (not verified) on 03 Nov 2006 #permalink

...Carter also ignores the fact that 2005 was the warmest year on record and this without a defined El Nino event...

But heck, why quibble? Carter reminds me of a hockey team that is losing 12-0 in the tird period and finally breaks the duck, makes it 12-1, then lets out a triumphalist shout that its game over, and that 'his side' are winning...

By Jeff Harvey (not verified) on 03 Nov 2006 #permalink

The problem with trained geologists is that they think like rocks. The changes we are looking at now are being driven on the timescale of decades. It is not so much the change (although there are significant problems with that such as sea level rise) but the rate of change.

Gee... Tim Curtin is defending the practice of cherry-picking an anomalous datum (the MOST anomalous datum) as one end of the selected data for a trend analysis - again. And Carter is doing it - again. Why am I not surprised - again? It's not like they haven't been called on this before.

Sceptics are listened to (worse yet, acknowledged that their opinion has value) because we feel an obligation to refute their nonsense, discredit them, prove them wrong and win back the argument before a dumbfounded average reader/audience.

These aging shills are never going to stop their gaming the discussion and goading the legitimate science community and people of common sense to turn attention to them as if they are relevant.

The past several years of US climate change discussion and argument have been shaped, in large part, by the Bush machine, corporate vested interests shoveling money to Sen. Inhofe, CEI, CATO and the award-winning scholar Michael Crichton. Name your favorite contrarians here............ Bottom line, these are irrelevant beings we recognize as moving forces to be confronted.

We get to throw the food back at them and they return the volley. Then, we scoop our plates and heave another round. If you think that is a mischaracterization of what is going on, spend some time trolling the blogs and see for yourself; attack then counterattack then new attack and new counterattack......serious climate change discussion does Rush Limbaugh.

No wonder the public turns off the chatter and goes back to BAU.

Two recent articles that are far more relevant than the wisdon of Carter:

Drought-Hit Australia Battles Climate Change linked at:

http://tinyurl.com/y4ztbh

[ SYDNEY - Australia is already feeling the heat from climate change with a five-year drought devastating rural life, severe early season wildfires and record unseasonal temperatures.

Every four days, a farmer commits suicide under the stress of failing crops, dying livestock and debt as the worst drought in 100 years bites deep into the nation's psyche and erodes economic growth. "The current drought highlights how vulnerable we are to climate change," said farmer Mark Wootton. "We will never solve the drought if we don't solve climate change." ]

In the article the view of the Australian Bureau of Meteorology provided a much more worthy topic for RealClimate when it said Australia and the globe are experiencing rapid climate change.

Are we witnessing the disintegration of Australia..in slow motion?

Then read:

China Turns to Saltwater To End Drought

http://tinyurl.com/y7znbk

["China is expected to desalinate 800,000 to 1 million cubic metres of sea water per day and use 55 billion cubic metres annually by 2010," the State Development and Reform Commission said, detailing China's ninth five-year plan.

China desalinated 120,000 cubic metres of sea water per day last year.

It was not immediately clear how China, which is also desperately short of fuel, would power the energy-hungry desalination plants". ]

Australian and Chinese municipal water supply agencies are capitalizing billions of dollars to manufacture fresh water because they cannot bet on the rain coming in time.

Would we recognize abrupt climate change if it hit us in the face or do we first have to see it on a computer screen?

By John L. McCormick (not verified) on 03 Nov 2006 #permalink

As much as I enjoy Mr Harvey's thunderous ecological rants, I must say that the using of a hockey game score is way up there in my view.

Best,

D

>Carter never said that. 1998 was hot and until 2006 it was cooler. Both years are El Ninos.

Yet another pretend climatologist Tim. The El Nino actually occured in 1997 with 1998 a year in which we transitioned to La Nina. Global temperature peak about 6 months after the peak of the El Nino. 2007 is the year to watch in terms of breaking the 1998 record (if you pretend it didn't happen last year)... but of course the goal post will then move and the story will be that it hasn't warmed since 2007.

Hill Billy

PS, can you get Bob to define for us what he means when he claims no global warming since 1998? The words keep changing and when I quizzed him he refused to provide an objective definition.

By Hill Billy (not verified) on 03 Nov 2006 #permalink

well i shall certainly take Dodds over Carter on geophysics thank you for the correction Andrew, and Jeff Harvey nails Lomborg and Carter, two queer birds in one, for Carter's "cherrypicking" hilariousness. Then there is Tim Curtin ... there will always be Tim Curtin!

"Every four days, a farmer commits suicide under the stress of failing crops, dying livestock and debt as the worst drought in 100 years bites deep into the nation's psyche and erodes economic growth."

It should be poined otu that Australia has logn had an unusually high asuicide rate and that we deal very poorly with depression and mental illness.

It's a major national failing which predates global warming and its a mistake ypo blame global warming/drought for these suicides.

By Ian Gould (not verified) on 03 Nov 2006 #permalink

John L McC " rapid climate change in slow motion"
I can't quite get my head around that one
And if it rains in Australia is that the end of global warming?
Hyperbole metre approaching red zone

Chris: the Australian government - which is virtually alone in bakcing the US position in opposition to Kyoto - has admitted that there is good evidence for definite long term canges in Australian weather patterns.

When it lasts twenty years it isn't a drought anymore, its the climate.

By Ian Gould (not verified) on 03 Nov 2006 #permalink

Ian: 2o year drought? Runaway Greenhouse ExaggeretionTM
If you think there is a link between drought and Global Warming then I suggest you avoid the BOM QLD website!

Dano,

I just thought I'd throw in a hockey game example cos' I used to play a lot of hockey while growing up in Canada. I was a big Toronto Maple Leafs fan way back then, even when they were losing to the Detroit Red Wings by a similar 12-1 score in a 1967 game that I remember well...

To be honest, I gave Carter way too much credit when I gave him a single goal yesterday - I should have said that he had a weak shot on goal that was easily saved and that the score is still 12-0...

By Jeff Harvey (not verified) on 03 Nov 2006 #permalink

Chris, just a suggestion but in future if you intend to keep up the snide, dismissive patronising attitude you might want to ensure you aren't talking nonsense.

http://www.bordermail.com.au/news/bm/national/497413.html

"Climate change to bring more drought: scientist

MORE severe droughts are inevitable if global warming continues, an expert has warned.

Climatologist Barrie Pittock told a Victorian National Parks Association audience in Melbourne that as global warming continued, worse droughts would follow.

"While drought relief may well be appropriate in the short term, we have to treat the cause as well as the consequences," Dr Pittock said.

"Increased temperature, due to emissions of greenhouse gases from fossil fuels and deforestation, is leading to increased evaporative losses from soil and vegetation, making droughts worse."

Dr Pittock, the CSIRO's climate impact group and author of Climate Change: Turning Up the Heat, said recent studies had shown that global warning was pushing the mid-latitude westerly winds towards the south and north poles.

"The low-pressure systems and cold fronts that bring rain to southern Australia are further south, so we only get the tail end of the fronts, with less rain than in earlier years," Dr Pittock said.

Pittock said this trend was first seen in the southwest of Western Australia, where rainfall started to drop in the 1970s."

By Ian Gould (not verified) on 04 Nov 2006 #permalink

Furthermore Chris, if you spout nonsense you might want to avoid spurious references to actual websites since people might actually go to thse sites and find embarassing material like this:

http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/silo/reg/cli_chg/trendmaps.cgi

Check the long-term rainfall trend - especially for WA, SA and Queensland and then check the long-term maximum temperature trend.

By Ian Gould (not verified) on 04 Nov 2006 #permalink

Lomborg trots out his tired old warhorse:
"They found that the world should prioritize the need for better health, nutrition, water, sanitation and education, long before we turn our attention to the costly mitigation of global warning."
As if the only thing that is holding back mankind from solving these solvable problems is those silly/bad environmentalists and their silly squeaky wheel agenda. As if the people who are against doing anything to mitigate climate change were the people whose first priorities were the welfare of poor third worlders. As if the people who will suffer the most from climate change were not the very same poor third worlders. As if, should sudden inspiration strike and global warming suddenly vanish from everyone's list of concerns, in short order the third world will be well fed, watered, housed, and medicated. Given the dubious quality of this specific analysis which runs like an unbroken thread through everything Lomborg writes, how can anyone take anything else he writes with any degree of seriousness?

I found this site http://www.aip.org/history/climate/co2.htm useful in explaining to "skeptics" the historical progress of thinking regarding greenhouse gases and climate change. In particular since the arguments of the self-styled scientifically aware skeptics seem to be evolving now towards the (mutually exclusive) viewpoints that 1) the atmospheric CO2 is already saturated, IR-wise and 2) the IR absorbtion of CO2 in the air is masked by the overlapping absorbtion of the more abundant water vapor. As seen in this site, that puts their thinking at about state of the art 1930.

What z sez about Blomberg. No surprise that it's places like OpinionJournal that most keenly market Blombergian fatuity to that broad church of skeptik muppets, the Street being of course renowned for its concentration on humanitarian issues. Whenever it gets a break in its business as usual holy war against greenies. Blomberg and Wall St? - a perfect match of naked self interests.

Carter didn't really go to the core of the Stern report's soft underbelly. We don't know what discount rate Stern used to come up with his scenario.

If somone does know, maybe they could share it.

By joe cambria (not verified) on 04 Nov 2006 #permalink

Jeff,

Let's be honest; Carter is playing with his skates tied together.

Ian Gould My apologies for my snide,dismissive patronising attitude and sorry about linking to the fact that has actually been raining in Queensland.
I suppose this is the part where I link to somebody that disagrees with your link.
Is that the etiquette?
Well how about the Copenhagen Consensus which rates pressing global concerns and has ranked Global Warming at No 27
Now you link to places that show that CC has connections to RW think tanks/EXXXon/fill in ogre here

Copenhagen's not in Queensland is it?! Now Bob Carter he is in Queensland so there may be some connection there (I don't know).

Joe Cambria: Stern flip flops with his discount rates, but 0.1 is his preferred rate of "pure time preference" (i.e. you would be indifferent between being offered $100 today and $100.01 in a year; if so, I am very willing to take wahtever you've got at that rate of interest, and retire on the difference between it and the 8+% easily to be found on the market here).

ChrisL "sorry about linking to the fact that has actually been raining in Queensland."

Actually, Chris you linked to nothing whatsoever.

The Copenhagen Consensus is a load of crap but even if it were not it is entirely irrelevant to the question of whether or not climate change is actually happening.

That question is entirely seperate from what, if anything, should be done about it.

By Ian Gould (not verified) on 05 Nov 2006 #permalink

Chrisl, I second the comment of Ian Gould

[The Copenhagen Consensus is a load of crap but even if it were not it is entirely irrelevant to the question of whether or not climate change is actually happening.]

Comparing the CC blather fest pronouncement to real concerns of AGW is like telling the highway patrolman: 'Officer, I was just sitting here. My car was speeding.'

Then again, we tend to believe what we want to believe.

By John L. McCormick (not verified) on 05 Nov 2006 #permalink

Tim Curtin:
Just wanting to check decimals vs. percent. If Stern's preferred discount rate is .1, is that 10%? You state it as .1, but your example uses it as .01% (i.e., essentially 0). If it's 10%, your 8% interest is a net loss of 2% per year. The different values may result in different preferences.

Well, the Copenhagen Consensus is more of the Lucy trick.

-You have concerns about climate change? Here are 27 more important problems.

=OK let's attack the first one first.

-I don't want to pay for it.

But in truth it is even worse. Those 26 are characterized by being local in time and space. Climate change is a global problem that will make every one of those 26 worse.

If you check out the Copenhagen Consensus web site you will see that it is headed by no other than Bjørn Lomborg. This means that it has the same legitimacy as the recent Stockholm "scientific" meeting.

Ian Forrester

By Ian Forrester (not verified) on 05 Nov 2006 #permalink

Ian Gould My apologies for my snide,dismissive patronising attitude and sorry about linking to the fact that has actually been raining in Queensland. I suppose this is the part where I link to somebody that disagrees with your link. Is that the etiquette? Well how about the Copenhagen Consensus which rates pressing global concerns and has ranked Global Warming at No 27 Now you link to places that show that CC has connections to RW think tanks/EXXXon/fill in ogre here

Methinks you do not understand the concept of "linking"; it generally, in fact always, involves at least one actual "link".

Tim C.: I haven't looked in detail at the Stern Report yet but if he applies the same discount rate to both the costs of global warming impacts and the the costs do avoidance then isn't it really only an issue if the two costs are incurred in difference time periods?

My assumption (and, again, I haven't read the report yet)is the costs of avoidance are incurred starting almost immediately but the avoided costs from the impacts of global warming are primarily in the later years. If that is the case, then surely any bias in the report due to a low discount rate will be in the form of a reduction in the NPV of global warming impacts?

By Ian Gould (not verified) on 05 Nov 2006 #permalink

It took me a while but I think I've made sense of Chrisl's invocation of the Bureau of Meteorology: it rained here in Brisbane on Saturday.

Apparently one rainy day is sufficient to declare the end of the drought (notwithstanding the current level 4 water restrictions).

On the other hand it didn't rain Sunday and it looks like it won't rain today so by Chrisl's logic I guess the drought is back on.

By Ian Gould (not verified) on 05 Nov 2006 #permalink

Stewart: apologies for the typo. 100.1 is what you would get in a year, not 100.01. The point I was trying to make is that Stern's use of a virtually zero discount rate misses the purpose of discounting, which is to determine the opportunity cost of alternative investments. Setting the rate to 0.1 or even 0.0 for evaluating climate change adaptation or mitigation costs is "ethical" according to Stern, but also penny wise and pound foolish. Consider an evaluation of whether it is better to replace coal or gas power with nuclear or solar, using data from Finland and IEA for nuclear and from the proposed Victoria solar power plant, and using Stern's US$85 per tonne of CO2 as the climate cost averted by reducing CO2 emissions. Using a zero discount rate, both nuclear and solar yield positive net cash flows vis a vis replacing coal, but only solar is cash positive for replacing natural gas (because of the lower CO2 saving). Using the internal rate of return, nuclear but not solar shows a return higher than the current market opportunity cost of capital (8%)for coal replacement, and both nuclear and solar fail this market test vis a vis natural gas replacement. So the correct decision is to replace coal with nuclear and leave natural gas in place. By adopting using Stern's zero rate and replacing gas with solar because it is cash positive despite a real rate of return of only 0.16 per cent, we forgo the 8 per cent return on the alternative use of those funds which would enable us to fund more replacement of coal. Using a zero rate leads to inefficient policy outcomes.

Tim,

There is an important distinction between the opportunity cost of time and the rate of time preference. The opportunity cost of time is the amount of future consumption you give up by consuming an additional unit of consumption today. It will depend on the return you could have recieved from investing the resources you spent on the additional unit of current consumption. The rate of time preference is a preference parameter. In general, it tells you something about the relative ranking of bundles that contain more current consumption with bundles that contain less current consumption and more future consumption. While the equilibrium interest rate will typically depend on the profile of time preferences of the agents in an economy, the interest rates and rates of time preference are different concepts.

Regards,

Damien.

Hi Damien and Eli

Thanks, Damien, and I'm in broad agreement, especially that in equilibrium time preference and the rate of interest will be equal. But there is no doubt that Stern argues (at 2A, Our approach, p.45, albeit in a patronising, special pleading, and pompous, manner eg "perturbation" for "change"!!)for a zero rate of time preference: "From Frank Ramsey in the 1920s.... the only ethical basis for placing less value on the utility (as opposed to consumption) of future generations was the uncertainty over whether or not the world will exist or whether those generations will be present". Cheerfull chappy! if Stern read more widely he would know that Pigou (who was Ramsey's source albeit misunderstood by the latter) said "this preference for present pleasures does not - the idea is self-defeating - imply that a present pleasure of given magnitude is any greater than a future pleasure of the SAME magnitude" (my emphasis). Arrow and Kurz (1960) noted that Ramsey went on to say (1931) that "in time the world will COOL and everything will die, but that is a long time still, and its present value at compound interest is almost nothing". (my emphasis). No wonder Stern does not cite Ramsey 1931! But Ramsey got it wrong. Pigou is right; discounting is a question of opportunity cost, and maximises future utility and consumption, pace Stern, whose understanding here is limited by his preference for constantly citing himself instead of reading more widely. See Time Discounting and Value, Colin Price 1993 for citations above and for comment that "discounting assures efficient allocation of investment funds [and is complementary with] sustainability [which] assures intergenerational equity; mostly economists who advocate sustainable development believe that discounting should be retained" (330).

Eli: see Richard Tol's critique of Stern on discounting and latter's 0.1 rate.

TimC is justified in criticising Stern's discussion of discount rares although I would prefer to describe it as muddled, convoluted and overly abstruse rather than flip-flopping.

However, I have now managed to find the tesimony from Dr Chris Hope of Cambridge University who actually ran the Page2002 modelling.

http://www.hm-treasury.gov.uk/media/F74/C6/climatechnage_judge.pdf

"Allowing discount rates and equity weights to vary gives slightly different results. With pure time preference rates in the range of 1% to 3% per year, and an equity weight parameter in the range of 0.5 to 1.5, the mean PAGE2002 estimate for the SCC becomes $43 per tonne of carbon emitted in 2001, with a 5-95% range of $7 - 128. The figures are lower because the central value for the pure time preference rate, 2% per year, gives a slightly higher discount rate than the Treasury Green Book, and so the impacts that occur in the far future have less weight."

That's still nto exactly clear but it would seem ro imply that the discount rate used was not 0.1%.

By Ian Gou.d (not verified) on 05 Nov 2006 #permalink

Ian: Thanks, but my direct quote from Stern implies zero, and Tol finds 0.1; one of the problems with the Stern Report that its numbers vary from page to page (eg "costs of Climate Change 5% now and forever" yet on p.243 by 2030 with stabilisation at 450 CO2 ppmv yet to be reached we have anything from -3.4 to + 3.9, so much for "minus 5% now and forever". Previously, at p.163, Table6.1, we have Mean "losses in CURRENT per capita consumption" of 2.1, 5.0, 10.9, 2.5, 6.9, 14.4 ("at discount rates of 0.1 per cent p.a.", Eli please note). As ever with both Stern and the IPCC everything is possible so they cane NEVER be proved wrong. But I am willing to provide you, Ian, as a special favour, with the winner of tomorrow's Melbourne Cup. It will definitely be one of the following (see The Age), but I fear your spam remover has already deleted my nomination of the winner, so watch this space, I will try again at 1500 hours tomorrow.

On a separate issue, Stern's main policy recommendation is that as new taxes might not help his boss get elected as PM, all we need is a bigger and better carbon emissions trading scheme (ETS). I have news for dear old Nick, from the Financial Times, 2 November. Thanks to the brilliant success of the EU's ETS, the UK's imports of coal will be close to 43 million tonnes this year, up from the record 35 mt when the ETS took off last year. One problem is that the power companies have seized on the gullibility of the public re AGW to increase prices above cost of ETS permits as that makes said public feel good, and now have all-time record profit margins. Meantime ETS prices have dropped from 30 Euros per tonne of carbon in April to 11 now. Yet Nickie boy reckons they should be 314 per tonne C (see Richard Tol). So we have ZERO drop in emissions (in fact the reverse, see UK coal imports) and falling ETS prices. Oh brave new world!

Nick Stern has never worked in the private sector with its sordid transactions of buying and selling. That is why he is incapable of grasping (I have tried to tell him)that a packet of cornflakes sold is a packet of cornflakes bought, for no net change in the stock, until the latter are eaten. Same with ETS: reduced emissions by A allow increased emisions by B, for no net change, until the latter are used up, when luckily A has more reduced emissions to sell. That is why there has been NO NET REDUCTION IN EMISSIONS SINCE THE ETS BEGAN. Back to the drawing board Nicko!

Eli,

I dont have the reprot in front of me but at one point it does indeed refer specifically to 0.1% per annum - for the time preference of money. As David Eldridge points out above, and as the quote from Dr. Hope confirms, the the time preference cost is not equivalent to the discounr rate.

By Ian Gould (not verified) on 06 Nov 2006 #permalink

Eli: do tell Sir Nicholas Stern. I already gave you the precise page ref for his statement that he uses a "utility (sic) discount rate of 0.1% per annum" (p.264). But then Stern learnt his economics at the Bin Laden (or Empty) Business School, where only a 0.0 rate is truly acceptable. Stern's whole Report is indeed redolent of the Islamic desert with its implicit anti-modernism, as Tol has also appreciated.

By Tim Curtin (not verified) on 06 Nov 2006 #permalink

How come Tim C gets play so he can spam the thread?

Jeff,

I'd say that Carter gets a hip-check from Gordie Howe before he gets a shot off, and being so weak he flops to the ice like Hasek, only with no grace. Or, maybe better, watches as Big M Mahovolich steals the puck from Carter and scores on the other end.

Or is that hapless Benny Peiser that gets the puck stolen?

Best,

D

Eli: do tell Sir Nicholas Stern that his maths is no better than 3rd grade. I already gave you (at my last but one offering) the precise page ref for his statement that he uses a "utility (sic) discount rate of 0.1% per annum" (p.264). But then Stern learnt his economics at the Bin Laden (or Empty) Business School, where only a 0.0 rate is truly acceptable. Stern's whole Report is indeed redolent of the Islamic desert with its implicit anti-modernism, as Tol has also appreciated when commenting on Stern's treatment of adaptation as less viable or important than mitigation.

Ian likewise: Stern says at page 264 that he uses a 0.1 DISCOUNT rate, not PTP (which for him is 0 as in the Koran).

By Tim Curtin (not verified) on 06 Nov 2006 #permalink

When will Eli ever admit that he was wrong to deny that Stern used a 0.1 per cent p.a. discount rate? Not before anybody else on this site will admit that Lancet/JHU were wrong not to refer to WHO lifetables for Iraq when establishing their baseline for mortality rates in that country.

By Tim Curtin (not verified) on 11 Nov 2006 #permalink

Tim Curtin wrote:

ancet/JHU were wrong not to refer to WHO lifetables for Iraq when establishing their baseline for mortality rates in that country

Ah. I overlooked yet a third possibility. Second alternative shorter Tim Curtin: "I don't know what a cohort model is and I'm hoping you don't, either."

Robert: When a cohort study claims a pre-war (i.e. 2002)crude mortality rate of 5.5 in Iraq, and supports it with the CIA's 6 plucked from the sky, while the WHO showed a rate of over 9 in 2001, then questions have to be asked about the sampling technique. In the last analysis a census or nation wide life tables have to be preferred to sample or cohort study. Failure of Robert and The Lancet's so-called peer reviewers even to bother to check out the WHO tells us something about their competence and integrity.

By Tim Curtin (not verified) on 11 Nov 2006 #permalink

Tim Curtin wrote:

When a cohort study claims a pre-war (i.e. 2002)crude mortality rate of 5.5 in Iraq, and supports it with the CIA's 6 plucked from the sky, while the WHO showed a rate of over 9 in 2001, then questions have to be asked about the sampling technique. [...] Failure of Robert and The Lancet's so-called peer reviewers even to bother to check out the WHO tells us something about their competence and integrity.

1. I'd say that the failure to even bother to check where the CIA's "plucked from the sky" estimate came from tells us something about your competence and integrity. BTW, I did check the WHO, so you were wrong there, too.

2. [In the spirit of something someone once said to me](http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2006/11/lancet_podcasts.php#comment-260…
), when you can show you understand (1) life tables, and (2) the mortality estimation methodology used by both WHO and the US Census Bureau then maybe I'll take your criticisms seriously--though that's still just a maybe. Cuz in your particular case, even if you could understand them, you'd almost surely still be a blustering hack.

Robert: questions about your integrity remain when you fail to tell us what you found out about crude mortality rates in Iraq in 2001 from the WHO life table.

By Tim Curtin (not verified) on 11 Nov 2006 #permalink