We do know, though, that if global warming continues unabated, it will impose severe costs on humans in terms of decreased agricultural yields, human health and decreased worker productivity. There are many estimates for the actual social cost of greenhouse gas emissions, but it may be around NZ$200 per tonne of CO2, or greater. On a cost*risk basis, we should absolutely be reducing our emissions. Let’s say the cost by 2050 of reducing emissions is $21 trillion (as per this article.); let’s say the risk of this being unnecessary is 2% (a generous figure). $21 trillion * 0.02 = $420 billion. On the other side, failing to reduce emissions may cost us $33 trillion by 2050, at a risk of 98%; $33 trillion *0.98 = $32.3 trillion. You’re the economist; you should be able to follow the math. If we look further, to the end of the century perhaps, the cost differential grows drastically: how do you put a price on civilization-as-we-know-it?

Don’t rely on Roy Spencer for accurate information. A quick google search easily finds the explanation of how he’s fudged his data: see here. You need to question what you read. You talk of science; well, a key aspect of science is trying to invalidate one’s own beliefs, and that’s what climate scientists are doing all the time. I, too, look for opposing views, to see if some new denialist claim holds any water at all. If there really were some strong piece of evidence to undermine the scientific consensus, I’d expect every denialist to be trumpeting it as loud as they can. But they all repeat the same shoddy misrepresentations and cherry-pickings. This is now one of the most studied areas of science, with both legitimate scientists and fossil-fuel-funded shills like Spencer putting huge effort into trying to invalidate the models. Yet the evidence supporting these models is vast and extremely strong, and growing by the day; and the evidence against is … not there.

Your hypothesis that governments are eager to issue new laws regulating carbon is frankly absurd. Governments are absolutely terrified of doing this, which is why it’s taking them so bloody long to act. It’s politically hugely difficult, and the main reason politicians are finally starting (just starting) to act is because they know that they can’t feign ignorance any longer.

Bear in mind, that to reduce the temperature of the world by limiting or abolishing the production of CO2, is a horrendously expensive task world wide. This attempt, regardless of the climate, can only lead to disastrous rises in the cost of energy which in turn will lead to economic collapse of world economies along with disastrous effects on the world populace. (Yup I majored in economics – class of 1981 – and for me this is easy to see).

You see, our economies are based on fossil energy, Coal, Gas and Oil etc and unless equally or less expensive substitutes are found, without them most of us will starve and/or freeze to death. But perhaps, as you are not doubt postulating on your site, if we avoid ruining the planet, maybe that cost will be worthwhile?

At the very least, trying to cool the planet is a very serious thing to attempt, and I am sure that you would agree that we should not go down this road unless we have absolute proof that humans are warming the planet and that the predictions we are hearing from some sources are scientifically confirmed.

Fortunately there is a scientific method which allows us to decide whether the above is true or not. If you read Karl Popper and if you wish to take it even further, William of Ockham, you can find the basis of the scientific disproof of a hypothesis.

This quick video may help: Richard Feynman on disproving a hypothesis. And Dr Roy Spencer’s Graph showing Models and empirical measurements. (Accompanying commentary can be found on Dr Spencer’s blog archive, June 2013.)

This is a good example of Popper’s disproval of a hypothesis. In this case the models are the hypothesis, (or law as Feynman describes them) and the actual temperature measurements, some of which are satellites, represent the empirical measurements. It is very obvious that the models fall under Feynman’s rejection. There is therefore no scientific evidence that the earth is warming (or cooling), other than what has already been observed throughout history.

Unfortunately, governments like excuses to issue new laws. As most governments nowadays, (including that of New Zealand), are sliding steadily to the left, this gives them an excuse to issue more laws and regulations of the sort which we must obey at the cost of trading a little of our freedom and democracy. We see this happening in our society at this very moment as common law is replaced with regulative legislation in most sectors. Common law traditionally is/was at arms length from governments. Regulations by legislation are not.

So please take the time to study these things. I understand how difficult it is to give up beliefs that you have accumulated, but one must remain logical and scientific in these things. To be otherwise one must be dishonest with one self. Cheers,

Roger

The fact you allude to is that solar power especially is far from constant: it comes only during the day, and it peaks around the middle of the day, when there’s bright sun at the right angle. Germany doesn’t yet have sufficient storage capacity for all this power, so it can’t store it all up until evening, for instance. Instead, Germany is exporting its surplus to neighbouring countries.
This is actually a good thing. It has long been recognised that renewable sources like solar are often time- and weather-dependent, and that to benefit best from them we need to be sharing power widely. There is a push in Europe at the moment to build a more extensive HVDC (high-voltage DC) super-grid that would allow power to be shared over large geographical areas with minimal attenuation of power. The greater the area you can span, the more everything averages out, so that you don’t have to deal with inconvenient surpluses and shortfalls.
Currently, serious work is being done towards uniting the European UCTE grid with the IPS/UPS grid covering Russia, Mongolia and other eastern countries. This would cover 13 timezones, enabling much greater smoothing of power supply; and the grid could equally be extended into Asia and across the Baring Straight to North America.

Here in NZ we don’t have nearby neighbours we can easily sling a power line to, but we’re actually in a great position regardless, because of how much hydroelectric production we have. Hydro is like a big battery: in periods of surplus, when the sun is shining and solar energy is plentiful, we can just reduce how much water flows through the hydro dams. In periods of shortfall, such as in the evening when everyone is cooking, we simply open the sluices and put more water through. That’s already how our hydro production works; nothing needs to change in that regard.
NZ is thus uncommonly well set for renewable power production. All we need is a few policy changes and we could be underway. For instance, until recently, Meridian Energy was the one power company that would buy privately-produced power at the same price it sold it for. Now it has substantially reduced what it pays.
If legislation were introduced requiring power companies to pay a reasonable price for all power they use, and if they were furthermore required to purchase renewable sources first, in preference to dirty sources, we would see an explosion of private power production just as there has been in Germany. Home-owners could save a huge amount on bills just by installing some PV panels, and instead of needing expensive batteries they could rely on the grid to be their battery. Feed in when the sun shines, feed out when it doesn’t. Very efficient, cheap to install.
We could see substantial gains for individual households, the country, and the climate, without any major spending required of the government.

It’s working for Germany; it would work even better for us.