Anthropogenic Global Warming - why I don't give a crap

Anthropogenic Global Warming - why I don't give a crap

Some people say the planet's current warming is part of the natural cycle. Others argue that is caused by CO2 emissions.

Here's what I say: I've stopped listening to the argument, because it doesn't matter which side is right. I hope the anthropogenic argument is wrong because the total CO2 emissions of the human race are going to increase significantly in the next 20 years.

Is this because of the United States, those capitalist pigs? No. The USA is completely insignificant to the situation, even though Americans emit so much CO2 per capita. If Americans turned off every light, every machine, and every car in the next twenty years, and all went to live in caves, the CO2 emissions of the human race would still increase.

Read that last sentence again.

And despair.

Here's why:

The total emission of CO2 in China is now 6.5 billion metric tons per year. Their forecast for growth in the next two decades goes from a low end of 3.5% to a high end of 5.0% per annum. Assuming the mid-point of 4.25%, we expect their emissions to be 14.9 billion metric tons in 2031. India currently emits 1.6 billion. Their own forecast for 2031 is that they will in the best case triple, in the worst case quintuple. Assuming the mid-point of quadruple, their 2031 emissions will be 6.4 billion.

The rest of the countries in the world currently emit 21.2 billion metric tons of CO2 annually, bringing the current annual global output to 29.3 billion.

If the experts are right in that the current level of 29.3 is too high, you can clearly see that we are in deep merde, because it's going to be a lot higher in twenty years. A LOT higher. Assuming that the rest of the world outside of China and India can cut CO2 output by 20% in the next 20 years, which is unlikely for many reasons, the total global output will be 38.3 billion metric tons, about 30% more than now.

In order for humanity to effect even a tiny global improvement from 29.3b to 29.2b by 2031, the "rest of the world" would have to cut its output from 21.2 billion to 7.9, and that precipitous drop would have to occur in the face of the industrialization of the third world and the re-industrialization of the former Soviet Union.

The frightening part of it is that there is virtually nothing that the great industrialized nations can do about the situation. China and India have no intention of scaling back on growth, arguing that they have the right to pursue the level of development which has already occured in the developed world. Even the 14.9 billion per year that China is expected to emit in 2031 is still less per capita than the USA, and India's projected amount will be MUCH less than the USA per capita. At that time the USA and India will have similar CO2 emissions, but India will have at least four times as many people.

Today's global output is 29.3 billion metric tons. If America were to reduce its output to absolute zero, the output in 2031 would be expected to finish somewhere around 34-38 billion. In other words, we better hope that CO2 output is not as dangerous as claimed, because there's going to be a lot more of it in the future.

The Kyoto Protocol, or any other agreement which places no reins of any kind on China and India, can produce no meaningful reduction in the global CO2 emission level. Kyoto is symbolic, not tangible; palliative, not ameliorative; political, not scientific.

But forget Kyoto and ask the pragmatic question, "What can we do?"

Pretty much nothing, except develop technology that gives off less CO2.

The dilemma we face is this: (1) we cannot reduce the total global output without massive curbs on China and India's growth; (2) we cannot ask those countries to curb their growth further because they are only planning to rise to a per capita level far lower than we are now.

So that's why I don't give a crap. I think and I fear that the anthropogenic argument is correct, but it doesn't matter whether it is or not, because global CO2 levels are going to rise no matter what the USA does. So the only thing I can do is hope the prophets of doom are wrong.