Ditto. I appreciate the difficult task you are doing. - Greg ________________________________________ From: geoengineering@googlegroups.com [geoengineering@googlegroups.com] on behalf of John Latham [john.latha...@manchester.ac.uk] Sent: Saturday, June 01, 2013 12:42 PM To: andrew.lock...@gmail.com; ebic...@mail.utexas.edu; geoengineering Subject: RE: [geo] Re: Reply to Ken Caldeira
Hello Andrew, I think you do a very difficult job extremely well, handling tricky issues fairly and with great sensitivity. Thank you! John (Latham) John Latham Address: P.O. Box 3000,MMM,NCAR,Boulder,CO 80307-3000 Email: lat...@ucar.edu or john.latha...@manchester.ac.uk Tel: (US-Work) 303-497-8182 or (US-Home) 303-444-2429 or (US-Cell) 303-882-0724 or (UK) 01928-730-002 http://www.mmm.ucar.edu/people/latham ________________________________________ From: geoengineering@googlegroups.com [geoengineering@googlegroups.com] on behalf of Andrew Lockley [andrew.lock...@gmail.com] Sent: 01 June 2013 19:33 To: ebic...@mail.utexas.edu; geoengineering Subject: Re: [geo] Re: Reply to Ken Caldeira I'm responding because of the criticism of my moderation. Clive has previously been unable to defend himself, as for technical reasons he's been unable to post to the group. Accordingly, I allowed him fairly free rein to respond as he saw fit. Members can draw their own conclusions about his arguments and conduct. I note that, on occasion, people on both sides of this debate haven't conducted themselves particularly well. I'm aiming for a light touch moderation strategy, but a firmer hand may soon be needed. If the present squabbling continues, I'll be putting a large number of people on moderation without warning, and without thinking too carefully in any particular individual's case. I hope this won't be necessary. I suggest that there's been adequate exploration of this incident, and of Clive's recent arguments and conduct. To protect everyone's nerves and your inboxes, it may be time we put this particular issue to bed. A On Jun 1, 2013 6:57 PM, "Bickel" <ebic...@mail.utexas.edu<mailto:ebic...@mail.utexas.edu>> wrote: Having just read Clive Hamilton’s response to Lee Lane’s post, I found myself wondering if this list is still moderated. First, Clive levels ad hominem attacks against my co-author, Lee Lane, and fails to take any account of the facts Lee just provided. Second, as Tom points out, Clive lays out a logic that because someone is associated with a group Clive disapproves of (or even if they are pre-associated as the case with Lee and AEI) that they must have ill intentions or, at least, intentions that Clive defines as nefarious. This assertion is false on its face. One cannot correctly claim that everyone associated with ExxonMobil or AEI believes or does x, y, or z. Thus, these attacks must be false, yet they allowed through by the moderator. I fear the discussion on this group is devolving to the point where serious members need to consider a different venue. Now, let me address another of Clive’s misunderstandings or “mistakes” that may be due a correction in the next edition his new book. Clive states that: “Lane is responsible for an ‘economic analysis’ (published by the AEI) purporting to show that SRM would be a much cheaper way to deal with global warming than cutting greenhouse gas emissions and is to be preferred.” “Lee Lane's paper purporting to show that sulphate aerosol spraying is the cheapest and best response to global warming is a travesty by any measure, and it is not surprising that it was published and heavily promoted by Bjorn Lomborg.” Clive appears to be referring to the paper that Lee and I contributed as part of the 2009 Copenhagen Consensus on Climate. This paper was drafted in early 2009 and published in Smart Solutions to Climate Change: Comparing Costs and Benefits in 2010 (Bjorn Lomborg, Cambridge University Press, pp. 9-51). It is interesting that Clive associates the paper only with Lee and AEI, when, in fact, I was also an author on the paper. It could be that it is harder to claim that everyone at the University of Texas at Austin is part of the right-wing conspiracy to destroy the planet. Clive’s claim about the paper’s message is provably false. Lee and I do not “purport to show that sulphate aerosol spraying is the cheapest and best response to global warming” or that SRM is “preferred” to emissions reductions. Rather we argue that the potential benefits of SRM appear to be large, but that the indirect costs are uncertain and could be large. Thus, we should pursue RESEARCH. A more careful reading of our paper may be in order. In terms of SRM vs emissions reductions, here is a quote from the second paragraph: “The reader should not interpret our focus on climate engineering as implying that other responses to climate change are unneeded. The proper mix and relative priority of various responses to climate change is in the purview of the expert panel, to which our paper is one input. One might also note that, with but one exception, every scenario considered in this paper is accompanied by greenhouse gas control measures.” (Bickel and Lane, p. 9) Our paper attempted to quantify the DIRECT benefits of SRM because those estimates were more readily available in early 2009. We noted that: “…the state of knowledge about both the benefits of [climate engineering] and its costs is primitive. Even base case estimates for many important benefit and cost parameters are unknown. Thus, where the existing literature contains quantitative estimates, this chapter will select what we regard as the best available. It will do so with the caution that today’s estimates are very much subject to change. Where possibly important factors have not been quantified, this analysis will point to their nature and discuss their potential significance.” (Bickel and Lane, p. 10) We then stated: “The costs of SRM fall into three broad categories. These include the DIRECT costs, such as the expense of developing and deploying SRM technology. They also encompass the INDIRECT costs, which might be thought of as the harm that might result from using these technologies. Finally, they include the transaction costs entailed by SRM. These costs might include the resources consumed in bargaining to secure agreement to use SRM or the costs of conflict that its use might occasion. Transaction costs also include routine considerations such as the costs of monitoring and measuring the system’s performance or nations’ contributions to it.” (emphasis added, Bickel and Lane, p. 21). Lee and I then attempted to quantify the benefit of reducing warming via differing levels of SRM use (1 W/m^2, 2 W/m^2, and 3 W/m^2) under No Controls and economically efficient controls (Bickel and Lane, p. 30-31). We also analyzed the benefit of using SRM to hold temperature changes to no more than 2 degrees C. We conclude our paper by stating: “Any assessment of SRM and [air capture] will be limited by the current state of knowledge, the rudimentary nature of the concepts, and the lack of prior R&D efforts. As noted in the introduction, this analysis relies on numbers found in the existing literature and existing climate change models. These inputs to our analysis are admittedly speculative; many questions surround their validity, and many gaps exist in them. This paper has also stressed the potential importance of transaction costs and “political market failures”. Finally, many important scientific and engineering uncertainties remain. Some of these pertain to climate change itself, its pace, and its consequences. Still others are more directly relevant to SRM. How will SRM impact regional precipitation patterns and ozone levels? To what extent can SRM be scaled to the levels considered here? What is the best method for aerosol injection? Are there other side effects that could invalidate the use of SRM? These are just a few of the questions that a well-designed research program should be designed to answer. … This analysis, then, can claim to be only an early and partial look at the potential benefits and costs of CE. Even so, the large scale of the estimated direct net benefits associated with the stratospheric aerosol and marine cloud whitening approaches are impressive. … While our analysis is preliminary, we believe it makes a strong case that the potential net benefits of SRM are large; the question is whether or not the indirect costs will change the calculus. Only research can answer this question.” (Bickel and Lane, p. 47) Thus, Clive’s claim that Lee and I purport to show that SRM is the cheapest and best response to climate change is simply false. Clive also dismisses the fact that our paper was reviewed by a panel of esteemed economists, including three Nobel Laureates. This panel agreed that SRM merits research and allocated about 1% of their fictitious budget towards this goal. They ranked energy R&D second. J. Eric Bickel The University of Texas at Austin On Saturday, June 1, 2013 1:23:57 AM UTC-5, mail wrote: Dear David Thanks for your response to my post; it provides a helpful perspective on the NASA-Ames meeting and subsequent report. However, I think you have misunderstood the point I was making. I am not suggesting that Ken is or was "somehow in league with" ExxonMobil and the AEI. I was making two points. First, I was pointing to the ethical problem of inviting representatives from the two organizations in the United States perhaps most responsible for propagating climate science denial and undermining efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions. It is not much of an exaggeration to say that the NASA meeting was convened because ExxonMobil and the AEI have been so successful in their political ambitions. To invite representatives of the organisations that did so much to wreck Plan A to a meeting to help formulate Plan B was, in my view, immoral. Secondly, there is the practical question of 'moral hazard'. ExxonMobil and the AEI both have an interest in promoting geoengineering as a substitute for mitigation, one commercial, one political and ideological. They are in no sense independent. Allowing representatives of those organisations to influence the assessment of geoengineering is likely to distort any analysis in favour of geoengineering over mitigation. Lee Lane's paper purporting to show that sulphate aerosol spraying is the cheapest and best response to global warming is a travesty by any measure, and it is not surprising that it was published and heavily promoted by Bjorn Lomborg. So my critique is aimed at the political naivety of many scientists engaged in geoengineering research and advocacy, including Ken. They do not see how their activities play into the hands of forces that do not share their admirable desire to protect the world from the ravages of climate change. And I must say, David, that your argument that Lane and Kheshgi were invited for their intellectual skills is another instance of this naivety. ExxonMobil and the AEI are hard-ball political players. Lane and Kheshgi are hired for their intellectual skills, skills that they are paid to deploy to their employers' benefit. That is how the world works. To imagine that they can somehow be purified, and become independent intellectuals as they walk into a meeting with well-meaning scientists, is ... well, I don't want to be rude, but I hope you see what I mean. The political dangers of the scientific push for geoengineering research is one of the principal themes of my book, Earthmasters, and there is a great deal more in it on these questions. On the question of the anti-democratic sentiments of the NASA group's report, I read the report very carefully and, in the context of the report overall and the composition of the group, I think my interpretation is a reasonable one. I invite others to read the NASA report and perhaps to peruse the more extensive analysis in my book. Put it this way; if I had been a member of that group and we wanted to write that in an emergency “ideological objections to solar radiation management may be swept aside” and that this is an “obvious political advantage”, all sorts of alarm bells would have gone off. But it appears that in the group none did. Yes, the report does come down more in favour of the "buying time" argument than the "emergency" framing, but it does so because the authors calculated that governments would be scared off by the emergency framing and would be less likely to fund research into geoengineering. I hope this makes my arguments clearer. Clive On 31 May 2013 02:53, Hawkins, Dave <dhaw...@nrdc.org> wrote: While I want to respect Ken’s wishes to get back to his work, I have a few points to add. First, I too do not like the tone of many of the comments on this list recently about Clive Hamilton and his position. They are unnecessarily dismissive and incorrectly (in my view) treat the issues Clive raises as though they were non-issues. One can disagree with his conclusions without attacking him for publishing his views. But I want to respond directly to Clive’s description of Ken’s role in the 2006 SRM meeting hosted at NASA Ames. I too attended this meeting and I think Clive’s criticism of Ken for his choice of invitees and report co-authors is way off base. Clive takes Ken to task for having invited Haroon Kheshgi of ExxonMobil and Lee Lane, then with AEI, to the workshop and for involving Lee Lane as a co-author of the workshop report. I have not read Clive’s book so I am reacting only to his email. I have spent a fair amount of my professional career fighting the positions of ExxonMobil and AEI but I think there is no basis for the innuendo that Clive draws from the fact that Ken involved Haroon and Lee in this workshop. There is a style of advocacy writing that uses the mere fact of a person’s employer as an explanation for the findings of various reports. Sometimes there are sufficient associated facts to warrant the implication that the employer explains the position taken. But that is not the case here. Clive seems to have decided to claim that Ken is somehow in league with anti-GHG-mitigation agendas of ExxonMobil and AEI just because he included their employees in the workshop and worked with Lee as a report co-author. There is a much simpler, non-conspiratorial (and in my opinion, more truthful) explanation for Haroon and Lee’s workshop involvement: they both possess intellectual skills and had some familiarity with the topic and Ken knew them. (As Haroon and Lee both know, I have had lots of occasion to disagree with positions they have espoused but there is nothing sinister or untoward in their participation in discussions like those at NASA Ames.) As to Clive’s claim that the workshop report puts forth a “profoundly anti-democratic analysis,” that is really a distortion of what the report says. The report described two competing strategic visions for SRM techniques. The first would do some research but put deployment on the shelf -- reserved for use akin to an emergency brake -- deployed only when a greater calamity was unavoidable. The second vision contemplated deployment of SRM in advance of calamitous change as a time-buying technique. The report’s comment about the “political advantages” of the emergency-use vision was an observation that in an emergency, issues that might require some time to work through, tend to get ignored. I would agree that labeling this feature as a “political advantage” was a poor choice of words, since it can be misrepresented as an endorsement of that form of decision-making. But, if anything, the report’s description of the pros and cons of the two strategic visions leans rather heavily in the direction of making the case against the emergency-use approach. I would be surprised if Clive actually believed the report was endorsing that approach and did so because it avoided democratic processes. Clive’s highlighting this as the most disturbing aspect of the NASA workshop report comes across to me more as a “gotcha” quotation approach; rhetorically useful but not an accurate account. Personally, I share a lot of Clive’s misgivings about how societies might misuse the prospect of geoengineering having some potential utility in fending off climate disaster but I don’t see that advocating a ban on research is a wise approach to dealing with geoengineering’s very real downsides. I respect Clive’s right to hold and defend a different opinion but as someone who knows Ken pretty well, I think impugning his integrity or judgment as Clive seems to be doing is unsupportable. David Hawkins From: geoengi...@googlegroups.com [mailto:geoengi...@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Ken Caldeira Sent: Thursday, May 30, 2013 11:48 AM To: Clive Hamilton Cc: Ross Salawitch; geoengi...@googlegroups.com Subject: [geo] Re: Reply to Ken Caldeira Clive Hamilton wrote "He [Gates] is an investor in Silver Lining, a company pursuing marine cloud brightening methods." This is false. Bill Gates made no such investment. I could be wrong, but I do not believe that there is any such company. There are some related facts (i.e., David Keith and I made a grant [i.e., gift] to Armond Neukermans to explore indoors the feasibility of making a nozzle, under the specific condition that the grantors and funders would have no financial interest in the outcomes of his work). Clearly, there was never any investment by Bill Gates in any company called Silver Lining. I leave it to Clive, the ethicist, to tell us what the right thing to do is when you make public, false, and damaging statements about someone else. ---- I do apologize to Clive (and others) for making statements that criticized them as persons. I should have restricted myself to criticizing statements, and not persons. I was wrong to make remarks that were critical of Clive (and others) as persons. I regret it, and I am sorry, and I will do my best to avoid such intemperate behavior in the future. --- I want to do my work and not waste any more time with this. Best, Ken _______________ Ken Caldeira Carnegie Institution for Science Dept of Global Ecology 260 Panama Street, Stanford, CA 94305 USA +1 650 704 7212 kcal...@carnegiescience.edu http://dge.stanford.edu/labs/caldeiralab @kencaldeira Caldeira Lab is hiring postdoctoral researchers. http://dge.stanford.edu/labs/caldeiralab/Caldeira_employment.html Check out the profile of me on NPR's All Things Considered<http://www.npr.org/2013/04/22/176344300/this-scientist-aims-high-to-save-the-worlds-coral-reefs> On Thu, May 30, 2013 at 5:36 AM, Clive Hamilton <ma...@clivehamilton.com> wrote: I’m confused. In one post Ken Caldeira calls for respectful communication and in the next (see below) he attacks me sharply for “making things up”. So let me respond. I should first confess that on occasion I make mistakes. When they are pointed out I correct them. My book, Earthmasters, was read thoroughly by several readers with various kinds of expertise, and revised several times to correct errors. Since publication a couple more have been pointed out by a diligent reader and will be corrected in the next printing by Yale University Press. But there is no need to make any corrections after Ken’s criticisms of me on this site. My source for the claim about Bill Gates and Silver Lining was an article in The Times. There it was stated: “Silver Lining, a research body in San Francisco, has received $300,000 (£204,000) from Mr Gates.” (http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/science/article2504715.ece) It’s the reference I include for the claim in my book (page 220, note 15) As for the role of Haroon Kheshgi, he was a member of the workshop convened by NASA and the Carnegie Institution that led to a report in 2007 advocating research into SRM and essentially pushing geoengineering hard. Ken was the convener of that meeting. He thought it appropriate to invite a representative of Exxon Mobil and a representative from the American Enterprise Institute. The latter was Lee Lane. Lane is responsible for an “economic analysis” (published by the AEI) purporting to show that SRM would be a much cheaper way to deal with global warming than cutting greenhouse gas emissions and is to be preferred. Ken was happy to have Lane co-author the NASA report with him. The AEI later cut and pasted large chunks of the NASA report into one of its own reports. This is all documented in my book. Ken invited Kheshgi to the NASA meeting but says that the leader of Exxon’s Global Climate Change programme had no influence over the proceedings or the report. Well (as one might say in the US) tell that to the marines. Ken can see no problem inviting onto a team to write a pro-geoengineering report a representative of the oil corporation that has done more than any other to attack climate science and resist all measures to curb carbon emissions. He also had no problem inviting a representative of the organization that has been the leading right-wing think tank attacking climate science for two decades. The AEI itself has received funding from Exxon Mobil to engage in climate science disinformation. One of its resident scholars infamously wrote to US climate scientists offering $10,000 in cash for any who agreed to write a critique of the IPCC’s Fourth Assessment Report (Hoggan, Climate Cover-Up, pp 73-4). Ken can see no problem working closely with these people on geoengineering. Nor can he see any problem with his public claim that all geoengineering research should be publicly funded (a claim he made at a public debate with me in Berkeley) while he himself accepts private funding (from Gates) and has privatized intellectual property by putting his name on geoengineering patents. Again, this is all documented in my book. What is most disturbing about the NASA report, co-authored by Ken from the meeting he organized, is its profoundly anti-democratic analysis. As I note in the book, Ken Caldeira and Lee Lane argue that in the “emergency” framing of geoengineering there is no point thinking about political objections and popular resistance to solar radiation management because, in a crisis, “ideological objections to solar radiation management may be swept aside”. The authors count the ability to sweep aside civil society objections to deployment of solar radiation management as an “obvious political advantage”. It is no surprise to me that the right-wing ideologues from the American Enterprise Institute should support the bypassing of democracy. That Ken, who frequently wheels out his credentials as an activist, should endorse such disdain for public participation in decisions determining the future of the planet comes as a shock. If Ken were to borrow a copy of my book he would learn a lot more about the politics of geoengineering, and perhaps even a bit about himself. As I compiled the index I noticed that his name features more than any other. I was surprised by this as my own assessment is that David Keith is a substantially more influential player. But David is more careful about how he goes about it. Clive Hamilton On 30 May 2013 12:18, Ken Caldeira <kcal...@carnegiescience.edu> wrote: Ross, I agree with you about the need to focus on facts and ideas and not making snarky remarks about people. Unfortunately, Clive does himself and the broader discussion a disservice by promulgating an abundance of misinformation. Just grabbing the first thing I could find on the web, he claimed that Bill Gates is an investor in Silver Lining, which is patently untrue. Bill Gates has no investment in Silver Lining. In an earlier email, I noted Clive's propensity to make claims about people's motivations, when he is not in a position to discern their motivation. Clive also wrote "Through Kheshgi, Exxon has begun to influence “independent” reports into geoengineering, such as the 2007 NASA report on solar radiation management organised by Caldeira.". What is the evidence for Exxon's influence in this report? Is it just an assertion, or is there real evidence? I have little desire to get into a discussion fact-checking Clive's every statement, but at least a few of them appear to have little foundation. (Many of them have a ring of "truthiness", in that they are related to true statements. The problem is that they are not in themselves true statements.) We can have our own points of view, but we cannot invent our own facts. Best, Ken PS. An example of "truthiness" might be the assertion of Exxon influenced the 2007 meeting report (http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20070031204_2007030982.pdf).Haroon Kheshgi was at the meeting, but I do not recall any influence he had in producing the report. Perhaps Clive can enlighten us, and tell us more specifically how Kheshgi influenced this report. _______________ Ken Caldeira Carnegie Institution for Science Dept of Global Ecology 260 Panama Street, Stanford, CA 94305 USA +1 650 704 7212 kcal...@carnegiescience.edu http://dge.stanford.edu/labs/caldeiralab @kencaldeira Caldeira Lab is hiring postdoctoral researchers. http://dge.stanford.edu/labs/caldeiralab/Caldeira_employment.html Check out the profile of me on NPR's All Things Considered<http://www.npr.org/2013/04/22/176344300/this-scientist-aims-high-to-save-the-worlds-coral-reefs> On Wed, May 29, 2013 at 5:56 PM, Ross Salawitch <r...@atmos.umd.edu> wrote: Disheartening to read criticism of Clive Hamilton, upon publication of his op-ed piece in the 26 May 2013 edition of the New York Times. Clive is eminently qualified to write on the topic of geo-engineering of climate, following the 22 April 2013 publication of his book "Earthmasters: The Dawn of the Age of Climate Engineering": http://www.amazon.com/Earthmasters-The-Dawn-Climate-Engineering/dp/0300186673 This book is very well referenced with citations to enumerable papers written by those active in this group. Since when has an op-ed piece contained citations to the peer reviewed literature? (in case it is not obvious, this is a rhetorical question). Several prior commentors seem to have lost sight of the fact a NY Times op-ed piece is written for the public, rather than a highly specialized audience of academics. IMHO, Clive's piece is outstanding and he should be lauded for such a thorough, succinct summary of this important societal issue. This forum is maintained by Google groups. Presumably, anything written will be preserved for many generations to follow. At the moment, this forum is close to delving into a pit of snarkiness. I urge those who chose to write to consider the permanency of your remarks before hitting the "post" button. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to geoengineerin...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to geoeng...@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to geoengineerin...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to geoeng...@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. -- Clive Hamilton Professor of Public Ethics Charles Sturt University www.clivehamilton.com<http://www.clivehamilton.com> -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to geoengineerin...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to geoeng...@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. -- Clive Hamilton Professor of Public Ethics Charles Sturt University www.clivehamilton.com<http://www.clivehamilton.com> -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to geoengineering+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering%2bunsubscr...@googlegroups.com>. To post to this group, send email to geoengineering@googlegroups.com<mailto:geoengineering@googlegroups.com>. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to geoengineering+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to geoengineering@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to geoengineering+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to geoengineering@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "geoengineering" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to geoengineering+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to geoengineering@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/geoengineering?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
