White House Releases Report On Climate Change

UNBELIEVABLE increase in utility outages

Another interesting part of the full report is the effect of more severe weather on electric grid outages.

Page 58, figure 2 has the Significant Weather-Related US Electric Grid Disturbances. The chart has data from 1992 through 2008. The average number of disturbances in the 1st 5 years, '92-'96 is about 6 per year. The average number of disturbances in the last five years is about 55, and for 2008 it is about 100.

Have we really had a 16 fold increase in 16 years ?????? Don't you this would have gotten a lot of attention? Don't you think that someone in the utility industry should have been consulted to see if this made any sense.

When this data was questioned by some skeptics, the persons responsible for the data gathering said that most of the increase was clearly tied to changes that have been made in data reporting procedures.

Meanwhile, our politicians are making decisions on things like Cap and Trade while reading reports that say that global warming causes more severe weather which causes more frequent electric outages.

Science my (*&)(*.

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Every time I dig a bit deeper on these supposedly reliable government reports, I find more issues like this.

Charlie of CA @ Jun 30, 2009 21:02:42 PM

Link to the Full Report

Ruth and others, you can download the full report here:

http://www.globalchange.gov/publications/reports/scientific-assessments/us-impacts/download-the-report

Let's all push for a positive transition.

Tom B Reeves of OR @ Jun 22, 2009 18:11:15 PM

Squat on Rairoad Track suprised when train hits

How long will the US tax payers permit our elected officials to reward "squaters" on 'railroad tracks" (defined as any known geological location that is subjected at any point in time to damages of nature, floodidng, land slides, high winds, hurracains etc)" to get tax payers dollars to help make them whole for their bad judgment(New Orleans below sea level).

Those who fail to heed known disasters or build on a 'railroad track" should be held responsible for his or her own action. Irresponsible decisions(behavior) and or action of my fellow citizen should not and is not my responsibility. Our nation must return to the practical concept that each individual is responsible for his or her action.

lee of TX @ Jun 22, 2009 13:52:41 PM

The yellow brick road

"Why should it be supposed that the thousands of scientists who study climate and agree on the changes that are occurring are perpetrating a fraud, or are simply mistaken?"

Because of $50 billion in funding?

http://archive.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2007/8/6/100434.shtml

Maldives Tree @ Jun 20, 2009 21:17:57 PM

global climate change

I have two concerns:

1. How do I find the full report? Usually the full report gives a lot of important information not found in summaries, and I am skeptical of summaries (let alone of media reports of summaries).

2. More important, what are the uncertainties and probabilities in the report? There is no way a prediction of anything can be absolute (e.g. "global temperature will rise..."). A scientific prediction almost always involves some uncertainty analysis (e.g., there is a 99% -- or whatever -- probability that global temperature will rise by x +/- y degrees C...)

This is neither pro nor con global climate change, but an observation about scientific prediction.

Ruth Weiner of NM @ Jun 18, 2009 09:33:42 AM

carbon tax

More evidence that we should abandon Waxman-Markey and get serious about stemming the tide of global climate change with a revenue-neutral carbon tax.

CTF of DC @ Jun 18, 2009 09:33:20 AM

Global warming doubters

Some of your commenters seem to think that global warming science is a conspiracy. During the past century, the scientific method has resulted in spectacular advances in physics, space travel, medicine, communications, etc., that have raised our standard of living to unprecedented levels. Why should it be supposed that the thousands of scientists who study climate and agree on the changes that are occurring are perpetrating a fraud, or are simply mistaken?

One of the problems with democracy is that the votes of ignorant, dishonest and stupid people count just as much as those of well-informed and intelligent ones. So there is reason to be concerned that the measures necessary to combat global warming will never be approved by our political system.

Desmond Armstrong of OR @ Jun 17, 2009 22:39:33 PM

Global Warming

Anyone who doubts that global warming is happening and is human-caused, and who

refuses to compare the percentage rise in atmospheric carbon in the last three hundred years with that of any other time in our globe's history has no credibility whatsoever.

Percentage rise. What does this mean? The RATE AT WHICH ATMOSPHERIC CARBON HAS RISEN is what it means. Think about it.

This is human-caused. We can remedy it, if we as a species are capable of acting together in an intelligent manner.

We may not survive this challenge.

A.P. of CA @ Jun 17, 2009 19:31:49 PM