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Taking a Stand Against Climate Change with Greener Technologies

My opponent has argued that the moderate to poor correlation of CO2 is enough to be considered major, however this is illogical. First, I never said CO2 had no effect, I argued it was not the main cause. Second, it is unlikely increasing CO2 has a large impact because CO2 increases are logarithmic, in other words the more CO2 there is the less warming effect each unit has. If we double the amount of CO2 from pre-industrial levels (we have gone through 30-50% increase) then warming per I increase would be extremely small. A 20 ppm increase of CO2 would be much less then 0.2 degrees Celsius [1]. Second, the climate is not very sensitive; a better way to put it would be an increase in CO2 would have little effect. The evidence claiming climate to be sensitive are very flawed, they ignore climate feedbacks and other factors relating to sensitivity. If CO2 were to double, only a 1 degree increase would occur, we have not doubled CO2 levels from the pre-industrial era and have warmed less then one degree Celsius. With current emissions it is unlikely we could argue CO2 is the main driver of climate change, when sensitivity is taken into account [2]. Second, my opponents rebuttal to the PDO and AMO argues the correlation is due to the seas space, however he ignores the fact the PDO and AMO go into cooling cycles and the correlation I cited showed when they cooled, the earth cooled, and in a warming phase the land warmed. Dr. Roy Spencer has argued the PDO may cause three quarters of the current warming due to its effects on clouds (therefore our albedo) winds, and obviously tropical winds. And it heats the pacific, obviously warming the earth in that way too. Spencer has argued, "mankind"s CO2 emissions are not strong enough to have caused the global warming we"ve seen over the last 100 years." And that "Here I present new evidence that most of the warming could be the result of a natural cycle in cloud cover forced by a well-known mode of natural climate variability: the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). While the PDO is primarily a geographic rearrangement in atmospheric and oceanic circulation patterns in the North Pacific, it is well known that such regional changes can also influence weather patterns over much larger areas, for instance North America or the entire Northern Hemisphere (which is, by the way, the region over which the vast majority of global warming has occurred).[emphasis added]"[3] For my opponents argument to work, he would need to prove the PDO and other currents would only affect the regional areas (as he argued with his map). However, the cloud cover changes caused by the PDO would change the earths albedo and cause warming for the entire northern hemisphere, and as he noted that"s where the warming is primarily occurring. 1. Global warming is real and is a threat My opponent has argued this warming is unusually fast, which is interesting, as I have argued above that warming has stopped in recent years. With the stop of warming in recent years, it is odd to argue it is rising unusually fast. Models have overestimated the effect of CO2, claiming over the last 15-20 years the warming should have increased"a lot"however the warming has stopped [4]. The earth has actually been significantly warmer throughout its time period, when comparing us to other time periods in geologic history we are in an ice age. According to the 1995 IPCC report, our warming as been extremely insignificant and fairly normal. Climate geologists, generally, oppose climate alarmism. Many of the most well known geologists have argued the current warming is "right on schedule". Nothing about our warming is odd, different, or one of a kind [5]. The sea level raises my opponent points too are exaggerated. There is vast evidence that sea level rise is meager to nonexistent. A 2003 study finds sea level rise has only been about .5 mm a year, half of what my opponent has argued. A 2004 study finds before 1940, sea level rise was about 1mm per year"my opponent"s number"but finds there has been no sea level increase (overall) after that date. Another 2004 study found, when you averaged the whole 20th century, we get 1.8mm rise per year, but when you break it into chunks (1950-2000) no sea level rose in that time period. And yet another 2004 study finds that the sea level increase is overall uncertain. They note in their study they believe sea level has risen 2 mm per year, however they failed to control for regional variability. They said their study answers many questions and creates many more, and conclude one cannot conclude anything. A 2005 study finds no increase in sea levels since 1950. And the list continues, the evidence that sea level rise is meager is growing [6]. My opponent has admitted no increase of hurricanes was argued. In other words, even if intensity increases but the number falls, we are left with a wash. However, even the intensity argument fails. Pro argues my data is incomplete"focusing on landfall hurricanes"although that"s what really matters (or at least matters more) then sea hurricanes, his argument still falls when I extend the data set. So let me again note: the number of hurricanes overall has fallen, and my opponent overall drops that point. Many studies project a 5% increase in hurricane intensity, however a 2005 study (although concluding higher intensity) says that number is twice as high as it should be. Other studies have found intensity to be the same or actually decrease. The 2005 study agreeing with my opponent, in a way, argues reducing CO2 emissions (which would occur by using green energy as the resolution states) would not change Hurricane intensity. A 2006 study finds there is no correlation between global warming and wind speeds in Hurricanes. A second 2006 study replicates the results, arguing there is no current correlation between Hurricane intensity and warming. Multiple 2007 and 2008 studies replicate these findings, arguing "if there is an increase in hurricane activity connected to a greenhouse gas induced global warming, it is currently obscured" (Chylek, P. and Lesins 2008) and that "no evidence that the distributional mean of individual storm intensity, measured by storm days, track length, or individual storm power dissipation index, has changed (increased or decreased) through time." (Briggs 2008) [7]. The evidence is pretty compelling: no Hurricane intensity changes have occurred. Remember: this is using non-landfall data too (making my opponents objection refuted). And there is some evidence that global warming reduces the total number of hurricanes meaning an overall decrease of extreme weather occurs. My opponent plays semantics. In this debate climate change, as implied in round one, is global warming. The dust bowl, as I argued, was caused by farming and not a warming earth. Therefore, his objection is irrelevant. A drought in the 16th century has been deemed a mega drought by a 2000 study. It was the largest drought in human history, before humans could have caused it. Droughts within the last 1000 years are much more severe then now, and a 1998 study noted there was a decrease of droughts in the 20th century. Warming has no correlation with droughts, however overall sun intensity (which, sometimes, means warming may correlate with droughts) and regional warming from the suns rays caused droughts, not human processes [8]. Hunnington (2006) has pointed out rainfall globally has been increasing. Many studies have concluded rainfall will increase because of global warming; plant growth will increase, decreasing the possibility of a drought [9]. 2. Caused by humans My opponent uses flawed data, my data was 60 million years ago, and my opponent has used data from the creations, 5-6 million years before. As CO2 naturally fluctuates with climate change"climate change often causes more CO2"it would not be unheard of for the ppm levels to be close too, or far from, other dates. My opponent also falsely correlated CO2 with temperature; by arguing it cannot be that close, the Cambrian was warmer. As stated, the historical correlation between CO2 and temperature is nonexistent, with CO2 lagging temperature or not correlating at all. The CO2 was 2000-3000 ppm 60 mya, by measuring oxygen isotopes. This data is impeccable, and my opponents Cambrian objection makes little sense, its not odd that CO2 was not much lower at this time period, as CO2 and temperature historically don"t correlate well his Cambrian objection is a weak one [10]. My opponent really doesn"t refute my lagging argument, only posts links. Those links only talk about modern temperature trends, meaning source seven stands. And when looking at data millions of years ago, it won"t matter if the study was published in 1999 or 2012. But if date is what he wants, recent papers back my findings too [11]. 3. Fixing the problem The resolution is in present tense, so saying "it will get better later" is against the wording of the resolution. However, lets refute the "future" argument. It is impossible to replace fossil fuels with green energy, New York would need 60 square miles of wind turbines and the wind to be blowing 100% of the time to power the city. Wind power has always been more expensive then fossil fuels, and new research has still failed to fix that problem. Bio fuels and other sources are quite inefficient and waste other resources in the process. Current renewable are a joke, and billions (if not trillions) of dollars are needed to make them competitive, which is not worth the cost, especially as I argued warming may help humans and more CO2 = more plants. Green energy is not a logical solution [12]. If the Kyto agreement would not stop warming, and is only a first step, converting to green energy would likely have no effect [5]. Further, photovoltaic"s are inefficient, and uncompetitive [6]. 4. Extinctions First, CO2 is not a pollutant, meaning his position is illogical here. Second, mass extinctions are not occurring. A 2009 study notes, ""after five years, a re-visitation of the summit areas revealed a considerable increase of species richness at the upper alpine and subnival zone (10% and 9%, respectively) and relatively modest increases at the lower alpine zone and the treeline ecotone (3% and 1%, respectively)." In addition, with respect to threats of extinction, they reported that "during the last five years, the endemic species of the research area were hardly affected," while "at the highest summit, one endemic species was even among the newcomers."[14] As we can see, animals are not being affected by warming. CONCLUSION: Global warming is (1) exaggerated, (2) not man made, (3) fixing it is impossible, and would not help anyone, and (4) extinctions are a widely popularized myth that has been refuted. http://www.debate.org...