And Mr. Rompuy thinks the acknowledgment is added spending, college taxes, and added debt. And again this antic has the assumption to accuse that markets are giving a thumbs-down. Amazing. frases para msn

It's difficult to debate a policy response to climate change, when so many still doubt its scientific evidence, no matter how high it is piled up. Bjorn Lomborg was the original sceptic, and his 2001 book held inordinate sway in holding back action, despite his argument being ripped apart by Scientific America (among countless others). But last year, quietly, Lomborg changed his mind: he now says climate change is real, its causes man-made, and that the IPCC is its clearest scientific authority. As I ask in this Crikey blog (http://bit.ly/gDicUr), why he changed his mind is probably more relevant than whatever else he's saying now. Having dropped the 'sceptic' tag, he now delights in his apparent friendship with Al Gore. But his current work seems designed to do exactly the same thing - hold back action on climate change. What then is he looking to achieve?

In the article, Freddy Sharpe, CEO of carbon management solutions group Climate Friendly (no vested interest there, is there) refers to " the urgency of our collective need to act". Act on what, climate change or  myopic man-made CO2? Climate change is always present and requires constant attention - man-made CO2 may or may not make a measurable change to the climate.

Learn to live with the climate, whatever may eventuate - hot, cold, wet, dry, calm or storm.Let's leave cyber worlds for those so inclined and stay with the real world 

I get the definite impression Bjorn Lomborg is more concerned with witticisms and self-promotion than actually solving the problem. He's like that guy at the party who always has some smart-arsed retort for anyone who has ever actually achieved something.  

Lomborg is a pessimist.  Climate change is always with us but man-made it is not.  Natural emissions average 210gt per annum and vary by between 50gt and 80gt in any given year, probably depending on the number of volcanoes and earthquakes which occur.  Man-made emissions of CO2, according to Ross Garnaut, are a maximum of 7gt per year of which Australia's share is 1%.  1% of 7gt is 70,000,000 tonnes of CO2 or .0003% of the total atmospheric mass.  Less than the thickness of a hair in one kilometre.  The Iceland volcano wiped out any gains world-wide in a week.  There are 20,000 active submarine volcanoes alone and CO2 emissions from all volcanic action is increasing by 4% per year, let alone earthquakes. Most of the excess CO2 must be re-absorbed by the planet because the total amount of CO2 as a percentage of total air mass remains at a constant 0.038%.  In fact the composition of air remains constant - ie 77% N, 22% O, 1% all other gases including CO2 at 0.038% which when broken down is one third C and two thirds O.

Have a nice day 

Risk management is firstly about developing your risk tolerances, learning about all the risks that you face  and then allocating probabilities and values to each identified risk. Then you set about managing the risks, allocating the management time proportionately into the biggest value, highest probability risks, particularly if you can't lay them off to an insurer or someone else that could manage them better than you.

Right now the biggest risk faced by mankind is climate change. Not the anthropogenic climate change that has some probability of occuring in the future but the climate change caused by the extreme solar minimum that currently exists. This is attributed by NASA to the collapse the ionosphere and reducing its temperature by 100 degrees. This information was  obtained by NASA from the C/NOFS satellites and the solar dynamics observatory and reported in February 2011 to a conference in Vienna. The changes in the ionosphere provides huge immediate risks to mankind through extreme weather events and higher risk of earthquakes and volcanic activity - all proven science.

So the simple logic of  risk management practiced by business is to manage the very large, immediate risks before managing the lesser far-off risks. But so far no-one wants to talk about the immediate threat of the extreme solar minimum as NASA calls it. How logical is that?

Oh and by the way the last time the sun went into an extreme solar minimum was around 1790 and that one lasted 40 years. The time before was also about 40 years but the one before that seems to have lasted for well over 100 years. Hopefully this one will only last a similar time to the two previous events. But there are 11 times the number of people on Earth now and last time they had a pretty tough time getting through it.

Bjorn is not helping. Maybe he should consider re-joining ABBA.

So he uses reductio ad absurdum, the panic merchants use ad hominum attacks all the time (Ignore everything X says, he is in the pay of those evil polluters). On this point how do you benefit from the imposition of carbon policies Freddy? Presumably you will stand to benefit immensly from offering carbon management solutions under a global response to carbon pricing, so should we ignore your views as simply self interested lobbying?

The level of debate around this issue is trivial at best, driven by the relentless need to cut through with single sound-bite data points.

All sides are guilty of trying to lord it over a confused public by trying to convey certainty of their side of the arguement, and the absurditiy of their opponents. 

Also driving the poor debate is the opportunity to get one's snout into what promises to be an absolutely huge trough of other peoples money, whilst trying to appear as though you are on the high moral ground.

I went to see Lomborg talk in Melbourne last week, and this was pretty much my exact response. Thanks for taking his arguments to task - he seems to have been given an unconditionally warm reception elsewhere in the Australian media. Very nice piece.