A Musing Environment

In the SF Chronicle, this information rates a page 14 treatment. Where was the article in your paper?

The 2001 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports estimated sea level rise of 0.5 m, give or take 0.4 m (up to about a yard), this century. This would primarily result from water expansion in warming oceans, just like the liquid in a thermometer expands when warmed. The addition of Greenland’s water to the oceans, which would raise sea level by 7 m, was expected to take a thousand years, or thousands of years. New results show Greenland melt will be an important portion of sea level rise this year.

A sea level rise of 0.5 m could have enormous consequences. The sea moves in about 50 – 100 m for every m increase in sea level, and ocean surges during high tide in a powerful storm would further devastate coastal communities, push salt water inland, affecting rivers and ground water, and generally make life unpleasant for much of mankind. It is not encouraging to learn that this may be an underestimate.

Melting icebergs don’t raise sea level, just like melting ice in a full glass of water doesn’t cause spillage. However, estimates of sea level rise due to land ice melt have increased in recent years. The latest study shows that it’s increasing much more rapidly than had been thought.

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Making Transit Work (pdf, Transportation Research Board of the National Academy of Sciences) compares reasons for differences in transit use in the US (2%), Canada (4%), and West Europe (10%), and produces a set of ideas which over many decades may work together to make the US as transit-friendly as Canada.

In 1900, the US had a greater percentage of people living in cities and more mass transit than other industrialized countries. However, the US also moved rapidly to mass-produced goods, including cars.

To some extent, the difference in behavior has to do with wealth; as Europeans become wealthier, they drive more. Still, car ownership/GDP is less in other countries, from about 95% US levels in Canada, to 55% US levels in Denmark.

Historical differences between the US and West Europe explain much about transit use. Europeans often wish to protect fragile city centers. This means fewer freeways, which led to traffic congestion back in the 1960s, when car ownership was still low. After WW2, European governments took over housing, building transit centers and housing both. While US population and jobs doubled since WW2, increase was only about 25% in France, Britain, and Germany. Racial and other tensions led many to move out of the US central city to the suburb, as did US land and transportation policies. Much of the US growth was in the South and West, where restrictions were fewer. In Europe however, central cities did not lose population, and some even gained.

Policies vary among these countries. Most European countries have very strong national planning (state in Germany). The provinces are most important in Canadian decision-making. The US depends on local planning. [In my city (greater San Francisco) means considerably more than 10 (20? 50?) transit districts. Someone from Berkeley who travels often in San Francisco might buy 3 transit passes, one for buses in each city, and one for BART.]

The US provides capital funding at the national level, which leads to more capital construction of both highways and light rail systems than is true in Europe. Subsidies skew planning in the US, encouraging and subsidizing driving, and in the case of mass transit, can lead to lower ridership as cities build more expensive light rail and ignore much less costly buses. [An old analysis shows both capital and operating expenses for BART to be much higher than for local bus lines.] US planning is mostly reactive, reviewing local plans. Florida and Oregon control of the planning process is still very small by Europeans standards. Europeans and Canadians are more accepting of top-down decision-making. Canadians share the European vision of planning transit and housing together. Additionally, the large differences in the density of US cities (and cultural values) make creating a common vision difficult. Additional chaos is introduced into American decision-making by our method of electing directors to the local transit.

Because so few owned cars for such a long time, Europeans became very accepting of high fuel prices, and fuels are taxed to raise money for non-automotive uses. Canadians began with low taxes and have been increasing them, but are not yet at European levels.

The differences in who uses transit may affect policies. In the US, 2/3 of transit use is in 6 cities. New York has the largest use, 140 transit rides per capita per year. Transit use in Boston, Chicago, San Francisco, Philadelphia, and DC also exceeds 75 rides per person per year. Nationwide, a quarter of transit users make less than $15,000 (1995 dollars). In the suburbs, 70% of users are poor.

In both Canada and Europe, a comfortable, clean, speedy ride is emphasized, and perks are available to attract new customers. The ride is faster due for a variety of reasons, such as spacing bus stops twice as far apart as in the US, requiring or encouraging pre-bought tickets, picking people up on median strips that allow rapid integration back into traffic, and giving bus drivers the ability to change traffic lights. Bus stops are often covered, sometimes provide current bus information, and are often located in small shopping centers or at least near kiosks. Heavy discounts may be offered to museums and sports events to attract bus users during off-peak hours – and perhaps a new customer. Discounts may be available to regular users for weekend car rentals or car-sharing. Taxis in some places are dispatched hourly or every half hour during night service.

The main alternative, cars, are made less attractive by higher fuel costs, much higher purchase taxes (180% in Denmark) and yearly registration fees, and less highly subsidized parking.

Canadian and West European transit operators work with fewer mandates re the poor and elderly, and less restrictive labor contracts. Local districts are given more time and opportunity to solve problems, and often show more creativity as a result.

The recommendations in brief, as to preconditions that foster success:

• Transit operational and quality-of-service enhancements

Flexible transit workforce; management autonomy, including latitude and incentives to innovate; regional coordination of transit fares and services; public expectations of dependable and convenient service

• Transit priority in traffic

Integration of highway and transit management and policy-making; limited street space and suitable geometry; latitude and incentives for operators to innovate

• Transit-oriented site design in land use zoning

Tradition of strong government regulation of development and land use; commonly accepted standards and guidelines for site design.

• Parking restrictions

Regional governance that allows for parking coordination across a metropolitan area

• Increase in cost of automobile use

Acceptance/tradition of high taxes on vehicles and fuel; public concern over pollution, noise, traffic, and other adverse side effects of driving; good alternatives to driving, including walking, biking, and transit

• Regional coordination of land use and transportation planning

Regional governance, including revenue sharing; government land ownership; tradition of strong regional governance; public concerns about environment and land scarcity

Recent readings on Smart Growth sometimes point out that great progress could be made not by forcing extra regulations on a free market, but by removing restrictions that impede the free market. One of these is Michael Lewyn’s How Overregulation Creates Sprawl (Even in a City without Zoning). Unit note: there are about 2.5 acres in a hectare.

As Houston doesn’t have a formal zoning code, allowing commercial/residential mixing, it is sometimes presented as an example of a city formed by the free market, and proof that the free market leads to sprawl.

Nothing I’ve read implies that all transit and housing problems can be solved via the free market. They do indicate that currently, city planning often interferes with free market solutions.

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Check out the evangelical statement on climate change, reasons, and suggested actions.

Claim 1: Human-Induced Climate Change is Real
Claim 2: The Consequences of Climate Change Will Be Significant, and Will Hit the Poor the Hardest
Claim 3: Christian Moral Convictions Demand Our Response to the Climate Change Problem
Claim 4: The need to act now is urgent. Governments, businesses, churches, and individuals all have a role to play in addressing climate change starting now.

On their action page, they site three crucial steps: pray, study, and act.

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This started out as a post on how we discuss climate change in groups: the problems and the solutions and our role in each. Then came Gerwazy’s comment on nature (previous post) and Chuck’s forward of an article describing how the Canada geese are still on Prince Edward Island, waiting for the cold that signals time for migration.

Note: climate change can have a variety of causes. Some, such as earlier springs and later falls, are predicted by global warming models.

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The International Climate Change Taskforce warned a year or so ago that 400 ppm (parts per million) atmospheric carbon would be dangerous, as the chance of accelerated, runaway, or abrupt climate change becomes dangerously high if the temperature increase is 2 C (3.6 F) — at 400 ppm C, the chance is one in five that a 2 C increase would occur. There were several points of confusion for me, thanks to RealClimate for clarification. Go to their explanation or read my slightly simplified one, which also includes explanations from John Holdren’s US Climate Policy Post-Kyoto: Scientific Underpinnings, Policy History, and the Path Ahead (pdf), a 2003 report.

Where does 400 ppm come from? and other questions

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James Hansen’s speech (pdf) at the December meeting of the American Geophysical Union implies that there is a much better sense of what is going to happen with the climate, and that the changes will be significantly faster than was expected.

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As someone who helped spread incorrect information about the energy and carbon benefits of ethanol, I am pleased to find that I was wrong. From Science’s news release for the January 26 issue: Ethanol More Energy Efficient Than Thought.

Corn-based ethanol, the plant fuel that contributes about 2 percent to the total transportation fuels mix in the United States, is a more energy efficient fuel than previous studies would suggest, according to a new rigorous review reported in Science.

Alexander Farrell and colleagues closely examined six previous studies, two of which found that the energy used to produce ethanol outweighed any energy provided by the fuel. By correcting a number of assumptions and calculations, including the use of outdated information on production methods and the failure to account for the energy benefits of ethanol byproducts, the authors estimate that corn ethanol reduces petroleum use by about 95 percent per gallon of fuel, but only reduces greenhouse gases by about 13 percent. Improved agricultural practices and ethanol made from plants other than corn could boost ethanol’s environmental performance, Farrell and colleagues say.

Dwindling fossil fuel supplies, global warming and economic woes tied in to rising gas prices all point toward the necessity of a biofueled future, according to Arthur Ragauskas and colleagues in this “Review” article. The authors lay out a roadmap for the near future of biofuel production.

To prepare for this future, researchers are at work building a better biorefinery, using genomic tools to boost the yield of fuel crops, applying new chemical techniques to break down and convert the raw material of a biofuel “feedstock” into both fuel and byproducts such as commercially useful plastics and lubricants. Biorefineries could also find ways to recycle their own waste products, the authors say.

In a related “Editorial,” Steven Koonin says biomass can provide a secure fuel supply with lower greenhouse gas emissions while supporting the agricultural economy, without significant changes to our current vehicles or the way we buy fuel.

The largest error in previous studies that showed a negative benefit was assuming that there were no co-products, such as feed and corn oil.

The article itself says that improvements in these numbers would occur with improved agricultural methods:

(P)olicies aimed at reducing environmental externalities in the agricultural sector may result in significantly improved environmental performance of this fuel. For example, conservation tillage reduces petroleum consumption and GHG emissions as well as soil erosion and agrichemical runoff.

The article also says that ethanol is more effective at decreasing petroleum than is ethanol from switchgrass, but that switchgrass-based ethanol decreases carbon emissions substantially.

Correction Thanks to RP for correcting my wording of the last sentence.

More from the (US) Transportation Energy Data Book.

Consumers continue to demand gas guzzling automobiles. The IRS collected over $79 million in 2002 from those buying autos with fuel economy less than 22.5 miles per gallon. This tax does not apply to light trucks such as pickups, minivans, sport utility vehicles, and vans.

These taxes are from $1,000 – $7,000 each. Many of us still don’t understand why the taxes don’t apply to light trucks. Consumers are paying much more in direct than taxes than are the manufacturers:

Manufacturers of autos and light trucks whose vehicles do not meet the CAFE standards are fined. Data from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration show that nearly $20 million has been collected from the manufacturers for model year (MY) 2002 and $34 million for MY 2001.

We all know that people with children drive more, 28,300 miles/year in 2001 vs. 16,700 miles/year for those without — some of that has to be age, as younger and older drivers spend less time behind the wheel. A big surprise to me is the urban/rural divide: 19,300 miles/year for urban households, up 300 miles from 11 years earlier; 28,400 miles/year for households, up 6,200 miles from 11 years earlier. That’s a lot of hours in the sitting position, not good for the health.

Correction Thanks to SD for catching my error in posting a 71% loss in electricity once it’s been manufactured. Most of that 71% is the huge loss in energy when molecules are burned (or atoms fissioned) to make heat, because only a percentage of heat energy is available for useful work.

His source (pdf) says, “Energy losses in the U.S. T&D [transmission and distribution] system were 7.2% in 1995, accounting for 2.5 quads of primary energy and 36.5 MtC. Losses are divided such that about 60% are from lines and 40% are from transformers (most of which are for distribution).”

In California, where we use less electricity than the size of our population would indicate, losses are closer to half, though I haven’t verified that by looking into the details. Electricity is shipped enormous distances: our coal power comes from out of state as we’re not allowed to pollute locally, and we regularly ship power from Washington State and back up to same. The size of our boonies (north or east of Sacramento) is larger than many states.

The independent operators lose about 4% by keeping production levels above use levels — if a large number of people turn on their electric dryers simultaneously, the surge could do terrible things. The power companies, no longer in charge due to deregulation, were more skilled, and kept that loss about 2%. Additionally, there is waste due to electricity manufacture at night. Nuclear power is stored by transporting water up, to be used the next day as hydroelectric power, with a loss of 10%? Wind power — 3 to 5 AM is the windy season — is lost.

Life is meant to be lived from a Center, a divine Center—”a life of unhurried peace and power. It is simple. It is serene. It takes no time, but it occupies all our time.

Thomas R. Kelly, Testament of Devotion, 1941 p.124

A life centered in God will be directed toward keeping communication with God open and unencumbered. Simplicity is best achieved through a right ordering of priorities, maintaining humility of spirit, avoiding self-indulgence, resisting the accumulation of unnecessary possessions, and avoiding over-busy lives.

From Pacific Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) 2001 Faith and Practice

I have recently been thinking about the elephant in the room. It interferes with simplicity, the ability to hear God’s voice, the ability to choose out of joy rather than out of fears and neediness.

It’s not just in the room but sitting on our chests, an elephant of fear, despair, grief, resentment, a cauldron of negativity. We know there is something wrong with the way we live in the US. You hear it all the time — what could I possibly do? No way I can change because— It’s not individual choices that will solve climate change, but changes in government policy. It’s in the tone of voice, the attempt to make what I say sound rational when I feel irrational with all that is happening.

It is true in part that government policy changes are a large part of the way to go, but new directions in government policy are much more likely to be pushed by people who are changing themselves. And we are pretty aware that changes in public policy alone will not suffice.

Most of us have the experience of resisting change, and finally we do it and what occurs is – joy! The relief of all that weight off our shoulders, the joy of becoming more a person we are happy with.

From Faith and Practice:

..over the margins of life comes a whisper, a faint call, a premonition of richer living which we know we are passing by. Strained by the very mad pace of our daily outer burdens, we are further strained by an inward uneasiness, because we have hints that there is a way of life vastly richer and deeper than all this hurried existence, a life of unhurried serenity and peace and power. If only we could slip over into that Center! … There is a divine Abyss within us all, a holy Infinite Center, a Heart, a Life who speaks in us and through us to the world.

Thomas R. Kelly, 1941

For those wanting more Kelly, one of my favorites is Holy Obedience. He discusses the weight of and joy of obedience. It is time for me to reread.

Comments that go beyond praise and nays Johan adds information about Antarctica and why the British are worried — Antarctica is not an island with ice, it’s a continent with ice. Apparently the balance between melting in one area and more ice being deposited in another area may no longer be holding. When I find more information on this, I’ll post myself.

In a January 19 post on his own blog, Johan discusses this further. His blog is always interesting, check it out generally.

The always excellent Juliet Elperin in today’s Washington Post looks at some of the concerns being strongly expressed in the scientific community about how rapidly people need to cut back carbon use (half in 50 years, even as population and per capita consumption continue to rise). As I understand it, there are a range of estimates coming from the science and energy policy communities, and many recommend much more rapid and sharp reductions in carbon use, but the article doesn’t reflect that there are pessimists involved in climate and energy policy more pessimistic than those cited.

Major point: we are looking at creating a Earth widely different from the one we currently live on, just as this Earth is very different from 20,00 years ago, think ice several km thick over Wisconsin. This new Earth may occur in the lifetime of many people who are alive today.

Also discussed is the Bush administration’s attempt to muzzle one of the most respected people studying climate change, James Hansen of NASA. This is a clever tactic, encouraging news sources and blogs that only cover controversy to cover climate change as well. The result is that Bush doesn’t get any kudos from any source, but the information is more widely spread.

But not widely spread enough. Think how slowly Americans responded to information about tobacco. We don’t have that amount of time, apparently, to respond to climate change.

Real Climate looked more than a year ago at What does the lag of CO2 behind temperature in ice cores tell us about global warming? While the numbers appear to be slightly different from what I heard John Harte say (preceding blog), the concept is the same: normally orbital changes cause the Earth to start warming, more carbon dioxide is produced, and the Earth warms much more than can be explained by the orbital changes alone.

John Harte from UC, Berkeley spoke to Berkeley Friends (Quakers) Thursday night. I’ve altered what he said very slightly.

For the first time people can alter the Earth at a global scale, rather than just polluting locally. In the 1960s, when Harte began work, there was still discussion as to whether the cooling effect of particulates being added to the atmosphere via coal, oil, and wood or the warming due to the greenhouse gases would dominate, but by the early 1970s, it was clear to pretty much everyone that greenhouse gases would dominate. By the mid-20th century, we should see warming on the same scale as from the depth of the ice age to now.

Scientists don’t prove anything, not gravity, not evolution, not climate change. What they do is amass more and more evidence until alternative explanations are disproved. The following is not proven, but there is enormous evidence: lots of validating data, and no contradicting data.

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from the (US) Transportation Energy Data Book.

For Americans who believe that the way we grew up was anywhere approaching normal:

US percentage of world cars

1950 76%
1960 65%
1970 46%
1980 38%
1990 31%
2000 23%

The (US) Transportation Energy Data Book is full of gems. Here are some factoids from early in the book.

• The cost of oil U.S. dependence is estimated to have been $7 trillion dollars (in 1998 dollars) over the last 30 years (assume population averaged 250 million, 30 years, almost $1,000 per person per year.)
• Between 1991 and 2002, heavy truck energy use grew at a faster rate than for any other mode.
• The energy/passenger mile for automobiles is less than for the average transit bus. There is a great deal of variability across metropolitan areas in the efficiency of transit systems.
• Vehicles per thousand people varies greatly by region of the world
• SUVs accounted for 6.8% of all light vehicle sales in 1990 and 27% in 2003
• Between 1969 and 2001, the number of vehicles per licensed driver rose from 0.70 to 1.06
• The average new car price in 2002 was $21,440 (imported cars were $27,524 and domestic cars were $19,126)

[Lest there be any doubt that the world I grew up and live in is privileged]

US petroleum consumption:

1960 9.80 million barrels per day 45.9% of the world share
2003 20.04 million barrels per day 25.3% of the world share

David Ignatius in today’s Washington Post provides an explanation for my last post:

One of the puzzles if you’re in the news business is figuring out what’s “news.” The fate of your local football team certainly fits the definition. So does a plane crash or a brutal murder. But how about changes in the migratory patterns of butterflies?

Scientists believe that new habitats for butterflies are early effects of global climate change — but that isn’t news, by most people’s measure. Neither is declining rainfall in the Amazon, or thinner ice in the Arctic. We can’t see these changes in our personal lives, and in that sense, they are abstractions. So they don’t grab us the way a plane crash would — even though they may be harbingers of a catastrophe that could, quite literally, alter the fundamentals of life on the planet. And because they’re not “news,” the environmental changes don’t prompt action, at least not in the United States…

The best reporting of the non-news of climate change has come from Elizabeth Kolbert in the New Yorker. Her three-part series last spring lucidly explained the harbingers of potential disaster: a shrinking of Arctic sea ice by 250 million acres since 1979; a thawing of the permafrost for what appears to be the first time in 120,000 years; a steady warming of Earth’s surface temperature; changes in rainfall patterns that could presage severe droughts of the sort that destroyed ancient civilizations. This month she published a new piece, “Butterfly Lessons,” that looked at how these delicate creatures are moving into new habitats as the planet warms. Her real point was that all life, from microorganisms to human beings, will have to adapt, and in ways that could be dangerous and destabilizing.

So many of the things that pass for news don’t matter in any ultimate sense. But if people such as [Thomas E.] Lovejoy [who fears that changes in the Amazon’s ecosystem may be irreversible] and Kolbert are right, we are all but ignoring the biggest story in the history of humankind. Kolbert concluded her series last year with this shattering thought: “It may seem impossible to imagine that a technologically advanced society could choose, in essence, to destroy itself, but that is what we are now in the process of doing.” She’s right. The failure of the United States to get serious about climate change is unforgivable, a human folly beyond imagining.

Comments that go beyond praise and nays John comments on North Europe Cooling? that North Europe experienced important climate changes in the past few centuries. His point is important, that climate change doesn’t have to be a world disaster to have large local consequences.

In two interesting conversations this last week about the environment, I heard about the difficulties of taking on the environment as a concern. My answers are partial, even after a few days to reflect and add to them. I am very interested in what you can add or shift in my response.

One person found that reading newspaper articles on the environment put her into a space of fear rather than love.

Being with the pain is an act of love. We don’t just love people when they are happy. That said, if we are to actually be constructive, we need to find or create ways to shift us from fear to love, for ourselves, but also for the work that needs to be done. Creating such a space for ourselves and others may be the most constructive work we can do today.

Another found concerns about the science, generated by people immersed in the details, too abstract compared to what he could understand about the destructive effects of oil in Nigeria and Colombia.

This is a challenge for all of us, to shift from what we are comfortable with, problems that follow our heart, to listening to the voice that asks us to change our priorities. This is difficult no matter how important our current work is, and addressing the destructive effects of oil on a culture and the environment is important work indeed. But it may be less our work, due to the immediacy and magnitude of the response required of us if we are to address climate change.

There is much important work to do today, and not nearly enough workers. To slow down climate change and its companion problems — the Earth’s degrading ability to supply food and clean water, and biodiversity loss — will require so many of us to help if we are to find our way to solutions. How do we as individuals decide if this is to be just one of the projects needing attention, or one of major importance to us?

Please comment!

I will be teaching a continuing class on the science of climate change, individual behavior, and policy issues on Thursdays at the North Berkeley Senior Center beginning January 12, from 1 to 3:30. The climate change portion will last about two months, then we’ll segue into other environmental topics, as the class chooses. Call 981-5190 to express interest or sign up at North Berkeley Senior Center.

I would love to see some blog readers there! Send me your ideas now for possible environmental topics: water, population, etc.

I just returned from a retreat at Ben Lomond Quaker Center, How Much is Enough? We examined this along with how much is plenty, how much is too much.

It occurred to me that we often ask if activities and possessions give us pleasure, whether they enrich us, rather than asking a much more fundamental question: who do I want to be?

Starting at the basic question has freed me to choose somewhat better the activities and possessions that help me become that person.

A man driving me to another Ben Lomond event years ago said that he loved the way he lived with a car, what he was able to do. He loved as well the activities he had chosen when he was without a car, in an earlier time. He loved better what he did without a car than the choices he made with a car.

Jon Carroll, a columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle, had a similar column years ago. He loved having fun in Central America, where fun meant going to a party where someone would play a guitar. He loved having fun in the US, driving to an expensive restaurant. The simpler fun nourished and pleased him more.

Once we know better what we want, the choices we make are more likely to satisfy us. Like these two men, we can choose not just what gives us pleasure, but we can consider shifting to a way of being and living that more often meets our needs.

It occurred to me recently that I really need to be an extrovert, but that’s hard for me. I became increasingly deaf beginning in 1992 (right ear) and 1994 (left). A cochlear implant was activated September 13, 2004; my nerves gradually become healthier, my brain gradually figures out how to sort noise from signal, how to understand speech over a wide range of loudness levels. But it’s still pretty difficult to be in multi-person conversations — because so many people remember to speak clearly only when they respond to me, I miss out on the give and take that doesn’t come directly from/to me. I have a headache during the conversation, as my brain struggles to keep up.

I’ve chosen other activities that give me pleasure, but they aren’t satisfying this real need in me. As my hearing continues to improve, the problem will go away to some extent. But I now realize that it’s worth headaches to be more often with groups of people, not just people one on one, for the pleasure that provides.

Examples of other needs, or strong wants: family and friends who love me and whom I can love in return, community, a way to contribute to the universe, a way to continue learning. My house as a means of hospitality. Planned serendipity: walking around to do errands allows me to run into people and taking the bus allows me to meet people and ideas I might not ever meet on a plane. Nearby stores so that buying food is a chance to walk and relax, not a major event. A big increase in bicycling, as I’ve lost in the past few years the sense that my body can take me where I want to go. A sense that my way of living and consumption patterns are more in line with the Earth’s ability to provide, so that people (and other species!) might all share more equally. A sense of fullness and joy that over the last few years has gradually replaced what was too often a sense of neediness in my activities.

What are your needs?

The largest reinsurance company has just produced a documentary
Global Warming: The Signs and the Science for the US (temperatures are in Fahrenheit). I just watched it on PBS.

The documentary is along the same lines of other documentaries on the subject with some minor differences. Social equity is emphasized: when we see a couple in China buying their first car, we are told the Chinese want what YOU already have. (The number of people in the world who use Fahrenheit and rely primarily on public transit/muscle is fairly small.)

Social justice is also emphasized. Black Americans will suffer disproportionately from climate change. Because blacks are more often poor, more susceptible to asthma (ragweed pollen may increase by more than half if atmospheric carbon levels double), more unable to afford huge air conditioning bills. A Central American town was devastated after it got 25 years of rain in 3 months in a strong El Nino year — El Ninos appear to be occurring more frequently as the climate changes. In Colorado, the drought is almost a decade old, and it’s driving particularly the older ranchers out of business. It isn’t just a decrease in precipitation, but a change in when it occurs, so there isn’t the water to feed cattle in the summer.

Rice, 30% of the calories humans consume, will be 10% less productive with a 1 C increase. With a 1 C increase, the soil in England, everywhere, will be dryer, and 10% more rain will be needed just to keep the soil from becoming dryer.

Some scientists speak. Martin Parry, co-chair of IPCC Working Group 2 (the impacts), says that we will need 10 to 20 times the Kyoto level reductions to keep climate change from being a problem. Kyoto was intended to be just a modest first step.

Stephen Schneider doesn’t look happy. “It took 100 million years of co-evolution of climate and life to give the distribution and kind of species we have. In one generation, or two generations, one species, us, so clawing over one another to get richer faster that we didn’t stop to think about what kind of damage we could do to tens of percent of the rest of the creatures. I think people in the future will look back on our generation and ask, ‘What was wrong with their values?'”

There is some emphasis on changing our behavior — students in a New Jersey and a Beijing school paying attention to turning lights off, etc. The discussion of technology, biodiesel, Nebraska farmers, and wind and solar, is both overly optimistic and realistic — we can only slow climate change. Definitely check out the Montreal green housing — the neighbors have to be jealous of the yearly $50 utility bill.

We have reached the shortest day of the year for Northerners, though the sun will continue to rise later for a few more days, even as the sunset has already been setting later these last few days.

The stellar day, the rotation time of the Earth on its axis, the time that passes while a star returns to the same position in the sky, is about 23 hours, 56 minutes. The Earth rotates 366 1/4 times/year. The time between noons averages 24 hours. This is because while the Earth rotates, it shifts slightly in its orbit, and now must rotate a little more to put the sun in the same point in the sky.

We are near our closest approach to the sun now, so the Earth is moving faster in its orbit, and must rotate a little more to get back to true noon. As a result, the time between noons is a little over 24 hours.

The solstice has not always been December 21/22. The spinning (rotating) Earth wobbles on its axis. Like a spinning top, this wobble is very slow compared to the rotation, about 26,000 years for a complete wobble. The North Pole points to three different pole stars over this period, with Polaris looking most northerly in 2017.

We see the wobble as a Precession (moving earlier) of the Equinoxes. From the viewpoint of the winter (Northern) solstice, the day the northern tip of the axis points most away is moving earlier in the year, about one day every 70 years.

Seventeen centuries ago, when the Church formally chose the date of Jesus’ birth, the solstice would have been 23 days later, January 16.

Much thanks to Bill O’Reilly and others who have triggered numerous stories on how the birth date of Jesus was chosen to compete with Saturnalia, the refusal of many early American Christians through the early 19th century to celebrate Christmas (it’s not in the Bible), the contribution of Jewish immigrants to creating “traditional” Christmas songs about the weather and community, and the well-posed questions from our legislators as to why Congress is celebrating the birth of Jesus by cutting health, housing, and education for the poor while providing even more tax cuts for the rich and profits to corporations.

For myself, this part of the year will be a time of renewal, a time to consider who I am and who and what I value, a time for family and friends. A time to hold in my heart and find ways to help those in need. May you find it a time to restore your strength and values as well.