Written by Julian Flood
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[Note on the author: Julian Flood was a Vulcan Captain at 24. It’s all been rather downhill since then.]
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Let’s start with a warning: O level maths was a very long time ago, so it will pay while reading this to be sceptical of the sums which are approximations. Anyone who wishes to demonstrate a more accurate take on the figures should join in with a comment. The facts are right as far as any facts about climate change are right which is ‘not very’ –only a very corrupted science would openly admit that it permits the deletion of data*) that contradicts the official narrative that we are all doomed – but I ran out of fingers working out how to apportion the blame for the worldwide climate Armageddon which is apparently all our fault.
It’s not all our fault. We produce about 1% of the world’s anthropogenic CO2, so only about 1% of the apocalypse can be laid at the UK’s draughty front door. That 1% is a fact that people argue about as we are accused of offshoring much of the CO2 used to make the things we buy, but 1% is what we’ll use, not least because it makes the sums easier.
As you go up the temperature drops, which is why mountains have snow on the top and why there’s ice at the North Pole. Humanity lives in the troposphere where it cools by 3 deg C per thousand feet, or, in the jargon, the lapse rate is 3 deg/1000ft. There’s an official standard for this called the ICAO standard atmosphere, so that’s unequivocal, laid down by statute. 3 deg/1000ft it is.
The next number is not exactly a fact, it’s more an aspiration. By 2080 we hope/intend/will compel the global temperature to rise by only 1.5 deg C above pre-industrial levels (let’s ignore the fact that “pre-industrial levels” covers the Minoan, Roman and Mediaeval warm periods which were all warmer than we are today). That’s why our rulers will force us to drive ruinously expensive short range dodgem cars when we’re not walking, cycling or running to our next appointment, and will make us shiver in our inadequately heated homes as the electricity Grid creaks, groans and fails trying to drive inadequate heat pump technology while charging all those electric cars. Let’s assume that the world manages to achieve that figure for the sake of the calculation – to be honest I don’t think anything we do will change the rate of climate change one iota, but we have to have some basis to calculate from.
We’ve already warmed by 1 deg C, so we’re allowed 0.5 deg C more. 1.5 deg C by 2080, here we come. Right, deep breath, sums!
[Note to editor. I’m going mad with the numbers. Sometimes they look right, sometimes they look wrong. [Ed: relax, they’re all fine!]]
By 2080 the UK’s global warming contribution would be 0.015 deg C if the climate models were right, which they aren’t, but no-one knows why, but if it’s good enough for Mrs Carrie Johnson with her degree in the history of theatre, the PM with his degree in Classics, ancient literature and classical philosophy, and for the Right Honourable Anne-Marie Trevelyan MP, Minister for Energy, Clean Growth and Climate Change (who knows all about chartered accountancy) then it surely must be good enough for us peasants. That’s what the UK will have contributed to global warming since pre-industrial times all the way up to 2080. 0.015 deg C.
If we could raise the whole world up to compensate for that temperature rise we’d need to elevate everyone by 1000*0.015/3 ft. Five feet. Five feet for 200 years worth of UK’s contribution – that’s roughly an inch every three years. It doesn’t seem like much of a challenge when taken in the round, but some people put on more girth than that during a single holiday on the Costa del Sol, and I know at least one grandson who has in the last year put on nearly three inches of vertical growth, well out-accelerating the UK’s contribution to global warming.
We could build five foot mounds for individuals, families or tribes but let’s face it, doing that is not practical. So how can we expiate our guilt for what we in the UK, a wealthy group of nations and dependencies, are doing to the climate? What can we do that’s actually achievable as an acknowledgement of our carbon dioxide sins? It’s going to take us years to recover from Covid so it can only be something modest, but it must be striking, an earnest of our good intentions and our regret. Just a symbol, but symbols are important. Here’s the answer.
Let’s do an Elton John.
No, not the portly singer, no need to sing Crocodile Rock***) to celebrate the Thames transmogrifying into a foetid swamp. His footwear.
While we research and fund development of small modular reactors (they’ll give us zero carbon dioxide energy and are the only practical solution to the problem if it turns out to be real) we can at the same time supply the entire population of the world with Elton John four inch stack heeled boots: wearing those super-cool accoutrements everyone will be lifted into the cooler climes of 12 years before. These are not boots! They are climate time machines!****)
There are about 7,500,000,000 people on the planet, and allowing for those who are still learning to walk, have lost mobility etc they’ll need 6,000,000,000 pairs of boots. Even fairly extreme versions sell for less than 50 dollars, so by shopping around we could expect to drive the price right down to, say, £20. That’s a mere £120 billion to fit out the entire world, and for that price we might even get up to six inches of elevation. The whole world saved from UK-caused global warming right up to 2038! If we cancelled HS2 we could easily afford that.
The propaganda value of my proposed solution would be immense. The biggest contributor to AGW, China, produces about 30% of the world’s greenhouse gases (USA is 14%, India 7%) and will be unable to match us in our token apology. China would have to lift everyone up by 30 times more than we do, which is obviously totally impractical and ridiculous: 120 inch boots would be really difficult to walk in. There’s only one solution.
China will have to stop building all those coal-fired power stations. While we wait for that – don’t hold your breath – our leaders can reflect on how insignificant is our contribution to AGW. Perhaps then they’ll stop grandstanding on the world stage at our expense.
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*) See Steve McIntyre’s blog about how the latest AR6 report manages to produce an alarming graph of 20th/21st century temperatures by throwing away any contradictory evidence from tree ring studies. It’s a long and complex read but it takes you to the heart of the scientific scandal that is the climate scam. Take a lot of data. Throw away all the data that doesn’t agree with your global warming hypothesis. Put all the data that’s left in a heap and point out that it agrees with your hypothesis. This is not a joke, this is what IPCC scientists are doing.
**) This is a joke. Go up, you know, up the map to the north? No? Suit yourself.
***) OK, if you must you can sing “Who Wears These Shoes?” – Elton John 1984.
****) Supercool! Geddit?
Photo by worldwind0 
How ridiculous we have been arguing and pontificating about AGW for soooo long.
You, Julian have found the answer!!
But it won’t stop there will it?
We will see higher and higher platform soles. Everyone and their dog will try and outdo each other.
The new lease of life for ‘virtue signalling’ will know no bounds as we all rise above ground level.
Unfortunately Julian you had not thought of sleeping hours. Perhaps you had. Does this mean that we will have to raise our beds? Does it also mean we will have to raise our chairs?
Well one thing is for sure you have raised our spirits.
What a brilliant idea. I have lost 4″ in height thanks to a very serious untreated problem which has just been done after four years (they blame covid!), I blame Dripford, which is now too late and have been put on another list for surgery). If I could walk in these shoes I certainly would. It’s about as plausible as the crazy antics of the climate numpties and their hangers on who would probably struggle to pass an 11+. An excellent book by James Deligpole Watermelons (green on the outside, red in the middle) is worth the read but of course it’s not about real science is it?
Helena. I accept much of your comment but CPRE in letter to me would not accept that immigration led population growth was hugely contributing to the incursion of development on greenfield/belt land. I wouldn’t give this organisation one penny – they are woke and PC as the National Trust. Farage recently remarked at TWT going the same way. How can you save our countryside if there is non stop immigration led population growth?
Excellent. Those with a technical bent might be interested in reading “The Hockey Stick Illusion” about the efforts of Steve McIntyre and Ross McKitrick in discrediting the tree ring analysis which led to Gore’s “Hockey Stick”. Sadly political whims take precedence over real science.
The “scientific” establishment has a lot to answer for.
Spock. Thanks. Now can you solve my problem. I’m less than 5ft tall and have great difficulty driving modern cars because my legs are too short to reach the foot pedals.
‘We’ve already warmed by 1.0 deg C, so we’re allowed 0.5 deg C more. 1.5 deg C by 2080’.
Warmed 1.0 deg centigrade. OK what ‘datum’ date is that? Put another way one deg since when? It helps understand the forecast numbers against time taken to get to where we are today (alledgedly).
May I contribute to the flood of applause there must be this lucid exposition of this modern British rush to set the whole world to rights by ensuring that we wear the hairiest shirt in public, as when we had ban the bomb and I know George Galloway declared Dundee a Nuclear free zone we cannot alone save the world from GW
How they can continue this man made element of GW when nearly everybody I meet at least rolls their eyes, because they know it is a scam based on fiddled ideologies and fiddled figures, I take as my authority on this an article written now many years ago by the late Christopher Booker in the Sunday Telegraph.
SMRS I am interested to hear about. Much more, I believe the Chinese model has now been approved by the World Nuclear authorities, I hope they don’t get the first production model in use before RR
I am told electric cars are just a step along the way and I note they are already talking about Hydrogen replacing gas boilers, so I’m sure cars and other vehicles will follow soon, then there is Ammonia being worked on and that apparently can be adapted for cars, it appears it’s already being worked on for big ship engines. And what’s more their exhausts don’t leave nasty carbon
Oh and I keep hearing about magic lumps of iron 238 anybody know anything about that?
Indeed does anybody authoritively know anything about SMRs Hydrogen cells or Ammonia
Hydrogen is a hybrid between Houdini and Basil Brush. Because of the tiny size of its molecules it’s very difficult to contain, especially as it makes metals brittle. It is explosive over a wide range of mixtures with air so it then goes BOOM BOOM
JF
CO2 may be the cause of our temperature rise, which I personally doubt (isn’t it the result of higher temperatures rather than the cause?) and may be conducive to our slow demise but hey, Hydrogen is dangerous in that if mishandled or accidentally ignited (oxygen present of course) our demise could be immediate!
Does that mean that I have not heard correctly that gas boilers are to b replaced with hydrogen.
Incidentally I’ve just taken out my solid fuel anthracite boiler and replaced it with oil, only other alternative was Calor gas, but I don ‘t like their price, their manner or their virtual monopoly position for those unfortunate enough not to have natural town gas laid on.
The best way to reduce the UK’s CO2 footprint would be to extend the gas grid. Then t those like us with oil boilers could convert to natural gas, halfway to the hydrogen economy.
JF
A far better way is to bin the CO2 nonsense. Real pollution is a different matter and is quite possibly being made worse by that policy. However, as with the virus, government is using it to impose a level of control over us which is unprecedented except perhaps in wartime.
War has been declared on climate change by Western governments and coporations alike And, as we all know, truth is the first casualty of war.
It may well be that the climate change scam like the banking system in 2008 is now just too big to fail.
Jake. It was probably your comment on here 10.59 am that set me thinking again about the dreaded ‘Finance’ and who does UK now owe the huge national debt!
Still very confusing and deliberately obfuscated of course but it seems that UK owes less money now to other countries, or global institutions, than it did in 2008. So saying we owe it to ourselves has some truth and reminding us the national debt is never repaid does also mean that future generations will not suffer from the ridiculous anti covid expenditure.
The fact remains of course that we are STILL not encouraging S.M.E.s that produce REAL goods.
Oh, I agree with you that immigration obviously contributes to the building on greenbelt land. Anyway we don’t need them, we don’t want them and there is no good reason to have them in our country.
Wow.
But whatever the merits of your case, could we, do you suppose, stop wrapping our food in a thousand different wierd amalgams of plastic, or paper, and probably animal skin and bones for all anybody knows. Drinking from metal or plastic. Or at least let us know what it is.. Can we stop putting dangerous Chemicals on farms, Surely we produce human waste enough for eager farmers. and rose gardens,
The civil service are supposedly good at organising us and other stuff,. Instead, organise food manufacturers/factories./farms.wholesalers and retail and importers.
Off you go chaps
As for climate change. There’s too many peculiar Universities, professors etc.. There is no longer an automatic cut off point seperating lunacy from reality.
T. G. Spokes. What a sensible comment. Well done.
Ah but TG – this is not ‘climate’, this is proper environmental management. Dealing with the things we homo sapiens are doing which really DO damage our planet and its flora and fauna.
The biggest CON in the whole climate cult scam is muddling it in amongst ‘green’ issues which sensible people really do care about. I am a member of CPRE and the Woodland Trust – for the right reasons, unless you want to call me a nimby for wanting to prevent my beautiful county being covered in concrete, yet both organisations have succumbed to the climate gaslighting. Leaves me a dilemma – do I resign in protest, as hubby & I did from the National Trust, or stick it out because of what they do that I want to support?
And since that green nutjob was forced to ‘fess up – I too drive a diesel car. A blue diesel, my second, with the additive to cut genuine health harming pollutants, not plant food.
TG, the big change in farm chemicals is the amount of nitrogen we apply. Humans fix as much nitrogen as all of Nature, and a large amount of it ends up in the sea together with a lot of dissolved silica.
We are probably playing merry hell with plankton populations, altering not only the amount of CO2 fixed and exported to the deep ocean but also its isotopic composition.
The ruler of Planet Earth is not Gaia, it’s Oceana, and my guess is that science has not fully understood that fact.
JF
Julian. So T.G. was right in his veiled suggestion of spreading human excreta on farmland!?! I believe over the ages some civilisations have done exactly that!
Well never mind. I’m sure cow sh*t works just as well on farm land and is far better than chemical fertilizers. Though I must admit I do not know how to deal with our own, without upsetting Oceana!