A Review of Climate Scientist Michael Mann's Talk: A Return to the Madhouse: Climate Change Denial in the Age of Trump

A Review of Climate Scientist Michael Mann’s Talk: A Return to the Madhouse: Climate Change Denial in the Age of Trump

As the talk’s title suggests it was mostly about the political aspects of climate change and Mann’s informed views but I did think there would be more science. There was some but only one graph shown by the man who formulated the famous “hockey stick” graph.

He began with superstorms, noting that Irma was the most potent hurricane on record in terms of wind speed while Harvey broke records for the amount of rainfall in a storm and Maria was the most destructive ever to Puerto Rico. He pointed out a paper he recently co-authored that calculated that the chances of the last 3 or 4 years to be the warmest on record had about a 1 in 4000 chance naturally so anthropogenic climate change is likely the main factor. He did note that talk about individual storms being caused directly by climate change was an incorrect way to depict extreme weather events – I agree – but that the correct depiction was that it may make storms stronger – more heat = more moisture for storms and so exacerbate storms. He talked about droughts and wildfires as well, noting that the recent extremely destructive Thomas Fire in California was completely out of season. Of course, there are many other factors in fires – human developments, previous forest and fire management, forest health, amount of fuel in the forest, etc. so most fires are not likely even connected to climate change let alone caused by it. He said that the recent California drought was the worst in 1200 years – not sure that is correct – it may be – but certainly there were far worse droughts in that area before that as the geologic and tree ring records show.

He talked about ‘false balance’ in journalism where an opposing view, even if way in the minority among scientists, is given equal weight in news stories. He talked a lot about the “deniers,” especially the ones in politics and congress.

He talked about being harassed by Virginia attorney general Ken Cuccinelli who tried without success to summon his emails when he worked at the University of Virginia in order to go through them to find mistakes and proof of political manipulation of data. The Virginia Supreme Court and other bodies were of course right to thoroughly rebuke Cuccinelli although he came very close to becoming governor after that.

He talked about the military being on board about climate change being a major threat – or rather a ‘threat multiplier.’ He mentioned a major drought in Syria being a major influence in the development of the war there but I doubt that was much of an effect and I think its mainly a political ploy to claim that.

I must admit I was a bit disappointed by his advocating for certain people and organizations that have questionable integrity and excess of bias such as Bill McKibben, the Sierra Club, and 350.org. Although he disclosed that he worked with Hillary Clinton’s campaign and helped add a pro-carbon tax position to the Democratic platform he seemed to see her as someone less committed on climate change that he thought he could move to the left – he said as much. So regardless of his scientific knowledge he falls into the “progressive” camp and his opinions on various aspects of climate change support that. In addition, he is giving political talks in swing states - he also said as much. Thus, his presentation is quite politicized. His most recent book from 2016, published just before the election, included as co-author a Washington Post political cartoonist who often used climate change as a subject.

When asked about how we could get there with renewable energy he invoked the study of Stanford engineer Mark Jacobson who was recently rebuked in a Proceedings of the Nation Academy of Science paper with 22 authors. Jacobson claimed he could design the U.S. to be run entirely on wind, solar, geothermal, hydro, and storage by 2050. The authors explained in detail how Jacobson’s paper made incorrect assumptions and assumed immature technologies would mature, and other errors. Mann said that Jacobson’s calculations were conservative, presumably because Jacobson said it. His immediate mention of Jacobson’s study “only” also put him squarely in the far left camp.  

Mann seemed a bit inflexible in his view that stopping the burning of fossil fuels was the only solution. He talked about the political will to do it but we are far far far away from that. He praised the Paris accord as a good first step. He made an off-color joke about Trump “pulling out.” He praised Obama’s Clean Power Plan and I agree it was a good proxy for a carbon price done by state and flexibly – at least for the power market. Even though many things have been rolled back by the current administration the utility companies are still focused on decarbonization as a long-term trend. He also noted that the U.S. will likely meet our initial commitments in the Paris Accord anyway. He did not mention, however, that the main reason for that is gas replacing coal in power plants along with some efficiency improvements and adding renewables, When asked about natural gas and fracking he immediately invoked methane leakage, yet another indicator that he was most influenced by the far left since the best science indicates that methane leakage from natural gas systems is less than often depicted and can be mitigated further. Just like the utility companies staying focused on decarbonization many oil and gas companies are staying focused on mitigating methane leakage as it can be cost-effective and good for public relations. He did not mention cows, landfills or deforestation at all as methane sources.

He said that the debate should not be primarily about whether climate change is real that we should be beyond that and the debate should be about things like what role should nuclear and natural gas have. I basically agree here. He did not address the question of how much of climate change, mainly temperature rise, is due to humans and how much is a part of long or short-term natural cycles. There is some uncertainty there., although that should not affect mitigation efforts. He did not address questions of climate sensitivity nor did he mention satellite data. He did say the notion of a global warming “pause” is bogus. As I understand it the so-called ‘pause’ is based mainly on satellite data which is not in accord with surface for global average temperatures. Perhaps he should have explained why he thinks it is bogus.  

He talked about the stages of climate change denial, things like pointing out the good parts of CO2 – actually there are good parts like increased plant growth and less freezing and longer growing seasons in some areas – he said that the implications were overwhelmingly bad or undesirable – likely true but he seemed to ignore any good outcomes. Another stage was saying that technology will come to the rescue – Bjorn Lomborg has said as much – and this seems to invoke geoengineering such as injecting aerosols into the stratosphere or putting iron oxides into the ocean. The complexity of the regional climate systems could be affected and he thinks the climate models show that most effects on those systems would be negative to people.

Talking about geoengineering he emphasized unintended consequences and while that may be the case we may be currently swimming in a soup of unintended climate consequences from all the things we do – deforestation, agriculture, fossil fuels, particulates, etc. He said he advocated more money for geoengineering research  and I agree but then indicated that he wanted that so that geoengineering solutions could be disproven. He said that some people saw geoengineering as “the” solution to climate change but most see it as only part of the solution to be used only if deemed necessary. There may be more benign forms of geoengineering we can do.

I agree with him that we need more money appropriated for renewable energy research. I also agree that the current administration seems hell bent on reviving coal and re-invigorating fossil fuels across the board. Scott Pruitt’s re-organization of the EPA and its mission has been a target for complaint and I agree he has gone too far. However, I do think many things are better regulated at the state level and that under Obama there was also some politicization of the EPA, though not nearly as much as now. Rick Perry’s efforts at reviving coal and nuclear have been rather embarrassing failures with the FERC unanimously rejecting the bid to prop up failing plants, especially with the PJM market’s own study that said coal is not at all necessary for baseload power even though it is used during cold weather events due to gas price spikes due to immediate availability of gas – in some areas this is strictly due to lack of gas pipeline capacity.  

He did not mention adaptation to climate change at all. That is something we need to work on regardless of how much climate change is anthropogenic and previous work on that could have lessened Harvey flooding in Houston and other places. He did not mention access to inexpensive energy being important for developing countries – more important than climate change mitigation for them.

Overall, I think the far leftists would say it was a great talk, the centrists like me not so impressed, those on the right seeing it was all politics, and those on the far right seeing it as another liberal conspiracy, like the very concept of global warming/climate change. They will see it that way as long as the solution continues to largely involve income redistribution, more taxation on wealthy countries that emit more – ie. the U.S. - and punishing fossil fuel companies. While Mann may be a Ph. D. expert in atmospheric physics he is not a policy expert and the same is true of others in his camp like Jim Hansen. They may be right – it may be best to act now and do it wholesale – but the personal and political upheaval necessary to codify the political will might cause significant social problems. People will not be happy to be paying more for energy, especially the poor. Convincing a majority of people that massively curbing fossil fuels right now is a daunting task. The most sensible scientific solution (weaning away from fossil fuels, also the most expensive solution) does not necessarily translate to the most sensible political solution.

Ecomodernism: A Rational, Sane, Optimistic, Generally Pro-Business, and Technological Approach to Environmental Protection

Ecomodernism: A Rational, Sane, Optimistic, Generally Pro-Business, and Technological Approach to Environmental Protection

Pragmatic approaches to environmental protection are pretty much required these days to optimize environmental protection as well as optimizing economic activity. In April of 2015 colleagues associated with the Break Through Institute launched the Ecomodernist Manifesto, a short essay advocating for a new pro-technology and optimistic approach to environmentalism. It has been described as center-left politically. Ecomodernists are also known as ecopragmatists.

One of the main goals of the ecomodernist approach is to decouple economic growth from environmental impact primarily through technology. In their 2007 book, Break Through, Nordhaus and Shellenberger note that conservatives tend to idealize the market while liberal environmentalists tend to idealize nature undisturbed. These are the two extreme poles and a pragmatic approach would have to bridge the two, acknowledging the importance and value creation of markets as well as the importance of environmental protection. One of the main arguments of ecomodernism is that technology aided by smart and sensible environmental protection have steadily improved lives, reduced poverty, enabled prosperity, and protected the environment. Through these means we are now able to do more with less, reduce waste, and optimize many processes. They advocate that a ‘politics of limit’ and austerity be replaced by a ‘politics of possibility’ and willingness to solve problems pragmatically rather than ideologically. They have argued that economic prosperity leads to upward mobility on Maslow’s ‘hierarchy of needs’ so that when basic necessities are met people can focus more on the value of environmental protection as is happening now in China in response to the environmental problems caused by their high rate of economic growth.

Critiques of Ecomodernism

Since ecomodernism advocates a paradigm that essentially replaces traditional environmentalism it is no surprise that fierce criticism has come from the traditional far-left, more radical faction of environmentalists, including George Monbiot. The critiques I have read were entirely unconvincing and I think they show a bit of what is called “butthurt,” with apologies for lack of a more accurate term. The title of Monbiot’s critique is telling: Meet the Ecomodernists: Ignorant of History and Paradoxically Old-Fashioned. Perhaps there is disgruntled-ness and lashing out because they realize their long-held dogmatic monopoly on environmental thought is beginning to fade. There are, however, a few quasi-legitimate complaints. Even so, the data supports the fact that technology continues to improve efficiency and environment, as well as optimize resource use and that draconian environmental laws threaten the continuation of those improvements. Nordhaus and Shellenberger also showed some flair and perhaps a bit of pomp in “launching” ecomodernism. Around 2007 they presented their essay, The Death of Environmentalism, by handing it out at a prominent environmental conference. In 2015 they had a media event launch of ecomodernism in the U.K. which no doubt brought on the ire of Monbiot and others.

Monbiot mostly disputes the benefits of urbanization and agricultural intensification, arguing that small-scale agriculture that utilizes more human labor produces higher yields. The data are against him. He argues that urbanization leads to greater consumption which may be true in a small sense since poor rural people in developing nations are not known for heavy consumption due to their poverty! They may consume less but they also suffer more with less medical care and less ability for basic human comfort. People in urban environments are far more energy efficient simply due to density and occupy less land, use less energy and virtually every other resource per capita than non-urban people – at least in developed nations. The ecomodernists acknowledge that poor rural peoples in developing nations will continue to move to the cities and there use more resources than they had in the past but also acknowledge that they should have a right and a path out of poverty and lack of opportunity. Monbiot’s arguments there are quite weak.

Environmentalists who seek to punish the poor in developing nations by restricting their access to modern energy and agricultural systems on the grounds that those systems increase pollution and climate disruption are hypocritical and authoritarian. One might call such a notion ‘regulatory authoritarianism.’ Monbiot also invokes the issue of the income inequality exacerbated by modern capitalist systems which is a separate issue from modernization in general. He mentions further ecomodernist critiques by Chris Smaje which turn out to be basic critiques against capitalism in general showing the socialistic bent of much environmentalism, from Europe in particular. He seems to favor hunter-gatherer primitivism and see only the negative effects of capitalism. He makes a fair argument about relative decoupling vs. absolute decoupling – noting that the ecomodernists seem to focus more on relative decoupling whereby less resources are used per unit of output rather than absolute decoupling whereby total output reduced and corresponding total resource use and total emissions are reduced as well. I think the ecomodernists address this problem by suggesting that developed nations are on the cusp toward absolute decoupling (though not there yet) while developing nations still have a long way to go and we should be content with relative decoupling in their cases – especially as they may benefit as “late adopters of resource-efficient technologies.” They note rightly that reduction of poverty in developing nations is more important than climate change mitigation or resource depletion. Smaje again notes that modernization leads to inequality but that can be addressed by other means like more social welfare and higher taxation on the super wealthy. He also favors a return to a labor-intensive economy from an energy-intensive economy, which seems rather insane since much of the poor in the world suffer due to the lack provided by intense labor relative to intense energy.

The ecomodernist website www.ecomdernism.org provides responses to several critiques of the Ecomodernist Manifesto, including critiques by Clive Hamilton, Daniel Ben-Ami, George Monbiot, and several others.

The Break Through Institute (A Pragmatic, Non-Partisan [Probably Center-Left] Think Tank)

Legendary Harvard experimental psychologist Steven Pinker has embraced ecomodernism and really offers some well-presented data in support. His balanced approach criticizes both far left pessimistic radicalism and far right anti-environmentalism. Pinker argues that the environment has improved in recent years and decades due in no small part to technological advancements, in addition to regulations. Ecologist, Author, and Whole Earth Catalog founder Stewart Brand is also a co-author of the Ecomodernist Manifesto and advocates for more realistic rather than idealistic environmental goals. He has advocated in favor of geoengineering, genetic engineering, and nuclear energy. Another co-author is Mark Sagoff, an expert in environmental law and philosophy and author of The Economy of the Earth. Authors Mark Lynas, Martin Lewis, Rachel Pritzker, and food ag expert and author Pamela Ronald are also ecomodernists.

The ecomodernists note that population growth rate has peaked and slowed and is now more related to longer lifespans and lower infant mortality rather than to fertility rates. They predict that population could peak and begin to decline a bit by mid-century. There is now ample evidence that modern agriculture can meet the food demands of the global population, especially with emerging biotechnology, concentrated agriculture that uses less land, and increasingly mechanized agriculture. These also have the potential to free up human labor resources that in the past have been mired in inefficient, labor-intensive, and low-paying agriculture. We can now produce more food per unit of land, per unit of water, and per unit of nitrogen fertilizer added (especially if nitrogen is applied in a smart manner). From the Ecomodernist Manifesto:

“As demand for material goods is met, developed economies see higher levels of spending directed to materially less-intensive service and knowledge sectors, which account for an increasing share of economic activity. This dynamic might be even more pronounced in today’s developing economies, which may benefit from being late adopters of resource-efficient technologies.”

“Taken together, these trends mean that the total human impact on the environment, including land-use change, overexploitation, and pollution, can peak and decline this century. By understanding and promoting these emergent processes, humans have the opportunity to re-wild and re-green the Earth — even as developing countries achieve modern living standards, and material poverty ends.”

They note that agricultural intensification along with the development of cheap, accessible, energy-dense, and scalable modern energy systems has the potential to ‘re-wild,’ to reverse deforestation trends and overall environmental impact. Low-yield (often organic) agriculture (high land use per unit of produce) and renewable energy (high land use per unit of energy production) can and often do work against these goals of rewilding and deforestation. Again from the Ecomodernist Manifesto:

“Ecosystems around the world are threatened today because people over-rely on them: people who depend on firewood and charcoal for fuel cut down and degrade forests; people who eat bush meat for food hunt mammal species to local extirpation. Whether it’s a local indigenous community or a foreign corporation that benefits, it is the continued dependence of humans on natural environments that is the problem for the conservation of nature.”

“Conversely, modern technologies, by using natural ecosystem flows and services more efficiently, offer a real chance of reducing the totality of human impacts on the biosphere. To embrace these technologies is to find paths to a good Anthropocene.”

  

Ecomodernist Focuses (according to my own observations)

1)      Climate pragmatism that prioritizes energy access and energy modernization, particularly for developing nations, over clean energy development. Access to the least expensive modernized energy systems moves more people out of poverty faster and is thus better for improving lives and the earth overall as reduced poverty, migration to cities, and lower population growth are often the results.

2)      Generally favors nuclear energy development as a means to abate climate change even though the current hurdles of cost, environmental safety assurance, and safety against sabotage are daunting. If requirements to prevent global avg. temperatures from rising 2 degrees Celsius by 2100 and by 1.5 degrees Celsius by 2050 are to be realized then wind and solar alone will be far inadequate and required drawdown of coal, oil, and natural gas usage cannot happen without something to replace them.

3)      Goal of updating the predominant environmental paradigm and philosophy away from Romantic emotional pessimistic idealism to one of Enlightenment rational optimistic realism. Acknowledging the positive role of technology and economic prosperity in environmental protection.

4)      Acknowledgement of the usefulness of mechanized agriculture and biotechnology in increasing food yields so that hunger can be abated, farmers can be more successful, land use per unit of food can be decreased, environmental destruction can be minimized, and food can be more available and inexpensive. This is in contrast to the anti-GMO, anti-mechanized agriculture stance of the prevailing environmentalist paradigm. In fact, a very good argument can be made that anti-GMO sentiment that spread from Europe to Africa and other developing regions has slowed down the food production in those areas needed to abate hunger.

5)      Rejection of fatalistic environmentalism where progress and technology are seen only as destroyers of nature but not as means to mitigate environmental problems. The ecomodernist goal is to decouple human development from environmental impact through the wise use of technology and planning. Especially rejected are ideas that emphasize limits to growth and degrowth. Ecomodernists instead see smart growth – growing the economy while simultaneously reducing impact and improving quality of life.

6)      Acknowledgement that adoption of modern energy systems in the developing world have the potential to significantly reduce deforestation, indoor air pollution, and poverty.

The notion of ecopragmatism from Daniel Farber’s 1999 book Ecopragmatism: Making Sensible Environmental Decisions in An Uncertain World is that knowledge changes and sometimes there is over-regulation as well as under-regulation and there is always a balance between costs and benefits. The Europeans and many of the radical environmentalists favor The Precautionary Principle which favors non-action over action that might cause undue environmental harm regardless of the benefits of that action. Thus, the Precautionary Principle has the potential to do more harm than good in some circumstances. Biotech is one obvious example. European disdain for genetically-engineered crops is rooted in the Precautionary Principle. European-influenced anti-GMO and genetic engineering has influenced the leaders of African countries who have a real need for such innovations even today after decades of use among billions of people and animals has proven GMOs safe. This should not be happening today – hungry people being denied healthy food for ideological reasons rooted in fear-mongering overly cautious approaches to environmental impact.

In conclusion, I think that ecomodernism as a new environmental paradigm offers a sensible ‘reset’ from the prevailing environmental “myths” of the past which are often rooted in anti-capitalism, anti-technology, and fear-mongering about environmental impact. That is not to say that vigilance against environmental impact does not need to be pursued but rather that regulations need to be smart, sensible, and well-considered and less influenced by the concerns of radicals.

References:

An Ecomodernist Manifesto – by multiple authors, April 2015, at www.ecomodernism.org

Break Through: Why We Can’t Leave Saving the Earth to Environmentalists- by Ted Nordhaus and Michael Shellenberger – (Mariner Press, 2007, 2009)

Meet the Ecomodernists: Ignorant of History and Paradoxically Old-Fashioned – by George Monbiot, in The Guardian, Sept. 24, 2015

Dark Thoughts on Ecomodernism – by Chris Smaje, August 12, 2015, in The Dark Mountain Project, blog at dark-mountain.net

Nature Unbound: Decoupling for Conservation – by Linus Blomqvist, Ted Nordhaus, and Michael Shellenberger, pdf available at Breakthrough Institute, 2015

Enlightenment Environmentalism: The Case for Ecomodernism – by Steven Pinker, in The Breakthrough Journal, Jan. 17, 2018

Climate Pragmatism (Rightful Place of Science -series) – edited by edited by Jason Lloyd, Daniel Sarewitz, Ted Nordhaus, and Alex Trembath (2017 - Consortium for Science, Policy, and Outcomes, Arizona State University

Ecomodernism: a response to my critics – by Chris Smaje, in Small Farm Future (blog), Sept. 7, 2015

Ecopragmatism: Making Sensible Environmental Decisions in An Uncertain World – by Daniel A. Farber (University of Chicago Press, 1999)