18 Comments
Jul 16, 2023Liked by Roger Pielke Jr.

Hi Roger,

Do you feel comfortable being lumped in with Shellenberger, Lomborg (and Crenshaw?) as the "new movement"? Potential motto: "sure, there is *some* truth to climate change, it is *not nothing*. Just don't be all alarmist about it". Others might say "The New Merchants of Doubt"....

More seriously, though: How can you not see or not care what people like Crenshaw are clearly doing here? Their only aim is to delay climate action domestically, making international cooperation even harder to achieve. It is painfully obvious that Crenshaw was unable to understand the point about 100% of global warming being antropogenic, yet eventually you accomodated to his ultimate obvious intention, which is just to sow doubt on climate change science.

I recognise you have some legitimate academic quibbles, but your love for taking the contrarian view is tragically leading you to cuddle with some really dodgy people. His hypocracy is beyond the pale... complains about subsidies for renewables, but is mute about those for fossil fuels; terribly concerned about energy access in the developing world, but oblivious about the loss and damages of climate change in those same countries. He pretty much recited the fossil fuel industry script agaist renewables .... embarrassing stuff

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author

Hi Daniel,

Well my views are my views.

I am well aware that being “lumped in” is typically a tool of delegitimacy more than anything else.

If someone wants to come after me based on who I speak with, well, that’s on them mot me. I’m happy to speak with people of a wide range of views. In fact, we should all spend more time speaking with those who disagree with us than those that agree, right?

My arguments and constitution are plenty robust to encountering heterodox thinkers;-)

If anyone wants to critique my views, well here I am👍💪🙏

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Crenshaw a "heterodox thinker" ... that is ... creative.

I agree completely with the importance of talking with those who we disagree with. It is valuable for individuals and the public. But that surely implies confronting them, not just providing a veneer of reasonableness and good-faith to politicians who already have a megaphone. You gently pushed back on his most engregious and misinformed notions, but in the end the take home message for his audience is exactly what he wants to convey: "climate change science is not trustworthy; adaptation will be easy. And here is this real scientist to back me up"

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Crenshaw's podcast is always worth a listen. Good job by Roger.

Crenshaw's confusion on the "how much is due to CO2" is easy to understand. From an energy perspective, the real question is how much is due to the CO2 that results from the burning of fossil fuels. I don't have the numbers handy but my recollection is that less than 50% of CO2 emissions come from the burning of fossil fuels. Someone needs to help Crenshaw come up with a nice simple summary of CO2 emissions due to the burning of fossil fuels.

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Great interview and I have to say how happy I am to see this movement of 'what's the best decarbonization policy regardless of climate opinions' take root

Because of air quality and energy security, and the currently misfiring policy choices, there is a really broad common ground for virtually anybody to basically agree that there are better policies than whatever it takes to try to reach a net zero by 2050 path without any other considerations

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Here is the transcript of the 2014 "debate" - actually seminar - hosted by the AIP [and moderated by Steve Koonin. Note that this is where he says he had his epiphany on climate change.] It's 9 years old but the science hasn't really changed. If anything the case for models being more uncertain and less reliable has even strengthened. [See RP's take on RCP8.5 or Zeke Hausfather's Nature piece on "Too Hot" GCM's]

https://www.aps.org/policy/statements/upload/climate-seminar-transcript.pdf

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Jul 11, 2023Liked by Roger Pielke Jr.

Roger - You mentioned a paper from some years back by Pielke Sr. in which he discusses changing heat balance of the planet. Is there a link handy? Thanks.

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Jul 11, 2023Liked by Roger Pielke Jr.

Good interview. And it works run at 1.5x speed [to save time]. Roger, keep doing these public talks. And being a current tenured professor at a major university is a huge plus; don't retire just yet!

As to the attribution of the recent warming being 100% mankind caused, Dr Judith Curry has stated it's most likely <25%, and at worst 50 percent. So at most, even if we did lower CO2 levels, it would have less than half the effect that we would have otherwise expected. [Curry at the AIP debate 2014]

I liked Crenshaw's focus on the energy policy aspect of this problem. He seems very realistic about the uncertainty in the climate science space. If someone is trying to sell you a nonsensical energy policy why on earth would you believe what they said about climate?

Our policy respnse to a supposed climate crisis is probably more dangerous to civilization than actual climate change itself.

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author

Thanks!!

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Jul 11, 2023Liked by Roger Pielke Jr.

Judith Curry runs a blog where many postings claim CO2 has no effect at all. It is a collegial group of total deniers, partial deniers, and various degrees of skepticism.

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author

Yes, that would be a good place to take these sort of off-topic discussions! Thanks!

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Jul 10, 2023Liked by Roger Pielke Jr.

Is a transcript available for us non-podcast people?

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author

Unfortunately, no. I am looking into this for my podcast. Seems fairly starightforward.

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Jul 10, 2023Liked by Roger Pielke Jr.

I agree that this was an outstanding interview. It is refreshing to see an influential politician that is conversant with depth on climate science and policy.

The "100% anthropogenic attribution to climate change over the last 100 years" did cause me to pause. On this, I think Judith Curry calls in correctly. Also, it is a stretch to imply that the increase in ocean heat is [mainly] due to infrared warming.

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author

Thanks!

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Jul 10, 2023Liked by Roger Pielke Jr.

OUTSTANDING INTERVIEW (emphasis deliberate)! Thank you for sharing.

One question: At one point, you reference research showing the "most aggressive climate policy scenarios can't detect a difference" in 100 years. Could you provide us a reference to that research, or at least point us towards key words for a google search? Is that in your work with Justin Ritchie?

Thank you.

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author

Thanks!

See IPCC Ar6 Ch.12 Table 12.12.

See also our timescale of emergence paper for the basic math behind these claims:

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/6/1/014003/meta

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