SINCE I AM BORED AND TO GET THOSE LATE SUMMER JUICES GOING..... (PLEASE FORGIVE ME!!!) AND .. I PLANTED MY TROPICAL FRUIT IN UPSTATE NY From Thursday's Daily Telegraph "On Friday the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change delivers its latest verdict on the state of man-made global warming. Though the details are a secret, one thing is clear: the version of events you will see and hear in much of the media, especially from partis pris organisations like the BBC, will be the opposite of what the IPCC’s Fifth Assessment Report actually says. Already we have had a taste of the nonsense to come: a pre-announcement to the effect that “climate scientists” are now “95 per cent certain” that humans are to blame for climate change; an evidence-free declaration by the economist who wrote the discredited Stern Report that the computer models cited by the IPCC “substantially underestimate” the scale of the problem; a statement by the panel’s chairman, Dr Rajendra Pachauri, that “the scientific evidence of… climate change has strengthened year after year”. As an exercise in bravura spin, these claims are up there with Churchill’s attempts to reinvent the British Expeditionary Force’s humiliating retreat from Dunkirk as a victory. In truth, though, the new report offers scant consolation to those many alarmists whose careers depend on talking up the threat. It says not that they are winning the war to persuade the world of the case for catastrophic anthropogenic climate change ��" but that the battle is all but lost. At the heart of the problem lie the computer models which, for 25 years, have formed the basis for the IPCC’s scaremongering: they predicted runaway global warming, when the real rise in temperatures has been much more modest. So modest, indeed, that it has fallen outside the lowest parameters of the IPCC’s prediction range. The computer models, in short, are bunk. To a few distinguished scientists, this will hardly come as news. For years they have insisted that “sensitivity” the degree to which the climate responds to increases in atmospheric CO₂ " is far lower than the computer models imagined. In the past, their voices have been suppressed by the bluster and skulduggery we saw exposed in the Climategate emails. From grant-hungry science institutions and environmentalist pressure groups to carbon traders, EU commissars, and big businesses with their snouts in the subsidies trough, many vested interests have much to lose should the global warming gravy train be derailed. This is why the latest Assessment Report is proving such a headache to the IPCC. It’s the first in its history to admit what its critics have said for years: global warming did “pause” unexpectedly in 1998 and shows no sign of resuming. And, other than an ad hoc new theory about the missing heat having been absorbed by the deep ocean, it cannot come up with a convincing explanation why. Coming from a sceptical blog none of this would be surprising. But from the IPCC, it’s dynamite: the equivalent of the Soviet politburo announcing that command economies may not after all be the most efficient way of allocating resources. Which leaves the IPCC in a dilemma: does it ’fess up and effectively put itself out of business? Or does it brazen it out for a few more years, in the hope that a compliant media and an eco-brainwashed populace will be too stupid to notice? So far, it looks as if it prefers the second option ��" a high-risk strategy. Gone are the days when all anybody read of its Assessment Reports were the sexed-up “Summary for Policymakers”. Today, thanks to the internet, sceptical inquirers such as Donna Laframboise (who revealed that some 40 per cent of the IPCC’s papers came not from peer-reviewed journals but from Greenpeace and WWF propaganda) will be going through every chapter with a fine toothcomb. Al Gore’s “consensus” is about to be holed below the water-line ��" and those still aboard the SS Global Warming are adjusting their positions. Some, such as scientist Judith Curry of Georgia Tech, have abandoned ship. She describes the IPCC’s stance as “incomprehensible”. Others, such as the EU’s Climate Commissioner, Connie Hedegaard, steam on oblivious. Interviewed last week by the Telegraph’s Bruno Waterfield, she said: “Let’s say that science, some decades from now, said: 'We were wrong, it was not about climate’, would it not in any case have been good to do many of the things you have to do in order to combat climate change?” If she means needlessly driving up energy prices, carpeting the countryside with wind turbines and terrifying children about a problem that turns out to have been imaginary, then most of us would probably answer “No”." This post was edited by mes111 on Wed, Sep 25, 13 at 18:12

I do agree with the other folks that it'll probably cost you just as much, if not more, to replace all your appliances and have the necessary electrical rewiring done: water heaters, furnaces, dryers and stoves are very high-drain items and you probably don't have the wiring there already... daaaaaaamn does that add up, especially if you need the panel expanded. Just upgrading a panel from 100amp to 200amp can run you $1500-2000! (That's on our to-do list, yuck-o.) Electric heat really, really blows big hairy wet dog IME except as supplemental heating. We now have oil heat and electric appliances and MAN do I miss my natural gas everything because it was all so much cheaper to run, even with a house a third bigger! Sadly, it would be something in the area of $25k to connect this house back up to the gas lines out in the street (since we'd have to tear up part of the street, which the city does NOT like)... not going to happen unless we win the lottery. A good gas stove will keep chugging along for a long time as long as you keep it cleaned and properly adjusted. Ditto for a natural gas dryer, which is generally a good bit cheaper to operate than an electric one - I actually see quite a few gas dryers go by on Freecycle and Craigslist as people get the fancy new sets, so if you want a replacement at minimum cost keep an eye out there. However, replacing a refrigerator that is more than 15 years old WILL lower your electric bill - tax credits are available for Energy Star models from many states, and many utility companies offer rebates (either cash or credit against your power bill). If you get a clearance or scratch-and-dent model, unless you go for mega bells and whistles, you probably won't have to spend much at all! A friend of mine recently got a nice fridge for about $250 after the rebates and credits because she accepted a discontinued model that had a great big scrape down the side - but it was the side that was going to face the wall so who cared? If the plumber is already there doing other work it will cost little more in labor to add hooking up a new water heater, which is probably a good thing to think about. You might even be able to get the WH itself at a good discount (like very close to wholesale) through the plumber if you're giving him a nice big job like repiping a house, and the gas company may offer credits or rebates as well. Our plumber is also fairly unimpressed with the tankless water heaters at this point. One thing he and I both find rather bothersome, rarely mentioned by the rah-rah sorts, is the many gallons of water that go down the drain while you're waiting for the hot water to get going - it's just not very practical to have buckets everywhere to catch all that cold and lukewarm water before it's wasted. Depending on the model and where the unit is located in relation to the points of use, it can take up to two minutes to get hot-enough water, so if you're waiting for your shower that's 5 gallons wasted with a standard 2.5gpm shower - over 1800 gallons per person per year. Potable water is precious stuff!

Lulie wayne, it's so good to see you post. I've been thinking about you lately for some reason. This whole BP thing is a disaster. I've been mad since day one since nothing seems to be happening except blotched attempts to save the oil well, nature be damned. It's way past time for BP to get off their throne and do something constructive. And another thing that ticks me off is the shrimp and fishermen are prepared to go out and clean the marshes but the EPA and Coast Guard are keeping them from it. (I just heard that on the news tonight.) I think Louisiana should take a page out of Arizona's book and just do it themselves like they would like to. Geez, think this upsets me?????

Thanks for posting the Holland story, Morz8. I first read it when DGS was diagnosed as a GERD baby. It was a help to me as I was figuring out how to help DS and DIL, who were overwhelmed by the situation at first. Especially as they live out-of-state. It is such a gentle lesson, but difficult - how to accept the unacceptable, and how to adjust gracefully to that which cannot be changed, and how to find the good in what appears so bleak. I haven't checked any boxes because I would have to check all of them. That's how touching these stories are! As Current Resident said, this is the internet at its best. Every person has a story. Even if you think you don't have a story, you do. I agree wholeheartedly that travel to a new place is a great way to challenge oneself, to find even a mild adventure, and to experience a change in perspective that can never be taken away. I remember what it was like returning to the States after my first year overseas in Israel and Jordan (some years before the 1967 war that changed my life), Israel then a second-world country, and Jordan almost third-world. I remember walking into my beloved Marshall Field's in the Chicago Loop and being bowled over, almost sick to my stomach at the vast amount of gorgeous stuff available there. I had totally adjusted to "poverty", small plain stores with not much in them, nothing remotely resembling a supermarket anywhere, few people owned their own cars, there was no tv, as neither country had television then, and on and on. But people lived with so much energy and happiness, with appreciation for the details of life and with plans for the future, just as we do. I did not understand how my values had changed until I got home. I was seeing the world with diffferent eyes now; this is what happens when you go to a different (and sometimes more difficult) place - your humanity expands.