May

The Prince Of The Environuts

Posted by: Curt @ 5:19 pm in Environment

Visited 543 times, 2 so far today

Well, that does it. I guess we all need to fall to our knees to the Goracle seeing as how Prince Charles has weighed in on the subject and given us 18 months until catastrophe:

The Prince of Wales has warned that the world faces a series of natural disasters within 18 months unless urgent action is taken to save the rainforests.

In one of his most out-spoken interventions in the climate change debate, he said a £15 billion annual programme was required to halt deforestation or the world would have to live with the dire consequences.

“We will end up seeing more drought and starvation on a grand scale. Weather patterns will become even more terrifying and there will be less and less rainfall,” he said.

~~~

He estimated that the cost would be about £15 billion a year but said that this should be viewed as an insurance policy for the whole world. “That is roughly just under one per cent of all the insurance premiums paid in the world in any one year. It is an insurance premium to ensure the world has some rainfall and reasonable weather patterns. It is a good deal.”

This coming from the man who said recently:

Worryingly in the last few months we have learnt that the North Polar ice cap is melting so fast that some scientists are predicting that in seven years it will completely disappear in summer.”

Uh?

Well, NASA says recent satellite images show that the allegedly endangered polar ice cap — which will melt completely one of these summers and kill off all the polar bears if we don’t slash our greedy carbon footprints and revert to the lifestyles of medieval peasants — has recovered to near normal coverage levels.

That’s what Josefino Comiso, a senior research scientist with the Cryospheric Sciences Branch of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland, told Canada’s CBC News — the Canadian government’s version of NPR/PBS - on Feb. 12.

Man….Charlie does like the dramatic doesn’t he?

Print This Post

This entry was posted on Sunday, May 18th, 2008 at 5:19 pm and is filed under Environment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Trackbacks

11 comments so far

Gregory Dittman

There are reasons to save the rain forest. Egypt use to be a rain forest in the time of Moses until the Egyptians and then the Romans cut down all the trees hundreds of years ago. I believe that’s a good enough warning right there not to cut down the rain forests.

May 18th, 2008 at 5:32 pm

Aye Chihuahua

OK,

Being the fact-oriented knowledge-based person that I am I admit that I was intrigued by Gregory Dittman’s statement about Egypt having been a rain forest during the time of Moses.

(My spouse says that my head is full of useless knowledge. I disagree but that is another story.)

I had never heard of that before so I did some searching.

Unfortunately, I came up empty.

Here on the Net, that statement has been posted here and there but I found no sources upon which I could verify the claim.

Gregory, if you know of someplace that I can look please post the link(s).

Right now, I am not convinced.

While I agree to some extent that we need to work to preserve our forests, the Egypt argument isn’t working for me.

Sorry.

May 18th, 2008 at 5:59 pm

Mike's America

That photo of Charlie is PRICELESS!

How many birds died to make that for him?

May 18th, 2008 at 8:11 pm

luva the scissors

and just what are the carbon footprints of his castles? all of them, possbly that of a small country?

May 18th, 2008 at 10:20 pm

Gregory Dittman

http://www.crystalinks.com/egyptrees.html
http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/gardens.htm
http://www.teenwitch.com/trees/pict/nilepalms.gif

Yeah they are a little vague, but that’s what I could find online. Any ancient forrest in Egypt would be buried under several feet of dirt or sand by now. They are still finding ancient cities there. So far the information was from the ancient Egyptians themselves rather than people out there digging for remains in the desert. They defiantly did live in a garden like atmosphere (even if they had to make the gardens themselves) rather than the dusty conditions of today.

I did find stuff on the deforestation of Africa followed by a drop in rainfall in the newly cut areas. From my understanding is the ground is nutrient poor. When the forrest is cut back, it won’t grow back and when several cubic miles are cut out each year the former area just turns into a wasteland (which turns into a dust bowl and eventually a desert). That’s why farmers have to keep cutting into the rain forests and not just sit on the land. After two or three years nothing will grow in the soil. Those going into the forests for illegal logging aren’t patient enough for the trees to grow back (if they can).

May 19th, 2008 at 12:09 am

Aye Chihuahua

Thanks for taking the time to post those.

I have to say that I remain unconvinced about your “rain forest” claim.

Trees growing along a river is not unusual. The Nile River and the land surrounding it is very fertile due to periodic (annual?) flooding and, of course, there is adequate water supply. That is why the Egyptians chose to settle there.

The Egyptians planted gardens and trees and had an extensive gardens around their homes which they irrigated. They were also an agrarian society. That too was made possible by irrigation.

The evidence I found, as well as what you have cited so far, remains insufficient to support your claim of an Egyptian rain forest.

May 19th, 2008 at 3:26 am

stix1972

Egypt a Rain Forest. Are you kidding me? It was more green and it did not have a rain forest in it. It did have more lush vegetation, and was not a desert, but it had no rain forest. And the loss of treees had nothing t do with deforestation in the region, it had to do with climate change that change the winds in the area.

Look to what they are doing for biofuel down in Brazil for deforestation. They are taking down forests by the truckload to grow their precious biofuls, which will have a big impact on the climate of Brazil in the years to come, but it will not become a desert. There will be wastelands because of the ridulous notion of biofuels being farmed on less than fertile ground

May 19th, 2008 at 7:35 am

suek

If you agree that oil is produced from biological sources, then it becomes apparent that much of the middle east was once botanically heavily productive. Today it isn’t. If the growth had been cut down, it wouldn’t have been available to become oil. But today, there _is_ oil. And sand, obviously. So, maybe Egypt clear cut their forests, but I question whether that would have been responsible for the change of climate in all of the Saudi peninsula, plus Iraq, plus Iran. Looking at their relative sizes just makes that improbable. And yet, today, there’s oil under those places, and sand on top. Obviously the climate has changed - but I sincerely doubt it’s due to clear cutting forests. Consider just the population levels…

You know…it almost makes you think that there might be changes in earth’s climate that have nothing to do with mankind…!

May 19th, 2008 at 10:31 am

stix1972

It was populated by schrubs and smaller trees, but it was never a Rain Forest. That would be likie saying the Bosque in Alberquerque is considered a Rain Forest. Yes there was more plants and trees life, but it was never the Amazon or anything close to that, waht is considered a rain Forest now.

I forgot where I saw this, but I think it was the Science Channel, but one of the downfalls of the Great Egyptian Empire was the change in Climate that occured in the area. At one time there was a lot more rainfall in Egypt and they could grow more crops, but the African Climate, especially in the North changed. It was not because of deforsestation or human based, it happened because of the change in the ocean currents at the time which happens all the time, . And the Sahara is growing ever since.

And if you want to go back to when the plants that produce the oil now, that would be a lot older than humans walked the Earth, back inthetime ofthe dinosaurs, when the whole Earth was alot warmer and more water vapor was in the air and there was less dry land to inhabit, and there was a lot more CO2 in the air at the tmie also for all the Climate hysteria cool aide drinkers.

And here something that will really get you thinking. The Moon is travelling away from us every year, and that has an effect on the tides and ocean currents.The Moon used to be a lot closer to the earth and the tides used to be a lot higherthan they are today.See, back when theEarth was forming another planet or huge asteroin hit the Earth and the debrit is what we see now as the moon, but it did not directly hit us, it it at an angle and was deflected and the rubble that was left consolidated into what is now the moon, but it is still moving away from us a few milimeters a years. And the Sun effecsthe climate also and is never constant, it flaresup and then flares down.

As Suek said they may have clear cut the forest, but in no way did it effect the Climate of the whole area. Maybe some local Climate changes, but you can not changetheClimate of a whole region by lcear cutting it. Just look at Easter Island, many believe now that something other than clear cutting is what destroyed the forests there. The people on the Island might have helped, but there was something other than just cuting down trees that did it.

May 19th, 2008 at 11:49 am

Skye

When exactly did the 18 month count-down start? I’d love to set a reminder on MidnightBlue.

May 20th, 2008 at 4:23 pm

stix1972

Have you noticed it is in then future when the end of the world is coming. Remember when 1990 people would be starving because of the lack of food. Then it is 10 years in the future we got to change and then 10 years come and we are alright and we are not dead. This 18 month one is new, but i will be the same premise, in 18 months we will have forgotten and it will be the next 18 months or 10 years again until doom and gloom

May 20th, 2008 at 4:38 pm