Wow, nice to see I'm not alone on this issue after all. Last time I stuck my head over the parapet on this one I got Big Rob'd

It does seem an amazingly emotive issue. I think it's a shame that it's become bastioned into left/right rather than debated in the press on it's merits.

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Soppy anti-British, pro-crime, anti-education, pro-immigration, anti-family nonentity

Ok good for you Timbo BTW what did you make of the report I linked to?

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There never was a golden age Mike, it's all an illusion

The Third Doctor Invasion of the Dinosaurs (1974)

Give us a précis, please.

the first one from the guardian

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There never was a golden age Mike, it's all an illusion

The Third Doctor Invasion of the Dinosaurs (1974)

The précis?

I don't really have an opinion. (How dare I? This is the internet!) Just to note that the source, the International Energy Agency, is a rich-world organisation set up in the 1970s to represent large energy-consuming (as opposed to producing) nations. It has consistently underestimated oil stocks and failed to predict improvements in oil production technology. It tends to reflect the priorities of its member governments' energy departments in their quest for a bigger share of the public purse. That shouldn't negate the report's findings, but it might mitigate them a little — this isn't a 'purely' scientific endeavour (as if that existed anyhow), it's part of a political campaign to hurry China and the US into taking action on climate change. So far, without much success.

so you don't entirely think that we have five years and then that's it then?

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There never was a golden age Mike, it's all an illusion

The Third Doctor Invasion of the Dinosaurs (1974)

What do you think?

I don't know. But even if we do, the energy/industrial lobbies in the US & China are so strong that there's no chance of anything being done about it. We have to hope the projections are wrong.

I don't Malco a part of me believes them because their scientists they know all about this I know very little, it's in the Guardian so therefore it's probably right on the other hand as bluebell's pointed out someone probably said something along these lines five years ago and as Ezinra the IEA may not be the most reliable organization.

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There never was a golden age Mike, it's all an illusion

The Third Doctor Invasion of the Dinosaurs (1974)

I think that's a dangerous assumption to make. You can probably trust the Guardian — unlike the Mail — to accurately transcribe information from a press release to a news article (give or take a few typos). And it's less likely to try to pass off a report by dubious vested interests as objective expertise. But the actual science of climate change is way beyond the hacks' remit — and the Guardian would certainly ignore the report if the findings didn't fit its readers' values, or promise a lot of page hits.

Good point Ezinra you know maybe I should take my dad's advice that you can't predict the future (BTW my dad is not a mail reader)

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There never was a golden age Mike, it's all an illusion

The Third Doctor Invasion of the Dinosaurs (1974)

Except, of course, that you can.
If we carry on producing atmospheric carbon at the rates we do it will increase.
If it increases (see above) it will cause global warming of more than 2ºC. Then we're fucked. Well, we're inconvenienced, Bangladesh and a lot of other places are fucked. Oh, and the likelihood of increased international tension as resources (and energy) runs out.

And because of a tsunami in Japan the British parliament gets cold feet over nuclear power...

guess my dad's wrong then so I take it do you believe what the report in the guardian says then malco?

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There never was a golden age Mike, it's all an illusion

The Third Doctor Invasion of the Dinosaurs (1974)

We talked about this before. While I don't accept the apocalyptic stuff about nuclear power, isn't it expensive? I recall seeing it was more expensive than onshore wind power. I don't know whether there's a prospect of the price of nuclear coming down, but (as with the end of the world stuff) we've heard that one before.