How to Make Your Opponent’s Work Considerably Easier
August 9th, 2006Posted by: Roger Pielke, Jr.
Can someone reading this blog who is plugged in to advising environmental organizations let them know that invoking hurricane impacts generally and Katrina specifically as reasons for greenhouse gas mitigation is not really helping their cause?
Comments like this from Environmental Defense, an organization with an impressive track record of environmental advocacy, often make me wonder if environmental groups are actually looking to give their opponents a justified basis for criticism:
Katrina tragically illustrated how vulnerable we all remain, even in the United States, to nature’s devastation. Moreover, given that New Orleans’ vulnerability to hurricanes had long been appreciated but never adequately addressed, it seriously calls into question the notion that we can simply adapt to the changes wrought by global warming. The costs from Katrina, still being tallied, are staggering, and the storm’s full cost—humanitarian, social, environmental and economic—will be felt for many years to come.
Katrina-like events will become more common and more widespread unless the emissions of global warming pollutants are capped. The link between global warming and hurricanes is yet another reason for Americans to insist on meaningful legislation to cap our greenhouse gas emissions.
To support this statement they cite papers from Emanuel, Webster, Holland, and Curry and disparage work of Klotzbach and Landsea. Here is what these six plus Anthes, Elsner, Knutson, and Mayfield had to say about policies related to hurricanes:
As the Atlantic hurricane season gets underway, the possible influence of climate change on hurricane activity is receiving renewed attention. While the debate on this issue is of considerable scientific and societal interest and concern, it should in no event detract from the main hurricane problem facing the United States: the ever-growing concentration of population and wealth in vulnerable coastal regions. These demographic trends are setting us up for rapidly increasing human and economic losses from hurricane disasters, especially in this era of heightened activity. Scores of scientists and engineers had warned of the threat to New Orleans long before climate change was seriously considered, and a Katrina-like storm or worse was (and is) inevitable even in a stable climate.
Rapidly escalating hurricane damage in recent decades owes much to government policies that serve to subsidize risk. State regulation of insurance is captive to political pressures that hold down premiums in risky coastal areas at the expense of higher premiums in less risky places. Federal flood insurance programs likewise undercharge property owners in vulnerable areas. Federal disaster policies, while providing obvious humanitarian benefits, also serve to promote risky behavior in the long run.
We are optimistic that continued research will eventually resolve much of the current controversy over the effect of climate change on hurricanes. But the more urgent problem of our lemming-like march to the sea requires immediate and sustained attention. We call upon leaders of government and industry to undertake a comprehensive evaluation of building practices, and insurance, land use, and disaster relief policies that currently serve to promote an ever-increasing vulnerability to hurricanes.
Question for Environmental Defense:
OK, I’ll bite. With the “meaningful legislation that caps greenhouse gas emissions” that you are calling for, what effect will this have on hurricane intensities and hurricane impacts over the next 100 years? Here is a hint (PDF) in formulating your answer. Readers feel free to answer as well.
August 10th, 2006 at 3:07 pm
Environmental Defense also had a huge press briefing and rollout of their new website on AGW causing hurricanes, and Dr. Webster endorsed them personally. Now that is interesting.
http://www.dailypress.com/news/local/dp-96245sy0aug10,0,1116203.story?track=rss
August 10th, 2006 at 7:25 pm
Public relations is different from making government policy decisions. The comment on ED’s website is designed to get public attention. It is not a technical policy discussion.
As a PR point it works, even though it may be a weak point for developing global warming policy.
August 10th, 2006 at 8:32 pm
Joseph-
Sort of like how WMDs were a good hook for getting the public’s attention but a weak point for developing an Iraq policy?
August 11th, 2006 at 12:34 pm
Roger,
I will log on and resubmit my last post. I took too long to write it and must have been automatically signed out.
August 11th, 2006 at 12:35 pm
From 1970 to 1990, environmental groups saw most of their goals achieved! From 1990 to the present, they have stayed alive by hyping various environmental scares well beyond what the science and the facts support. The method in question here has been the modus operandi for many environmental groups for many years. That is why I no longer send money to any of them, although I often contributed back in the 80s.
Roger, you seem genuinely interested in finding the best possible use of limited resources for dealing with the consequences of climate change, and that is commendable. I do not know who makes decisions for Environmental Defense, but I would be willing to wager that their main goal is to increase the coffers of ED, and thus their ability to peddle influence. In other words, their primary goal is to save Environmental Defense, not the planet! Hence the dubious/misleading PR campaign.
I am sure it has all been rationalized with the mindset of ‘the ends justify the means’, but I think Sir William Scott had more wisdom when he wrote: O, what a tangled web we weave, When first we practice to deceive!
In answer to your question: It will have no discernable impact, for hurricanes will come and go none-the-less, and we will (hopefully) reduce our risks through better planning and mitigation, which would totally swamp any effect from emissions reductions.
August 11th, 2006 at 2:36 pm
Roger-
I am tempted to play the rhetoric game a little. Maybe:
“Roger-
How can you compare reducing pollution that endangers human life and health with an unjust war that is killing thousands of innocent people without any clear benefit for anyone but the terrorists?”
You did qualify your statement with “sort of like”. That gives you plenty of wiggle room, so I’ll cede you that point.
For the record when I was in school I knew people who worked at the legal department of Environmental Defense, and I worked for a firm that generally took the same side as ED on environmental issues.
On the PR front most of the criticisms leveled at enviro groups like ED are usually just ad hom’s and not substantive arguments, so even if the Hurricane AGW link is weak I don’t know how much it will hurt ED.
If you were to ask the people at ED they would agree 100% that coastal development even without AGW is a critical problem. Coastal development is not only disaster prone it is done in environmentally sensitive zones, like dunes and marshlands.
Enviro groups are public actors though and when you are a public actor style is sometimes as important as substance.
August 13th, 2006 at 6:38 am
Joseph,
You Wrote: “Enviro groups are public actors though and when you are a public actor style is sometimes as important as substance.”
Isn’t that the same thing as saying that the ends justify the means?
I am not sure I can accept ‘the exaggeration of threats and the misrepresentation of science’ as a definition of ’style’, but if it is, then that has been the ’style’ of many environmental groups for a long time!
August 14th, 2006 at 4:23 pm
Jim,
Emphasizing weak, but not incorrect, points is not the same as misrepresentation.
Instead of making substantitve arguments to counter ED you are just using ad hom’s.
Environmental groups have been sucessful because they used accurate science better than their opponents. Even their opponents admit this. Have you read the Luntz memo?
August 15th, 2006 at 3:38 pm
Joseph,
Emphasizing weak points over strong points is the same as misrepresentation. Conveying speculation as fact is misrepresentation. Cherry picking the data to get the required result is also misrepresentation.
During the 70s and 80s, environmental groups did use better science and won many worthwhile victories. Since then, the ‘problems’ have become less obvious and environmentalists have been misrepresenting the state of the science in many instances. In order to avoid the appearance of an ad hominem attack, I will stop speculating as to why they do this, but the motivation for such practices seems pretty limited.
The ED site in question is one example. There are many more. As a test, why don’t you suggest one or two websites of prominent environmental groups addressing global warming and I will point out examples of what I am referring too. If I can not, I will concede to your superior wisdom.
August 16th, 2006 at 11:13 am
When I mentioned ad hom’s I was primarily referring to claims that the environmental groups are alarmist.
Where in the ED webpage does ED cherry pick or
portray speculation as fact? Emphasizing weak points could be misrepresentation if someone claimed that the weak points were stronger than the true strong points. Does ED do this on this page?
I don’t necessarily think of questioning motives as ad hom’s. Environmental groups do need to raise money, but it is not used for their own benefit. They use it to run advocacy campaigns.
When I was in school ED had an ad in the career services office for a summer position in their legal department that paid 6$ an hour (that’s about the same a teenager in a fast food restaurant makes) while the large law firms were hiring summer associates for 1500$ a week. If people are looking to line their own pockets they would not work for environmental groups.
August 16th, 2006 at 9:55 pm
Jim,
On the web, Patrick Moore, a co-founder of greenpeace, cited a study promoted by the WWF.
http://www.greenspirit.com/printable.cfm?msid=29
He says:
“More seriously, in March 1996, the World Wildlife Fund held a media conference in Geneva during the first meeting of the UN Panel on Forests. They stated that there are now 50,000 species going extinct every year due to human activity, more than at any time since the dinosaurs went extinct 65 million years ago. Most significantly, WWF stated that the main cause of these extinctions is “commercial logging”. This was largely due, according to WWF director-general Claude Martin, to “massive deforestation in industrialized countries.” The statements made at the media conference were broadcast and printed around the world, giving millions of people the impression that forestry was the main cause of species extinction.
I have tried to determine the basis for this allegation, openly challenging the WWF to provide details of species extinctions caused by logging. To date it would appear that there is no scientific evidence on which to base such a claim. WWF has provided no list of species that have become extinct due to logging. In particular, the claim of “massive deforestation” in industrialized countries runs counter to information provided by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. According to the FAO, the area of forest in the industrialized world is actually growing by about 0.2% per year, due to the reforestation of land that was previously cleared for farming.”
Some other example can be found in Bjorn Lomborg books.