GM exec stands by calling global warming a "crock"

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

GM exec stands by calling global warming a "crock"

Feb 22, 2008

Reuters

Here is a story to warm the hearts of those who don't like Al Gore's crusade. From the article:

General Motors Corp Vice Chairman Bob Lutz has defended remarks he made dismissing global warming as a "total crock of shit," saying his views had no bearing on GM's commitment to build environmentally friendly vehicles.

Lutz, GM's outspoken product development chief, has been under fire from Internet bloggers since last month when he was quoted as making the remark to reporters in Texas.

Bob Lutz

From a post on the Autopia blog by Chuck Squatriglia:

Lutz made that crack during a private lunch with reporters in Virginia, according to D Magazine, and followed it up by saying, "I'm a skeptic, not a denier. Having said that, my opinion doesn't matter."

No, it doesn't, but it's always entertaining to hear it.

If the automobile industry is saying this about global warming, the jig is up. They lose money on statements like that, so they just don't make them unless they believe otherwise (I mean the part about losing money).

I normally don't like vulgar invective, but at times it is appropriate. Lutz's comment is a perfect example of how great an impact a vulgar comment can make by not being diluted through overuse.

Rock on, Mr. Bob Lutz. Rock on.

Michael

[tjohnson]

I'd laugh if he lives close to sea level and has to move inland as the sea level rises. There is no doubt that we are changing the composition of the atmosphere, the only question is what will be the effects.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

GS,

The context is man-made global warming. Using cars is supposed to destroy the entire planet by overheating it according the environmentalists. GM's vice-president has another opinion...

Michael

[Selene]

There is no doubt that we are changing the composition of the atmosphere, the only question is what will be the effects.

Therefore, you are stating that it is "scientifically" established, beyond any argument, that man is the sole cause of the change in temperature that has been "quantified" by our current methods of recording the temperature of the Earth?

Correct?

Adam

[tjohnson]

Therefore, you are stating that it is "scientifically" established, beyond any argument, that man is the sole cause of the change in temperature that has been "quantified" by our current methods of recording the temperature of the Earth?

Correct?

Adam

I don't believe in "sole" causes. As I said, there is no question that man is pumping considerable gases into the atmosphere but no one knows what will be the effects yet. Rising sea levels from melting icecaps is one effect. There is evidence of this already.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

As I said, there is no question that man is pumping considerable gases into the atmosphere but no one knows what will be the effects yet. Rising sea levels from melting icecaps is one effect. There is evidence of this already.

GS,

Look a little closer. Instead of evidence, you will see a bunch of scientists, politicians, and other partisans lined up on one side or another and they are all yelling at each other. All of them have so-called evidence, facts, reports, graphs, statistics, and so on ad nauseum. They all contradict each other.

God knows what the truth is.

From what I have seen, man's influence is minuscule—nowhere near enough enough to change the temperature of the poles, much less melt a polar icecap. But then again, that is an impression, not a fact. Trying to get hard facts about this is one of the most frustrating experiences you will ever encounter. At least that was true for me.

If you line up with one side and accept the findings of its scientists, they will love you and the other side will hate you. You will belong to that tribe whether you really agree with them or not. The same goes vice-versa. And if you do not line up on any side and demand objective analysis, they ALL will hate you. And everybody is absolutely sure that ones they vilify are hell bent on making some kind of major destruction, environmental or social. You should see how cheap talking about death is among them. Nothing short of mankind's very survival is in the balance. Yeah, right.

That's why I fully agree with Bob Lutz. It's all a crock. It's nothing but people who should know better screaming about political power and government grants. They scream global warming, but they always mean political power and government grants.

Crock. Intellectual garbage.

Hell, I may even buy a GM car because of what Lutz said.

Time to turn on the news and watch the weatherman to see about tomorrow.

Michael

[tjohnson]

When I see what mankind does to the planet I am disgusted, whether or not he is changing the climate. I think we should be changing our lifestyles simply because much of what we do is insane and so the whole climate change discussion is somewhat of a red herring to me. Insanity is our biggest problem, not burning fossil fuels. That being said, I doubt that climate change is "a crock", I suspect the reality is somewhere between the two lunatic fringe positions.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

GS,

Climate change is not a crock. That is a natural phenomenon. Man does change some of it in provable manners. For instance, cities are usually warmer than surrounding countryside because more heat is released in them. They suffer air pollution when there is a great deal of exhaust released in them (although that gets better when the exhaust is less—and I have seen this personally in São Paulo). But on a global scale? I haven't seen anything to convince me of any real danger so far. On the other hand, I haven't seen anything that convinces me that there is no man-made influence at all, either. (I suspect it is itsy-bitty teeny-weeny... )

The man-made global warming media war is a crock. Pure BS from all sides.

Michael

[tjohnson]

I see, so you feel the climate may be changing but we can't attribute it to man's activities except in a negligible fashion. I can live with that but if it were up to me I'd rather not perform an experiment of this magnitude and find out out influence was considerable after all. Especially when we could use different technologies like biodiesel and not add carbon to the carbon cycle. Not to mention it would prevent wars about oil and gas reserves.

[Aggrad02]

I see, so you feel the climate may be changing but we can't attribute it to man's activities except in a negligible fashion. I can live with that but if it were up to me I'd rather not perform an experiment of this magnitude and find out out influence was considerable after all. Especially when we could use different technologies like biodiesel and not add carbon to the carbon cycle. Not to mention it would prevent wars about oil and gas reserves.

The problems with bio-fuels is that we have to eat. If we use our food for fuel other than our bodies, then the food supply can become compromised. We need to find other ways to become less reliant on fossil fuels. My biggest concern with fossil fuels is the that the majority of the worlds supply is in the Middle East and Russia.

Hopefully we can develop more efficient solar and wind power sources, on top of that they can make combustion engines run more efficients as well, I think that Volvo has a car that gets 80 mph over in Europe.

--Dustan

[tjohnson]

My understanding is that biodiesel could be made from algae in tracts of desert land that has no agricultural value whatsoever. The entire supply of fuel for the US could be produced in a relatively small amount of land. Of course this will take alot of money but so do wars and what do they accomplish? But I agree there has to be other initiatives as well, like better public transportation and stopping urban sprawl so as to reduce commuting, encouraging teleworking, alternative energy, energy efficiency, etc.

[Aggrad02]

My understanding is that biodiesel could be made from algae in tracts of desert land that has no agricultural value whatsoever. The entire supply of fuel for the US could be produced in a relatively small amount of land. Of course this will take alot of money but so do wars and what do they accomplish?

If possible this would definitely be a good solution and the money spent would be invested wisely. (The only problem I see is that the vast majority of desert is also located in the Middle East )

But I agree there has to be other initiatives as well, like better public transportation and stopping urban sprawl so as to reduce commuting, encouraging teleworking, alternative energy, energy efficiency, etc.

I don't like the idea of stopping urban sprawl. How do you stop people from building on their own property. Public transport is also not high on my list for various socialist reasons, but I do feel that transportation is important so it is still on the list.

[tjohnson]

If possible this would definitely be a good solution and the money spent would be invested wisely. (The only problem I see is that the vast majority of desert is also located in the Middle East )

I don't like the idea of stopping urban sprawl. How do you stop people from building on their own property. Public transport is also not high on my list for various socialist reasons, but I do feel that transportation is important so it is still on the list.

Apparently there is more than enough desert in the US to produce it's own biodiesel, according to what I've read.

Zoning laws and public transportation does not = socialism? Unregulated growth is not necessarily a good thing, look at cancer. We need to look at sustainable growth models.

[Aggrad02]

Zoning laws and public transportation does not = socialism? Unregulated growth is not necessarily a good thing, look at cancer. We need to look at sustainable growth models.

Sounds pretty collectivist to me. A group of your peers decides what you can do with your own property? Or even worse, a government bureaucrat decides. How about let people decide what they want to do with their own property.

Also public transportation is socialist/collectivist. A large group of people subsidize transportation for a few. In the case of rail/subways, the government also confiscates private property to serve the few.

And who is to tell me how much I can grow through my own production so that it is sustainable? That is bull crap.

--Dustan

[Selene]

This is an interesting discussion. The "weighing" of "property rights" versus "eminent domain" issues. The recent decision by the Supreme Court in the Connecticutt case was, in my opinion, terrible constitutional law.

However, the question is well worth debating.

[tjohnson]

So Dunstan, when you are stuck on the freeway everyday for 3-4 hrs averaging 20 mph on a highway designed for 70 mph traffic because of the sheer volume of vehicles on the road what is the "anti-collectivist" solution? What good does it do to build cars with really good gas mileage when they are idling in traffic most of the time?

[Judith]

So how come nobody talks about nuclear power these days? It seems like such a glaringly obvious solution, and yet there hasn't been a new nuclear power plant put on line in ages. If we could harness nukes for cars the way we have for submarines, we could be completely energy independent.

Judith

[Aggrad02]

So Dunstan, when you are stuck on the freeway everyday for 3-4 hrs averaging 20 mph on a highway designed for 70 mph traffic because of the sheer volume of vehicles on the road what is the "anti-collectivist" solution? What good does it do to build cars with really good gas mileage when they are idling in traffic most of the time?

Are you asking what is the solution for the person that is stuck on the highway or the solution for the planners who built the highway?

If you are talking about the person stuck no the highway, the individual stuck on the highway, then he has many solutions:

He can change jobs so that he does not have to take that particular route.

He can change routes so that he does not get stuck in the traffic.

He can move closer to his job so that he does not have to drive as far.

He can move to an entirely different place that does not have traffic.

He can buy a motorcycle and save fuel plus zip in and around traffic to get through quicker.

He if decides to do none of the above, I would suggest getting XM radio or purchasing audio books and enjoy the trip.

If you are talking about planners, well I would say the traffic problem is probably theirs to blame. Zoning is one of the reasons that all of the jobs are in one place and all of the residences are in another making everyone sprawl outside the city and then have to shift around to work. Also people usually move to the suburbs because to the failure of the planners in the city. Usually when a city starts to get bigger, it becomes more socialist, raising taxes to do more public good, which is usually a disaster and drives people to move into the less taxed, less socialist suburbs. Plus if the planners did not anticipate the increase in growth and build more highways to accommodate the growth then once again the problem is theirs. Public transportation is collectivist/socialist, but I think in our economy probably necessary. I think that as far as efficiencies goes, planners should make the highways efficient as possible for transportation reasons, but not for environmental reasons.

--Dustan

BTW: If you really wanted to stop the sprawl, all you would have to do is to stop building highways and transportation. Once that 4 hrs of commuting turned into 8-10 hrs, people would stop moving outside the city.

[Matus1976]

Sounds pretty collectivist to me. A group of your peers decides what you can do with your own property? Or even worse, a government bureaucrat decides. How about let people decide what they want to do with their own property.

That government beuracracy has pretty much caused urban sprawl, just about every city in the country has zoning restrictions on how tall you can make a building, most of which are 2 - 3 stories. If you have ever been to phoenix it is more obvious here than anyway, as a result the metropolotin area of phoenix is geographically one of the largest in the US, but the population is no where near one of the highest. The building heights are limited to 4 stories. You can only grow up or out, if you make it illegal to grow up, well, out's the only way to go. Almost the entire state of New Jersey is one entire tract of urban sprawl.

Many cities and towns in New England (where I live) not only limit heights of buildings, but also demand a certain amount of area surround each house, in some town that could be a couple acres. In most it's at least a couple hundred feet or so.

It is far more effecient to grow up than it is to grow out, both from the laws of scaling and the huge amount of resources in pipes and materials needed to supply utilities to 20 houses spread over 4 square miles vers 20 units in a 10 story building.

I look at cities like that, and am disgusted by what 'we are doing' to the earth, but not because I think the environment is on the verge of the collapse, but because it's an absurdly stupid waste of resources and costs the economy a great deal, and is caused only by the idiotic policies of little social tyrants. I look at cities like Dubai, and Hong Kong, and I *LOVE* what 'we are doing' to the earth. It's marvelous.

Dubai

http://www.dubai-architecture.info/DUB-GAL1.htm

The author of that post ends with "What the hell are they doing over there?" (in regards to the absolutely tremendous growth) I think a more appropriate question is "What the hell are we doing everywhere else"

[Matus1976]

So Dunstan, when you are stuck on the freeway everyday for 3-4 hrs averaging 20 mph on a highway designed for 70 mph traffic because of the sheer volume of vehicles on the road what is the "anti-collectivist" solution? What good does it do to build cars with really good gas mileage when they are idling in traffic most of the time?

Thats easy general semanticist, build more highways. The EPA's policy now is basically to not let anyone build a new road anywhere.

From 1956 to 1975 the Federal Highway Act created 35,000 miles of it’s planned 42,000 miles of highways. In the subsequent 20 years from 1975 to 1995 only the remaining 7,000 miles were built. In the latest 10 years from 1995 to today, a mere 4,000 more miles have been paved, a 10% percent increase. According the Bureau of Transportation Statistics the number of vehicle miles traveled in 1975 was 1.4 trillion miles, in 1995 was 2.4 trillion miles while in 2005 that number was 3 trillion. Today highways represent less than one percent of the nation’s total road mileage yet carry over 20 percent of the nations traffic. We see barely 20% more highway travel lanes than in 1975, while the number of vehicle miles traveled has doubled, and the number of cars on the road continues to sky rocket.

Interstate 95, which goes from the Florida Keys to the cost of Maine, through Atlantic City, New York city, and Boston, also passes through Connecticut on it’s southern coast. Most of 95 through CT is two lanes, and the Stretch of 95 that goes from Danbury CT (near the New York border) to Old Saybrook is one of the busiest exchanges in the country. Recently a plan was unveiled to add one single lane on the north and south bound parts of 95 in CT, along 65 mile stretch. The estimates for the cost and time frame? 20 billion dollars and 20 years! Are you kidding me, we paved half the nation in that time and cost.

In 1991 work began in Hong Kong on the most ambitious civil engineering project of the 21st century. In the following 7 years, and at a cost of 20 billion dollars, a six lane one mile tunnel, two bridges, one of which was the worlds longest double decker suspension bridge, the other the worlds longest cable-stayed bridge, twenty-two miles of an elevated superhighway, much of it built over an existing fourteen lane highway which remained opened, a high speed rail along that highway, an artificial island and on top of it a new airport with the worlds largest passenger terminal in history were built. Yet it takes the US 20 years and 20 billion dollars to add one lane to 65 miles of highway!

[Matus1976]

So how come nobody talks about nuclear power these days? It seems like such a glaringly obvious solution, and yet there hasn't been a new nuclear power plant put on line in ages. If we could harness nukes for cars the way we have for submarines, we could be completely energy independent.

Judith

If 'Global Warming' really is a problem, then essentially environmentalists actually caused it by promulgating completely irrational fears about nuclear power and derailing the natural transition we were undergoing to a cleaner, safer, and cheaper form of power. Some leading environmentalists seem to be realizing the stupidity of this particular mistake, and are now champions of nuclear power, including Patrick Moore, co founder of GreenPeace (he left it when it became marxist and anti-corporate) and also James Lovelock, founder of the Gaia Hypothesis and considered 'grandfather' of modern environmentlism by many.

James Lovelock: Nuclear power is the only green solution

http://www.ecolo.org/media/articles/articl...ep-24-05-04.htm

Patrick Moore - Co-Founder of Greenpeace Envisions a Nuclear Future

http://www.wired.com/science/planetearth/n...007/11/moore_qa

Also, plans are moving forward steadily for the first new Nuclear power plant in decades to be built in Texas, it will be the largest plant in the US. Unfortunately it is not expected to go online until 2020.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dw...s.1c0d98a7.html

On an Engineering forum I frequent, I see posts for jobs in nuclear engineering about every other week. Where for? in China through a construction firm in Dubai.

[Chris Grieb]

Matus; Let's hope we don't get a bunch of showings of "The China Syndrome".

[Selene]

Chris:

As usual, you are ahead of the curve.

Jane, the traitor Fonda's movie clips have been playing on various left mediums for about two or three days. lol

[tjohnson]

Thats easy general semanticist, build more highways. The EPA's policy now is basically to not let anyone build a new road anywhere.

Surely you don't think building more highways will solve traffic congestion? Building more highways actually encourages more traffic, "if you build it they will come". We humans need to face facts - there are limits to everything. You can only handle so much traffic with the superhighway-vehicles model. We will only solve congestion with a multitude of initiatives.

[tjohnson]

If you are talking about planners, well I would say the traffic problem is probably theirs to blame. Zoning is one of the reasons that all of the jobs are in one place and all of the residences are in another making everyone sprawl outside the city and then have to shift around to work. Also people usually move to the suburbs because to the failure of the planners in the city. Usually when a city starts to get bigger, it becomes more socialist, raising taxes to do more public good, which is usually a disaster and drives people to move into the less taxed, less socialist suburbs. Plus if the planners did not anticipate the increase in growth and build more highways to accommodate the growth then once again the problem is theirs. Public transportation is collectivist/socialist, but I think in our economy probably necessary. I think that as far as efficiencies goes, planners should make the highways efficient as possible for transportation reasons, but not for environmental reasons.

--Dustan

BTW: If you really wanted to stop the sprawl, all you would have to do is to stop building highways and transportation. Once that 4 hrs of commuting turned into 8-10 hrs, people would stop moving outside the city.

I agree that the planners have failed miserably in this respect, but that does not mean planning is bad. Our model has been economic growth at any cost but this is unsustainable. It's like those pyramid scams when everything is fine until expansion of the base reaches a limit and then the whole thing comes crumbling down.