I'd describe myself as an activist. Rarely successful but I keep trying. Climate change is clearly most important but on this I am a voice amongst many but I try to pass on what I discover to like minds and to decision makers (politicians & related) that I seek out.
(I hope that wasn't to self centred but it might help any response.)
I have an uncomfortable feeling now that decision makers haven't much of a clue (or any sort of a clue) as to the current state of the climate - even those honest and clear minded enough to put aside the "I don't like it so I don't believe it" effect. I also have some problem with the climate science community (OK, that's another thread) and this paper by Rosenfeld et al. causes me some angst. Partly because it suggests Hansen's Faustian bargain may be much worse. Hansen raised this issue in 1990 in
Sun and dust versus greenhouse gases: an assessment of their relative roles in global climate change, Nature 346 713–9 Later
he wrote in the Huffington PostThe principal implication of our present analysis probably relates to the Faustian bargain. Increased short-term masking of greenhouse gas warming by fossil fuel particulate and nitrogen pollution represents a 'doubling down' of the Faustian bargain, an increase in the stakes. The more we allow the Faustian debt to build, the more unmanageable the eventual consequences will be. Yet globally there are plans to build more than 1000 coal-fired power plants (Yang and Cui 2012) and plans to develop some of the dirtiest oil sources on the planet (EIA 2011). These plans should be vigorously resisted. We are already in a deep hole—it is time to stop digging.
A
report in Science Daily says of Rosenfeld et al.
For a while now, the scientific community has known that global warming is caused by human made emissions in the form of greenhouse gases and global cooling by air pollution in the form of aerosols.
However, new research published in Science by Hebrew University of Jerusalem Professor Daniel Rosenfeld shows that the degree to which aerosols cool the earth has been grossly underestimated, necessitating a recalculation of climate change models to more accurately predict the pace of global warming
Question 1: Does this mean that Hansen's Faustian bargain has just got much worse.
Question 2: Why has it taken 30 years to find this out?
Question 3: Will any of this get through to policy makers?
(Internet search of BBC and UK: nothing on Rosenfeld. Similarly WAPO & NYT)
As an activist I'm interested in what the policy implications are. I've been campaigning against
cars, planes, high buildings and beef&lamb for climate reasons - for many years now. An naturally have campaigned for renewable energy. I've been campaigning for trees and the use of wood.
However, for some time I have had in the back of my mind
Attribution of climate forcing to economic sectors by Unger et al. Figure 2 shows the progression of cooling/warming from different activities

As far as I can see, this shows on road transport (mostly cars), household biofuel, animal husbandry (beef & lamb particularly?) warm the Earth early on but industry (inc cement and steel manufacture?), biomass burning, agricultural waste burning and shipping have medium to long term cooling effects before warming starts.
Additionally, Unger has criticised policies for planting trees to slow climate change. From the
Nature BlogAccording to Unger’s latest findings, the volatile organic compounds (VOCs) emitted by trees heat our climate. It’s controversial because it’s a new idea, modeled by Unger, and there are lots of ways to run a model.
Unger has also expressed the view that aviation is much less of a problem than many think and has a significant cooling effect before it turns to warming. I haven't the reference to hand (a saved link broken) but found this
"From the point of view of the general public, there's been a level of anxiety that people feel recently about their carbon footprint when they go to airports," Unger said. "We should be feeling that way when we turn on our car ignitions."
"Attribution of climate forcing.." is now almost a decade old and the latest findings from Rosenfeld seem to have substantially increased estimates of the cooling before the warming starts. As we have short term as well as long term problems, this is worryingBut do we now have? :
1.Cars - very, very, bad from the start.
2.Beef & lamb - very bad from the start.
3.Fossil fuel power - very bad but we worry about losing the initial cooling.
4.High buildings - bad but the embodied CO2 comes from "industry" so some initial cooling.
5.Planes - not so bad but we worry about losing the initial cooling.
6. Trees - where can they be planted to avoid the aerosol warming effects?
Sadly the "I don't like it so I don't believe it" effect kicks in." and there is
a reluctance to accept that
stopping mass car ownership is a priority.