Climate Change’s $75 Billion Bill – Forbes.com. “Total economic losses from natural catastrophes in 2007 rose to $75 billion from $50 billion the year before as extreme weather conditions driven by climate change wreaked havoc across the world, according to Munich Re (other-otc: MURGF – news – people ), the world’s second-largest reinsurer on Thursday…. “The trend in respect of weather extremes shows that climate change is already taking effect and that more such extremes are to be expected in the future,” said Torsten Jeworrek, a member of the reinsurer’s board.”

EPA Is to Reveal Greenhouse Gas Papers – Washington Post. The EPA “signaled it is prepared to comply with a congressional request for all documents — including communications with the White House– concerning its decision to block California from imposing limits on greenhouse gases.” Should make for interesting reading.

Report Finds Deforestation Offers Very Little Money Compared To Potential Financial Benefits – ScienceDaily. “What we discovered is that returns for deforestation are generally so paltry that if farmers and other land users were rewarded for the carbon stored in their trees and forests, it is highly likely that a large amount of deforestation and carbon emissions would be prevented.”

Times Square New Year’s Eve ball goes green – MSNBC. “The star of the world-famous holiday extravaganza was revamped this year with 9,576 energy-efficient bulbs that use about the same amount of electricity as 10 toasters.” Who says enviros can’t have a ball?

After some encouragement, they apologized to Sen. Obama (D-IL):

We at the DeSmogBlog would like to acknowledge a mistake in “awarding” presidential hopeful Barack Obama a 2007 SmogMaker prize for his position on global warming.

Many others besides Climate Progress had chimed in:

Mooney, author of The Republican War on Science and the most recent Stormworld, Hurricanes, Politics and the Battle Over Global Warming, said: “There remains a huge gap between what is scientifically and climatically necessary on global warming, and what is politically feasible in the US. So no sane candidate is going to be able to completely satisfy environmental interests right now. … I think it’s a mistake to therefore attack the candidates who take the problem seriously as they try to walk this difficult line.”

Ross Gelbspan, whose defining books Boiling Point and The Heat is On were a big part of the inspiration for starting the DeSmogBlog, also spoke up for Obama’s position: “I think he’s made a giant step for a politician, given that he comes from a coal state, in backing off his unqualified support of CCS (carbon capture and storage) and other coal technologies. Initially, he was pushing coal. After the environmentalists talked to him, he strongly qualified his approach — supporting only proven CCS technology. That means the guy can listen — and can change his position according to what he learns.”

We all make mistakes, especially in new media like the blogosphere. The question is, what do you do once you realize you’ve made one? Apologize , learn from it, and move on.

DeSmogBlog remains one of the top climate blogs and a must read for those interested in clearing up the fog of the global warming delayers and deniers (before the harsh reality of global warming burns it off forever).

Honestly, if anyone tells you “For nearly a decade now, there has been no global warming” — as this Boston Globe columnist and some commenters on this blog have — they simply are not interested in seriously trying to undestand and deal with the gravest problem facing humanity. They deserve the label “global warming denier” for willfully trying to confuse the public debate.

Let’s look at the data, from NASA, presented last month:

Through the first 11 months, 2007 is the second warmest year in the period of instrumental data, behind the record warmth of 2005, in the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) analysis. The unusual warmth in 2007 is noteworthy because it occurs at a time when solar irradiance is at a minimum and the equatorial Pacific Ocean has entered the cool phase of its natural El Ni±o — La Ni±a cycle.

Figure (a) Annual surface temperature anomaly relative to 1951-1980 mean, based on surface air measurements at meteorological stations and ship and satellite measurements of sea surface temperature; the 2007 point is the 11-month anomaly. [Green error bar is estimated 2σ uncertainty....]

Yes, in some global datasets — not NASA’s however — 1998 is still the peak year because that year we had global warming PLUS the warm phase of the natural El Ni±o — La Ni±a cycle. But guess what, deniers? Climate change is about a change in the “climate.” A single year doesn’t make the climate, that’s why people use a running average — in order to show the trend. Duh!

NASA points out:

The six warmest years in the GISS record have all occurred since 1998, and the 15 warmest years in the record have all occurred since 1988.

That would be a trend, as the figure above shows.

All those who say there’s been no warming since 1998, you should be happy to take a $1000 bet against the claim that this decade will be warmer than the last one, and that the next decade will be even warmer. Heck, I’ll give you 2-to-1 odds. Anyone who won’t take such a generous bet — you really deserve even odds if you are serious about what you are saying, like the Globe writer who claims we’re actually going to start global cooling — is just trying to confuse the public debate with rhetoric they don’t even really believe themselves. And that is the very definition of a global warming denier.

By the way deniers, when one of the next five years turns out to be the hottest on record in all the datasets, which is very likely barring a major volcano — will you admit you were wrong and the planet is warming due to rising human-generated emissions of carbon dioxide as predicted by the scientific community? Somehow, I think not.

The book that gave birth to ClimateProgress, Hell and High Water: The Global Warming Solution, will be out in paperback tomorrow, Tuesday.

Yes, you may notice a new subtitle from the hardcover — I leave those things up to the marketing geniuses at Morrow.

I am too modest to repeat the jacket quotes here, but not so modest that I won’t print a picture of the jacket where you can almost read them….

Since I had one-tenth the readers when I first excerpted the book on this blog, I will repeat those excerpts over the next two weeks. When the hardcover came out, it was featured in a New York Times article: “Travel Habits Must Change to Make a Big Difference in Energy Consumption.” The article, one of the better newspaper pieces quantifying what people need to do to reduce emissions, ends:

Mr. Romm, the author of a new book about energy and climate change, Hell and High Water, said that eventually the world’s industries would have to switch to lower-carbon fuels, but before that time individuals and industries could take plenty of action. “You use efficiency to stop demand growth,” he said.

Giving energy efficiency its due as a climate solution is one of the main goals of both the book and ClimateProgress.

The book was also the subject of a long review in the Toronto Star, as well as an extended podcast interview and blog post, which says the book “offers one of the best looks at why and how the Bush administration (and conservative forces in general) is avoiding action on global warming” and concludes:

The book itself is a short and easy read, not as intimidating as some other works, and it hits all the main points on the science and politics behind global warming, and the policy and technological solutions to minimize damage to the planet, economy and humanity.

Regular readers of Climate Progress will be familiar to many of the arguments I make, but I have much more space in the book to discuss climate politics and climate solutions. And the book would make a great gift to that skeptic/doubter/denier/delayer you’re always arguing with!