The Grimsvotn volcanic eruption: a comment from Professor Ian Plimer.

A message to all those worried about Human Produced CO2 from Professor Ian Plimer of the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Adelaide. He is also a joint member of the School of Civil, Environmental and Mining Engineering.
Are you sitting down?
Okay, here’s the bombshell. The volcanic eruption of Iceland’s most active volcano, Grimsvotn, which lies under the Vatnajokull glacier in south-east Iceland and last erupted in 2004, since its first spewing of volcanic ash, has in just FOUR DAYS, NEGATED EVERY SINGLE EFFORT you have made in the past five years to control CO2 emissions on our planet, all of you.
Of course you know about this evil carbon dioxide that we are trying to suppress, that vital chemical compound that every plant requires to live and grow, and to synthesize into oxygen for us humans, and all animal life.
I know, it’s very disheartening to realize that all of the carbon emission savings you have accomplished while suffering the inconvenience and expense of: driving Prius hybrids, buying fabric grocery bags, sitting up till midnight to finish your kid’s “The Green Revolution” science project, throwing out all of your non-green cleaning supplies, using only two squares of toilet paper, putting a brick in your toilet tank reservoir, selling your SUV and speedboat, vacationing at home instead of abroad, nearly getting hit every day on your bicycle, replacing all of your cheap incandescent light bulbs with expensive CFC and LED light bulbs…well, all of those things you have done have all gone down the pan in just four days.
The volcanic ash emitted into the Earth’s atmosphere in just four days – yes – FOUR DAYS ONLY by that volcano in Iceland, has totally erased every single effort you have made to reduce the evil beast, carbon. And there are around 200 active volcanoes on the planet spewing out this crud any one time – EVERY DAY.
I don’t really want to rain on your parade too much, but I should mention that when the volcano Mt Pinatubo erupted in the Philippines in 1991, it spewed out more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere than the entire human race had emitted in its entire YEARS on earth. Yes folks, Mt Pinatubo was active for over one year, think about it.
Of course I shouldn’t spoil this touchy-feely tree-hugging moment and mention the effect of solar and cosmic activity and the well-recognized 800-year global heating and cooling cycle, which keep happening, despite our completely insignificant efforts to affect climate change.
And I do wish I had a silver lining to this volcanic ash cloud but the fact of the matter is that the bush fire season across the western USA and Australia this year alone will negate your efforts to reduce carbon in our world for the next two to three years. And it happens every year.
Just remember that your government thanks to EU pressure, just tried to impose a whopping carbon tax on you on the basis of the bogus ”human-caused” climate change scenario.
Hey, isn’t it interesting how they don’t mention ”Global Warming” any more, but just ”Climate Change” – you know why? It’s because the planet has COOLED by 0.7 degrees in the past century and these global warming bull artists got caught with their pants down.
And just keep in mind that you might yet have an Emissions Trading Scheme (that whopping new tax)
imposed on you, that will achieve absolutely nothing except make you poorer. It won’t stop any volcanoes from erupting, that’s for sure.
But hey, relax, give the world a hug and have a nice day!
PS: I wonder if Iceland is buying carbon offsets?
British Gazette comment: There is a certain sublime and ironic beauty that nature in its awful majesty has so utterly negated the pathetically small actions of humanity. It calls to mind does it not Charles Dickens’s wonderful phrase in “A Christmas Carol”, where the Spirit of Christmas Present berates Scrouge, “Oh, the insect on the leaf……”
We humans live on the Earth that orbits the Sun which with its planets as tiny additions, takes part in a great precession lasting of millions of years through the Milky Way spiral galaxy of which we are a part. The forces which have created and sustain us being on a cosmological scale in size, power and time and yet we have insignificant little insects such as our dearly beloved Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, Chris Huhne, fretting about the CO2 produced by his ministerial Jaguar.