Dear Editor

Donald Trump

First of all, let me say that if I were an American, given the candidates in their last presidential election, I would have voted for Trump. However, that is a statement of the quality of candidates more than an endorsement of Trump.  Also, I thought the establishment would have been able to control him more.

What Trump is doing is of no surprise to me. He is, as has been suggested in the news reports, an “idiot.” I did not expect him to do much for his masses of supporters. He duped them. Trump is only for Trump. If anyone else benefits from what he does that is by luck, not design. And, I thought the Americans deserved a president like Trump.

Having said that, I do support his stand on global warming. For those who don’t know, Trump has pulled the US out of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. He is supporting and promoting the US coal industry.

I was just watching a show about Quttinirpaaq National Park on Ellesmere Island. It showed the ice caps that are the last remaining remnants of the ice flows that covered much of North America 50,000 years ago. It was stated that the ice flows were in danger due to global warming. There you have it folks: global warming has been going on for around 50,000 years.

A few years ago, NASA reported that there was global warming on Mars, Jupiter, etc. It appears there is very little we can do about it. That is not to say we shouldn’t try, but…

By far, the largest by volume of greenhouse gases (GHG) is water vapour. While it varies, water vapour can constitute as much as 95 per cent of the GHG. Again, there is disagreement, but carbon dioxide (CO2) can comprise up to 85 per cent of the remaining GHG. In other words, up to 85 per cent of five per cent = 4.25 per cent of the total GHG, max. The US Environmental Protection Agency has given CO2 a global warming potential (GWP) of one. Methane gas (cows’ farts and what we burn in our furnaces to heat our homes) makes up about 11 per cent of the five per cent. Methyl alcohol (MEOH) has a GWP of about 30. There are a myriad of other gases, mostly manmade, that make up the rest. There are GWPs measured in the hundreds or thousands. When you multiply the GWP by their percentage, it is easy to see that the other gases have a greater effect than CO2.  E.g. 85 X 1 = 85, 11 X 30 = 330.

So, CO2 is not the main culprit. And, as David Phillips, Senior Climatologist with Environment Canada (google his YouTube) states, CO2 has a residency measured in centuries. Therefore, there is nothing we can do about CO2 that will have any effect in our lifetime or that of our children. It is all a bunch of BS.

On top of that, I couldn’t even find any GWP for water vapour and, other than statements saying it has a huge effect on global warming, there is little information on how water vapour affects it.

So Donald, I’m with you on this one. We are being taken for a ride on this whole CO2 GHG thing and the carbon taxes that go along with it. It is just taking money from our pockets. It will have almost zero effect on global warming. It appears that, if the scientists are right about it, our coastlines will be inundated with oceans by the end of this century.

That ocean front property in Arizona?  Might just come to be.

Eugene Eklund

Whitecourt, AB