Articles Tagged "Opinion"

Global warming science is still evolving; will future IPCC reports reflect that?

On Monday an independent review found that the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has downplayed uncertainties surrounding climate science. The review also found that the IPCC needs more robust safeguards against conflicts of interest, that it had committed "unnecessary errors" by failing to meet its own standards, that it had inadequately flagged its use of nonscientific sources, that it made claims with "high confidence" based on "weak evidentiary basis," and that it gave short shrift to dissenting scientists.

And for all that, the review added that the IPCC "has been successful overall and has served society well."

This week's report, in keeping with three earlier investigations into the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit, limited its inquiry to the "processes and procedures" of the IPCC. While it found those wanting, it also saw no need to question their scientific result.

That's too bad, since the state of the science has moved on considerably since the IPCC concluded in its 2007 report that climate change was "unequivocal." A forthcoming paper in Annals of Applied Statistics details the uncertainties in trying to reconstruct historical temperatures using proxy data such as tree rings and ice cores. Statisticians Blakeley McShane and Abraham Wyner find that while proxy records may relate to temperatures, when it comes to forecasting the warming observed in the last 30 years, "the proxies do not predict temperature significantly better than random series generated independently of temperature."

The latest news is most countries in the world are backing out of the pseudo scientists' wishes for limits on greenhouse gases and global warming legislation. Most industrial countries realize it is too expensive an endeavor to partake in at a time when the world's economy is teetering on collapse, since over two hundred billion dollars would be needed from wealthy countries to help poor countries conform to proposed climate change rules. Poor countries also do not need any more restrictions on industrialization than they now have which would limit what little growth they may have.

The actual quote of money needed from industrial countries is one hundred billion dollars, but all realize that the cost is expected to double or even triple in the coming years if all were to get on board. Such fantastic amounts of money have to come mostly from the American taxpayers in the form of double gasoline prices, tax amounts equal to energy use amounts of all energy bills, higher prices for all goods and services and across the board tax State and Federal tax hikes for all Americans.

In this time of having the worst economy since the Great Depression with most people just scraping by from day to day and some not making it at all, it is insane for any rational individual to even consider anything which would lessen what economy we have.

Three modern myths have been sold to the American people: the promise of a transparent administration (President Obama); the promise of a more ethical Congress (Speaker Pelosi); and the myth of “global warming,” or climate change.

The first two are daily proving suspect and now the third is sinking with greater force than melting icebergs, if they were melting, which many believe they are not.

After spending years promoting “global warming,” the media are beginning to turn in the face of growing evidence that they have been wrong. The London Times recently reported: “Britain’s premier scientific institution is being forced to review its statements on climate change after a rebellion by members who question mankind’s contribution to rising temperatures.”

It gets worse, or better, depending on your perspective. Newsweek magazine, which more than 30 years ago promoted global cooling and a new ice age — and more recently has been drinking the global warming Kool-Aid — headlined a story, “Uncertain Science: Bickering and Defensive, Climate Researchers Have Lost the Public’s Trust.” Newsweek does its best to cling to its increasingly discredited doctrine, but the growing body of contrary evidence only adds to the public’s disbelief.

In Canada, the polar bear — which has been used by global warming promoters to put a cuddly face on the issue — is in danger of not being endangered any longer. CBC News reported that the polar bear’s designation as a “species of special concern” has been suspended “while the government reviews the polar bear’s status and decides whether to renew the classification or change it.”

Well, I survived Earth Day. But only just. Thanks to all the hot air and greenhouse gases being spewed into the atmosphere, especially from that nasty Icelandic volcano, the global temperature likely went up by at least a couple of degrees.

But here it was simply a lovely spring day, the kind that reminds us we live in one of the cleanest, most pollution-free cities on the planet (except, of course, when the potheads cloud it over during their annual toke-in).

Nevertheless, the relentless drive to make the Lower Mainland ever cleaner and greener continues to consume our province's most creative minds.

The reason? There's a lot of green in it, especially when you consider the hundreds of millions of dollars in grants and subsidies up for grabs by environmental insiders -- and the excuse it gives government to grab those dollars back and more from regular taxpayers through various eco-levies.

The latest volcano eruption in Iceland is now being used as an example by the Global Warming fanatics of how thinning ice caps can actually cause volcanoes to erupt. The latest is how thinning ice caps in Iceland are releasing pressure on the ground and creating liquid magma. Freysteinn Sigmundsson, a vulcanologist at the University of Iceland, goes on to say that melting ice caused by Global Warming can influence magmatic systems as seen from the increasing volcano activity at the end of the Ice Age 10,000 years ago apparently because as the ice caps melted, the land rose.

Carolina Pagli, a geophysicist at the University of Leeds in England warns of the risk of volcano eruptions in other ice covered areas such as Antarctica and Alaska because the decrease in pressure on the ground from decreasing ice caps can have effects in deep areas where magma is produced.

Pagli and Sigmundsson wrote a 2008 paper in the scientific journal Geophysical Research Letters about possible links between global warming and Icelandic volcanoes.

Their report said that about 10 percent of Iceland's biggest ice cap, Vatnajokull, has melted since 1890 and the land nearby was rising about 25 millimetres (0.98 inch) a year, bringing shifts in geological stresses.

Click source to read FULL report

When you listen to those who say that human-caused global-warming is a fact, you will hear statements like “The science is settled,” and “We should defer to what the scientists say.”

So, the question is, is it science, or cult science?

First, let me explain why a writer whose column is titled “Populist Economics” is musing about climate science.

The reason is The-Mother-of-All-Environmental-Laws -- climate-change legislation -- is coming.

Every time an environmental law is passed, politicians affect the choices of your life and opportunities you have to get a job, make money to support yourself and your family. Frankly, to this observer, the most of the environmental laws passed are detrimental to those ends, and ironically, do little to protect the environment or people, and, in fact, may actually harm them.

One recent example was the forced introduction of MTBE additive to gasoline by Angus King during his governorship. He eventually made the correct decision to withdraw the order, but not before wells and aquifers were poisoned. The same may be true of wind-powered electricity today. King may realize that before Maine’s mountains, coastlines and economy are gutted. But don’t count on it. He stands to make too much money. Let’s go back to the premise behind climate-change legislation and wind-powered electricity: global-warming.

Is it science?

Click source to read FULL report by J. Dwight

Green policies lack detail but some experts detect 'seismic shift' in new era of regulations, sanctions and subsidies


Cover of the Labour Manifesto 2010: a green future for all?

"After 13 years they have finally understood that they can't create a low carbon, secure energy supply in this country without some more intervention," said Matthew. "[We need] certainty for investors so they shift their money from high to low carbon energy services. They need that support to get off the ground, but eventually they'll stand on their own and end up cheaper than the fossil fuel industries."

Click source to read FULL report from Juliette Jowit. Our opinion on this is that the importance of "Man Made" Climate Change will be dropped within the next few years. No longer will it be put forward as an issue that concerns the direct action of "Man". Instead Governments will come to their senses about how to help people adapt from a less active Sun and a cooler world.

The warmer version of our world that has been put forward by the very misinformed media will also be changed after the next election, just like the new Labour manifesto.

The IPCC's climate-change fearmongering is only the latest excuse to expand the public sector.

The United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change admitted for the first time last month that it is facing a crisis of confidence. But the IPCC's failings go far beyond the recent spate of errors identified in its reports. The problem began with the global political climate that led to the formation of the IPCC two decades ago.

Contrary to popular perception, the IPCC is not a scientific organization. It does no research of its own. Composed of scientists nominated by different governments, its key function is to collate evidence of human-induced climate change, not just changes in climate.

It is hardly surprising that with such an inherently biased objective the scientists lost their objectivity. Many of them went on a crusade to support the political goal of proving anthropogenic global warming. Concerns about scientific objectivity and critical discourse were thrown overboard.

Quality science, not alarmist hyperbole, must inform debate

SERIOUS climate change debate is not the place for alarmist hyperbole and sophistry. Australians need to come to grips with the issue through quality science and rational argument, which is why a new CSIRO/Bureau of Meteorology analysis is welcome. While more than 90 per cent certain that greenhouse emissions have caused most of the global warming observed since 1950, the report's balanced approach enhances its credibility.

Temperatures in Australia, it notes, have increased by about 0.7C since the 1960s, with some areas experiencing warming of 1.5C to 2C. Sea levels are rising between 1.5cm and 3cm per decade in the south and east, and between 7cm and 9cm in the north, it says - a trend far short of the deluges predicted by some. Greenhouse gases are blamed for half the fall-off in winter rainfall in southwest Western Australia, while heavy increases in rainfall in northern and central Australia and decreases across the south and the east are also noted.

For years, The Australian has promoted intelligent discussion on climate, recently providing a platform to commentators as diverse as climate change father James Hansen and economist Bjorn Lomborg, who accepts the theory of climate change but argues that cutting carbon would be more costly than living with the problem.