Martin Hovland writes in with this statement. It seems that AGU Position Statement keeps costing them members.
He writes:
Although I have been a long-time member of the American Geophysical Union (AGU), I hereby refuse to pay my membership fees. The main problem is the organization’s Position Statement on the purported “Human impacts on Climate” This statement includes the following statements: “During recent millennia of relatively stable climate, civilization became established and populations have grown rapidly. In the next 50 years, even the lower limit of impending climate change—an additional global mean warming of 1°C above the last decade—is far beyond the range of climate variability experienced during the past thousand years and poses global problems in planning for and adapting to it.
Warming greater than 2°C above 19th century levels is projected to be disruptive, reducing global agricultural productivity, causing widespread loss of biodiversity, and—if sustained over centuries—melting much of the Greenland ice sheet with ensuing rise in sea level of several meters. If this 2°C warming is to be avoided, then our net annual emissions of CO2 must be reduced by more than 50 percent within this century. With such projections, there are many sources of scientific uncertainty, but none are known that could make the impact of climate change inconsequential. Given the uncertainty in climate projections, there can be surprises that may cause more dramatic disruptions than anticipated from the most probable model projections.”
As an active communicator in geophysics, spanning subjects ranging from marine geology to climate science, and an expert reviewer for the IPCC Working Group 1 on the up-coming Assessment Report 5 (my comments have just been submitted to the organization), I can no longer bear to support the AGU.
Martin Hovland
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Brave man.
Is he close to retirement?
Kurt in Swtzerland
I cannot bare illiteracy…..
REPLY: Neither can I, fixed – A
The Berlin wall came down brick by brick until the foundations collapsed and the east came in from the cold
> Is he close to retirement?
Seems he’s working for Statoil. Maybe he’s safe.
the reason is the statement? which part of it?
Hovland’s working for Statoil, isn’t he? Just for my clarification.
It would be nice if he could be more precise as to why he can no longer bear to support the AGU. Is it the conservative 2 degrees celsius? Is it the 50% reduction in CO2 emissions? Is it the word “disruptive”?
Or is it because he works for the oil industry? http://www.martinhovland.com/
REPLY: Or maybe it’s people like you, trying to find an evil motive in anyone who thinks differently?
Do we know just how many have resigned & under what circumstances? Do the AGU actually care anymore, or will they still not do so until membership numbers go critical? He is though, as already said, a brave man indeed.
That is such utter and provably false bull. Global temperatures were 2C higher than now for thousands of years earlier in the Holocene. We did not experience a loss of agricultural productivity, on the contrary, that is when agriculture was invented. We did not see a melting of the Greenland ice sheet and it DID continue for centuries. Tens of centuries. We also didn’t see any widespread loss of biodiversity, either.
The problem with this sort of hype is that it is so provably wrong. We know it is wrong with 100% certainty.
this will put the cat in the pigeon nest
You know… its not actually that hard to debunk this standard ‘oil industry shill’ talking point.
Fact: There is insufficient infrastructure for ‘renewables’ yet.
Opinion: “Cleaner” fossil fuels should be what rational eco-minded people push for, for now.
Fact: Oil is cleaner than coal.
Fact: Gas is cleaner than oil.
Fact: Oil companies are fast becoming gas companies.
Fact: Energy companies stand to make billions from climate change abatement (they just pass on costs to consumers, and are the people best placed for geosequestration).
Fact: Energy companies are publicly supportive of measures to combat climate change (see the points above for economic reasons).
Garrett says:
February 9, 2012 at 1:02 am
Or is it because he works for the oil industry?
Yes, Garrett. Big Oil, as opposed to Big Government which of course only has our best interests at heart.
/sarc
Funny how Statoil were the good guys until they became the bad guys…IOW if anybod had issues with an AGU member’s links with the oil industry why would those issues only surface now?
Garrett says:
February 9, 2012 at 1:02 am
Or is it because he works for the oil industry?
=====================
David, UK says:
February 9, 2012 at 1:28 am
Yes, Garrett. Big Oil, as opposed to Big Government which of course only has our best interests at heart. /sarc
====================
or BIG GREEN which seems to be pulling many levers on behalf of its rabid socialist masters.
Seems he’s working for Statoil. Maybe he’s safe.
Probably not all that safe, unless Statoil is abandoning its carbon sequestration program, the bio-fuels deal with Brazil, its wind turbine program, the Hydrogen fuel division and so on. I ask David, UK which is Statoil considered, Big Oil or Big Government since it is effectively a branch of the Norwegian government (over 2/3rds owner)?
“REPLY: Or maybe it’s people like you, trying to find an evil motive in anyone who thinks differently?”
I am presuming the above reply is from Mr. Watts.
I realize my question was an ad hominem attack, but without specifying a specific reason for leaving the AGU, he has left himself open to such accusations. We all have our biases, and Dr. Hovland will not be an exception. The question then is how much his oil industry bias has influenced his decision, or can he prove his decision to be purely based on science? If he can write up a personal critique of the AGU Position Statement, then we will all have a better understanding of his stance.
Kind regards.
I love the idea that you can automatically ignore what people say if they have oil industry links, given that both St Gore and the head of the IPCC both have oil industry links this means we can automatically ignore them . Although to be fair that is already the case for AGW skeptics, however for AGW proponents this seems to be different which is odd given the ones making the claim in thr first place. But then so is their ability to ignore oil industry funding to the IPCC and CRU , the type of funding which is always consider ‘evil’ if none AGW people get it, strange how that works .
A brave and intelligent man – thank heavens that there are such people otherwise we would all be lost, and at the mercy for the rest of human history of the likes of Al Gore.
The statement by the AGU shows a complete ignorance of recent past climates which, true to form, have not been at all stable.
For a scientific organization to be politically correct is complete lunacy.
Garrett: Or is it because he works for the oil industry?
REPLY: Or maybe it’s people like you, trying to find an evil motive in anyone who thinks differently?
Well said, Anthony — and more kindly than I would have rejoined.
because he works for the oil industry?
Given the huge amounts of cash the oil industry shoves at heaters that’s a bit weak !.
Here’s are my reasons:
– In 2003 I discovered that the scientific literature became biased (leading journals surch as ‘Nature’ and ‘New Scientist’) started targeting us, who doubted some of the science behind climate change and IPCC. I stopped taking some of the climate-related articles and comments in these journals seriously.
– I was, however, happy to continue with the American journals, ‘EOS’ and ‘Science’. However, after AGU came with its stance (policy declaration), in 2006, I became dubious, and have been more and more dissapointed with their uncritical “Global Warming” issues.
– When it came to ‘Science’, I was disgraced to see the article by Mann et al., nov. 2009 on the Medieval Climate Anomaly (previously called the Medieval Warm Period). A comment sent to the Editor of ‘Science’ was disgarded. I was asking Mann et al., to tell the readers more about how the “Pseudo proxies” are made, and especially their other derivatives mentioned in the article.
My retirement from the AGU is an official demonstration against scientific organizations that do not treat natural science as an open entity any more. I fear that this can seiously compromise Western Scientific work for decades to come. (Thus, it has nothing to do with my work in the oil industry, which I am acutally being pensioned from in June…).
Garrett says:
February 9, 2012 at 1:02 am
“Or is it because he works for the oil industry? http://www.martinhovland.com/”
People like you really make me laugh! Same old “Oil Shrill” garbage! No matter that you are typing on a computer that used oil somewhere in its manufacture, No matter that how it is powered, What transport do you use? The list is endless.
We know there are people working in the climate field that try to be honest and many are supported with funds from oil companies. Try working in the oilfield, on a platform or barge etc and you will meet some of the most concerned people out there when it comes to protecting ecology but do not let that stand in the way of your religion!
The way you people think you are the only ones fit to be guardians of the planet makes me want to puke! Every sceptic I know wants a cleaner world for themselves and their children but not under the “Water Melon” system you lot propose with its bent “Science”!.
Rant ends!
I wonder who make more money out of the use of fossil fuels. – Is it, say the “Oil Companies” who, or which, supply – and pay for all the necessary equipment, manpower and research right from the first survey and geological dynamiting to find the oil, – or could it be the various governments around the world who only supply a few “Taxation experts” to demand and collect taxes from, not just the “Oil Companies” but also from all the people and industries connected?
Even companies making bicycles, shoes and beer-bottles cannot exist today if it was not for the burning of fossil fuels. So, come on you AGW fanatics —. Get real – why do you think it is possible for you to send your comments to WUWT if it was not for “Oil Companies” and other fossil fuel companies making it possible to generate enough electricity for all of us.
crosspatch says:
February 9, 2012 at 1:05 am
The problem with this sort of hype is that it is so provably wrong. We know it is wrong with 100% certainty.
Sadly, most pro-CAGWers still don’t want to admit that the hockey sticks are all broken. They usually point at e.g. Gavin Schmidt’s “Hey ya (mal)” post on Real Climate, where he tries to pull one hockey stick out of his hat after the other. The problem with this and other attempts at showing a “multitude of hockey sticks” is that the sticks are all either based on the same wrong data and methods (e.g. upside down Tiljander) or they start in the middle of the little ice age.
Since its becoming so hard to figure out who’s sleeping with who, I’d like to propose a new bit of jargon, please. Since the Garretts and the Obs like Big Oil (and I’m sure the “military-industrial complex”) and us deniers (/sarc) like Big Green, etc., and since we know they’re all inter-related anyway, I propose the following: Green-Industrial-Military-Energy Complex, or GIME, for short. GIME, it should be self-evident, is pronounced “gimmee”, which, for the ESLs is colloquial English for “give-me”…