NOTE: This op-ed is apparently too hot for some editors to handle. Late last week it was accepted and posted on politix.topix.com only to be abruptly removed some two hours later. After several hours of attempting to determine why it was removed, I was informed the topix.com editor had permanently taken it down because of a strong negative reaction to it and because of “conflicting views from the scientific community” over factual assertions in the piece.
Fortunately, some media outlets recognize a vigorous scientific debate persists over humanity’s influence on climate and those outlets refuse outside efforts to silence viewpoints that run counter to prevailing climate alarmism. My original piece follows below.- Craig Idso
Guest essay by Dr. Craig D. Idso
The release of a United Nations (UN) climate change report last week energized various politicians and environmental activists, who issued a new round of calls to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Some of the most fiery language in this regard came from Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA), who called upon Congress to “wake up and do everything in its power to reduce dangerous carbon pollution,” while Secretary of State John Kerry expressed similar sentiments in a State Department release, claiming that “unless we act dramatically and quickly, science tells us our climate and our way of life are literally in jeopardy.”
Really? Is Earth’s climate so fragile that both it and our way of life are in jeopardy because of rising carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions?
In a word, no! The human impact on global climate is small; and any warming that may occur as a result of anthropogenic CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions is likely to have little effect on either Earth’s climate or biosphere, according to the recently-released contrasting report Climate Change Reconsidered II: Biological Impacts, which was produced by the independent Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC).
This alternative assessment reviews literally thousands of peer-reviewed scientific journal articles that do not support and often contradict the findings of the UN report. Whether the subject is the effects of warming and rising CO2 on plants, animals, or humans, the UN report invariably highlights the studies and models that paint global warming in the darkest possible hue, ignoring or downplaying those that don’t.
To borrow a telling phrase from their report, the UN sees nothing but “death, injury, and disrupted livelihoods” everywhere it looks—as do Senator Boxer, Secretary Kerry, and others. Climate Change Reconsidered II: Biological Impacts demonstrates that life on Earth is not suffering from rising temperatures and atmospheric CO2 levels. Citing reams of real-world data, it offers solid scientific evidence that most plants actually flourish when exposed to both higher temperatures and greater CO2 concentrations. In fact, it demonstrates that the planet’s terrestrial biosphere is undergoing a great greening, which is causing deserts to shrink and forests to expand, thereby enlarging and enhancing habitat for wildlife. And much the same story can be told of global warming and atmospheric CO2 enrichment’s impacts on terrestrial animals, aquatic life, and human health.
Why are these research findings and this positive perspective missing from the UN climate reports? Although the UN claims to be unbiased and to have based its assessments on the best available science, such is obviously not the case. And it is most fortunate, therefore, that the NIPCC report provides tangible evidence that the CO2-induced global warming and ocean acidification debate remains unsettled on multiple levels; for there are literally thousands of peer-reviewed scientific journal articles that do not support a catastrophic, or even problematic, view of atmospheric CO2 enrichment.
Unfortunately, climate alarmism has become the modus operandi of the UN assessment reports. This fact is sad, indeed, because in compiling these reports, the UN either was purposely blind to views that ran counter to the materials they utilized, or its authors did not invest the amount of time, energy, and resources needed to fully investigate an issue that has profound significance for all life on Earth. And as a result, the UN has seriously exaggerated many dire conclusions, distorted relevant facts, and omitted or ignored key scientific findings. Yet in spite of these failings, various politicians, governments, and institutions continue to rally around the UN climate reports and to utilize their contentions as justification to legislate reductions in CO2 emissions, such as epitomized by the remarks of Senator Boxer and Secretary Kerry.
Citing only studies that promote climate catastrophism as a basis for such regulation, while ignoring studies that suggest just the opposite, is simply wrong. Citizens of every nation deserve much better scientific scrutiny of this issue by their governments; and they should demand greater accountability from their elected officials as they attempt to provide it.
There it is, that’s my op-ed. It’s what some people apparently do not want you to read. While the over 3,000 peer-reviewed scientific references cited in Climate Change Reconsidered II: Biological Impacts are likely more than sufficient to establish scientific fact in a court of law, they are not sufficient to engage the real climate deniers in any debate. The rise in atmospheric CO2 is not having, nor will it have, a dangerous influence on the climate and biosphere. But don’t take my word for it, download and read the report for yourself (available at www.nipccreport.org). Compare it with the UN report. You be the judge!
Dr. Craig D. Idso is the lead editor and scientist for the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC).
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Hunter:
My authority in this matter is science. When I mentioned the fact that Pentagon has accepted climate change as a reality for a long time, it was only to falsify the argument of RACookPE1978. I suspect the Pentagon make their choice in part through some institutional process that evaluates science as well.
20 April: NYT: Beth Gardiner: Setbacks Aside, Climate Change Is Finding Its Way Into the World’s Classrooms
LONDON — From Mauritius to Manitoba, climate change is slowly moving from the headlines to the classroom. Schools around the world are beginning to tackle the difficult issue of global warming, teaching students how the planet is changing and encouraging them to think about what they can do to help slow that process…
To slow dangerous warming, “we need an overall change of mind and a change of action that relates to everything that we think and do,” said Alexander Leicht, of Unesco, the agency overseeing the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development, which ends this year…
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/21/business/energy-environment/setbacks-aside-climate-change-is-finding-its-way-into-the-worlds-classrooms.html?hpw&rref=education&_r=0
is this what UNESCO has in mind?
19 April: Missoulian: Free event on effects of climate change planned at SKC campus in Pablo
Montanans from all backgrounds will gather in 13 communities across the state to show strong home-grown support for immediate solutions to the climate crisis Saturday, April 26 from noon to 3 p.m…
Montana is heating up and the evidence of climate change is all around us: beetle-killed forests; larger and hotter wildfires; smoke-filled valleys threaten our health; melting mountain glaciers; less irrigation water for farmers and ranchers; fishing closures on blue-ribbon trout streams; and, weird weather events that damage property.
Clearly the changing climate is affecting our way of life and costing taxpayers millions…
Local businesses and organizations will share information promoting green energy and climate solutions.
Lunch and music will be provided. The event is free and open to everyone.
http://missoulian.com/news/state-and-regional/free-event-on-effects-of-climate-change-planned-at-skc/article_d914220a-c81f-11e3-9f5a-0019bb2963f4.html
20 April: Monmouth University to Go Carbon Neutral in Honor of Earth Day
Written by Monmouth University
West Long Branch, NJ – Monmouth University will go carbon neutral on Earth Day and help students and area residents to do the same. On Tuesday, April 22, 2014, Hess Energy Marketing, a Direct Energy Company, is providing the University with Verified Emission Reductions (VERs) equivalent to the University’s energy consumption for that day. The carbon off-sets are the equivalent of taking seven passenger cars off the road for a full year.
On Tuesday, April 22, Monmouth University will host an Earth Day Celebration on the patio of the Rebecca Stafford Student Center from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. with Clean Water Action and several other University energy partners. The event will have music, giveaways, environmentally-themed games, and information tables. All are invited to stop by and get a free LED bulb, while supplies last…
http://www.ahherald.com/newsbrief/monmouth-news/17388-monmouth-university-to-go-carbon-neutral-in-honor-of-earth-day
An unauthorized release of documents indicate Idso received $11,600 per month in 2012 from the Heartland Institute.[11]
From Wikipedia, on Dr. Idso. Dare I say, “Yellow Journalism” or Unmitigated BULL SHIT!
I’m willing to wager he may have recieved a payment in ONE MONTH of that amount for “sponsored work”. Why is it (actually knowing the general budget of the Heartland Institute) that I have complete doubt to the accusation (indirectly, but implied here) that he’s on a 130K a year stipend from H.I.????
I really regard this sort of demonisation as actual EVIL. Akin to NAZI propaganda, or SOVIET PROPAGANDA. Of course, unless one has the reasources, as the U.S. did, to “economicaly break the back” of an “Evil Empire”, or as in the case of WWII one actually WAGES DROPPING BOMB WAR against an EVIL group, the only other thing we can hope is “for the blind to see and the deaf and dumb to be made whole…” Miracles indeed!
Slackbladder,
You seem a little confused so let me try and explain:
If you gave the same human 10g of water they would not die. That’s because water isn’t morphine. Equally, CO2 isn’t morphine. You can’t compare the two.
Additionally, please don’t start thread-bombing this blog with youtube links like you do over at Jo Nova’s place. It gets boring very quickly. (Although there are some great videos of cats falling out of trees…)
“The rise in atmospheric CO2 is not having, nor will it have, a dangerous influence on the climate and biosphere.”
Agree with much of what you said but just as many of us fault the warmists for their predictions based on plausibility we need to eat our own dog food which is to say . . . better to have left this as “CO2 is not having . . . .”
Anyway, that is what I think.
Paul Woland says:
April 20, 2014 at 4:59 pm
Hunter:
My authority in this matter is science. When I mentioned the fact that Pentagon has accepted climate change as a reality for a long time, it was only to falsify the argument of RACookPE1978. I suspect the Pentagon make their choice in part through some institutional process that evaluates science as well.
——————————-
Argument from authority needs a bit more than ‘my authority in this matter is science’. It requires (inter alia) a genuine consensus amongst qualified experts. There is no genuine consensus amongst qualified experts that co2 emissions will lead to CAGW, so the argument from authority fails.
Report: McKinsey & Co: Myths and realities of clean technologies
Don’t be fooled by high-profile setbacks. The cleantech sector is gaining steam—with less and less regulatory assistance.
April 2014| bySara Hastings-Simon, Dickon Pinner, and Martin Stuchtey
The world is on the cusp of a resource revolution. As our colleagues Stefan Heck and Matt Rogers argue, (For more on their argument, see “Are you ready for the resource revolution?,” McKinsey Quarterly, March 2014, which summarizes some of the ideas in Heck and Rogers’s new book, Resource Revolution: How to Capture the Biggest Business Opportunity in a Century, New York, NY: New Harvest, 2014.) advances in information technology, nanotechnology, materials science, and biology will radically increase the productivity of resources. The result will be a new industrial revolution that will enable strong economic growth, at a much lower environmental cost than in the past, thanks to the broad deployment of better, cleaner technologies and the development of more appropriate business models. But how do we reconcile this bold and heartening prediction with recent challenges experienced by cleantech, the general term for products and processes that improve environmental performance in the construction, transport, energy, water, and waste industries? Over the past couple of years, many cleantech equity indexes have performed poorly; in January 2014, the American news program 60 Minutes ran a highly critical segment on the subject.
***The former chief investment officer of California’s largest public pension fund complained in 2013 that its cleantech investments had not experienced the J-curve: losses followed by steep gains. It’s been “an L-curve, for ‘lose,’” he said.
So, is cleantech failing? In a word, no…
http://www.mckinsey.com/Insights/Energy_Resources_Materials/Myths_and_realities_of_clean_technologies
If “97 percent of scientists agree”, then there wouldn’t be 3,000 peer reviewed papers to draw from to create a report that contradicts the IPCC’s latest effort. And, please note, that the IPCC does not restrict itself to peer-reviewed. They are more than happy to use anecdotes to ‘prove’ their point.
Governments continue to perpetuate the myth of harmful AGW. The reason is simple: It’s not about truth. It’s not about right. And, it’s not about wrong. It’s about power and control. In other words, politics as usual.
Unfortunately, this time, politicians have the media on their side. Those who are supposed to keep us informed, are willfully uninformed and intend to keep us in the same condition.
So is Barbara Boxer. Their scientific ignorance is amazing.
face reality, McKinsey & Co:
19 April: The Economist: Coal: The fuel of the future, unfortunately
A cheap, ubiquitous and flexible fuel, with just one problem
WHAT more could one want? It is cheap and simple to extract, ship and burn. It is abundant: proven reserves amount to 109 years of current consumption, reckons BP, a British energy giant. They are mostly in politically stable places. There is a wide choice of dependable sellers, such as BHP Billiton (Anglo-Australian), Glencore (Anglo-Swiss), Peabody Energy and Arch Coal (both American)…
***Just as this wonder-fuel once powered the industrial revolution, it now offers the best chance for poor countries wanting to get rich.
Such arguments are the basis of a new PR campaign launched by Peabody, the world’s largest private coal company (which unlike some rivals is profitable, thanks to its low-cost Australian mines). And coal would indeed be a boon, were it not for one small problem: it is devastatingly dirty…
But poverty kills people too, and slow growth can cost politicians their jobs…
America’s gas boom has prompted its coal miners to seek new export markets, sending prices plunging on world markets…
In Germany power from coal now costs half the price of watts from a gas-fired power station. It is a paradox that coal is booming in a country that in other respects is the greenest in Europe. Its production of power from cheap, dirty brown coal (lignite) is now at 162 billion kilowatt hours, the highest since the days of the decrepit East Germany.
Japan, too, is turning to coal in the wake of the Fukushima nuclear disaster. On April 11th the government approved a new energy plan entrenching its role as a long-term electricity source…
A $5.2 billion taxpayer-supported clean-coal plant in Mississippi incorporates all the latest technology. But at $6,800 per kilowatt, it will be the costliest power plant yet built (a gas-fired power station in America costs $1,000 per kW). At those prices, coal is going to stay dirty.
http://www.economist.com/news/business/21600987-cheap-ubiquitous-and-flexible-fuel-just-one-problem-fuel-future
Konrad says:
April 20, 2014 at 4:33 pm
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Repeated explanations as to what is wrong with your experiment you are, it seems, oblivious to. Repeated reference to ERBE and CERES data that shows exactly the opposite of what it would show if your experiment were correct similarly make no impression on your made-up-damn-the-facts maind.
The difference between you and an alarmist zealot clinging to a belief system in the face of massive amounts of contrary data is precisely zero.
This is why I voted “no” in Anthony’s poll re forming an official group of some sort. Our ranks are as much beset by drivel as those of the alarmists. It cannot be routed out of the internet (the stupidity of the sl@yers is testament to that), or even in this blog (without destroying the essence of debate that makes this blog work). But an organized group, to be effective, must speak with one voice.
TRBixler says:
April 20, 2014 at 8:21 am
Obama has declared war on the truth. Huge sums are spent to promote the scam of AGW.
Disagree,TRBixler. Billions are being spent to advance two things…..higher taxes for political leeches to live off of and advancing UN Agenda 21. It really is simple.
Funny. When I hit the link to the report I get the contents page but when I try to download a pdf of the sub sections Chrome gives me a “this is a dodgy website” and won’t let me do it. This is on my iPad. Works fine on my Win 7 PC running Firefox.
Anyone else seen this?
Discourse Commissars and Gauleiters such as Babs Boxer, Big Al Gore and “Pompadour John”
Kerry are deviants, not “deniers”.
Anyone scrutinizing a chart where Point A = +1, Point B = 0, and Point C = -1, only to assert that trend-line ABC is positive, is worthy of Rene Blondlot, Immanuel Velikovsky, Trofim Lysenko, and other chuckle-headed sham-wows grunting preschool doo-wop to foreclose rational debate.
Tattoo a crimson “D” on each of these dolt’s sloping foreheads, with “300 PPM” tastefully strung down their noses, and see how far their Luddite sociopath bleats-and-squeaks carry before common-sense and fundamental humane decency take hold.
My authority in this matter is science. When I mentioned the fact that Pentagon has accepted climate change as a reality for a long time, it was only to falsify the argument of RACookPE1978. I suspect the Pentagon make their choice in part through some institutional process that evaluates science as well.
————————————————————————————
Paul, you linked to an article in The Observer and you declared that your authority is science.
Apparently, this prestigious scientific journal, sister publication to The Guardian, The Observer Sport Monthly and The Observer Woman, became aware over a decade ago of a “SECRET” report, suppressed by the “defence chiefs” (sic) but endorsed by the Pentagon.
This analysis insisted that, by the year 2020 (six years hence), major European cities will be sunk by rising seas and Britain will be plunged into a Siberian climate.
This is the same science that John Kerry invokes when he proclaims that the atmosphere’s CO2 exists as a layer a quarter inch thick at the top of the atmosphere.
The same science coming from Al Gore with the temperature of the Earth’s crust at several million degrees.
The same science that has David Suzuki declaring that the carbon in your wind-shield is what makes your car hot.
I’ll give you this; I did recently spend a week-end trying to make a small part of the Earth flat, so, you got that part right.
Perhaps it’s time Anthony treated Mosher like the drive-by troll he has become. Like all the others, he just drops his cr** and leaves. Or maybe he’s just become yet another deranged eschatologist, longing for the end of the world, even when it’s not happening – except in his and his deranged colleagues’ heads. Sorry to rant but I am so, so tired of his and their contempt for anyone who doesn’t agree with their loopy UNPROVEN world-view. Clown? You sure are Mosher.
blackadderthe4th says:
April 20, 2014 at 1:15 pm
I guess you must be playing the part of Baldrick – the useful idiot.
“This fact is sad, indeed, because in compiling these reports, the UN either was purposely blind to views that ran counter to the materials they utilized, or its authors did not invest the amount of time, energy, and resources needed to fully investigate an issue that has profound significance for all life on Earth. And as a result, the UN has seriously exaggerated many dire conclusions, distorted relevant facts, and omitted or ignored key scientific findings”
The reason that they ignore contrary data is because they believe its just noise, perhaps even sometimes correct ‘noise’, but nevertheless noise that obscures an ultimate Malthusian inevitability.
Because they have nailed the colours to the Malthusian mast, that economic growth and human progress will inevitably result in a Malthusian catastrophe (population and growth will outstrip resources), contrary data is just seen as delaying the inevitable, or just being used to prop up a doomed system. Climate change is being used as a tool to prop up their Malthusian-based ideology. It doesn’t even matter to them if the science of climate change is ultimately incorrect, the Malthusian inevitability remains the priority, and justifies the distortion of science to achieve that aim.
The problem with their position of course, it that there may well not be any Malthusian inevitability at all, than humanity might well adapt and continue to prosper. They also seriously underestimate the human capacity to prepare, mitigate, or use alternate resources and innovate, as well as the seriously under estimating the earth’s carrying capacity itself.
Many people do not accept the fundamental basis of Malthusian ideology, in biology for example many species do not all behave like mosquitos which reproduce on mass leading to inevitable mass mortality, many species in fact adjust their reproduction according to resource availability and survive ad infinitum. As long as this fundamental assumption remains unaddressed, the IPCC will not listen to all the data and arguments.
James Ard says:
April 20, 2014 at 1:24 pm
Did Mosher just imply that the onus is on us to prove their doomsday scenario is wrong? I thought he was smarter than that.
That’s the warmistas last attempt to be right without proof: change the null-hypothesis to CAGW=true and let others try to disprove it. In 30 years they haven’t been able to prove their point. So much for settled science. There is no evidence at all for CAGW, only a pathetic believe in the destruction of the earth and rejection of the Western way of life as we know it. The inmates are running the asylum.
Mosher is a nice guy in person, but he has a strange view of reality:
“I wonder how the clowns who wrote the NIPCC scientifically determined that there will be little effect in the future? how’d they do that? I read the NIPCC. I saw no experiments that proved there would be little effect.”
Such an experiment would be tantamount to proving a negative. Alarmists often use this tactic: “Prove that ___________ can’t happen!”
Dr. Idso is absolutely correct: CO2 is harmless. No global harm from the rise in CO2 has ever been identified. And, it is beneficial: the planet is rapidly greening in direct response to the rise in CO2.
No wonder the alarmist crowd is losing the battle, and the debate. Every prediction they have ever made is a scary one, and every prediction they have ever made is wrong.
Steven, instead of name-calling, post some scary predictions for us that have actually happened. As a member of the climate alarmist clique, surely you must know of some.
davidmhoffer says:
April 20, 2014 at 5:29 pm
——————————–
David,
I also voted “no” in that survey. A single sceptic organisation would be far more susceptible to Alinsky group control tactics. It is important to have a diversity of views. For sceptics, diversity is strength.
AGW believers would love to see sceptics in one group holding the lukewarmer line. After all many are now desperate for an exit strategy and “warming, but less than we thought” is just what they want. The lukewarmer position that the atmosphere is warming the oceans is what AGW believers need to engineer their “soft landing”.
But there can be no soft landing. The atmosphere is provably cooling the oceans and radiative gases are cooling the atmosphere.
I’ve seen many of the millions of climate refugees myself. They came to Florida for the Winter to escape the cold, as they have done for a hundred years.
Moshpit, you really should stick to low level journalism. ! The one thing you might be good at.
And ‘hangin’ with the crew from BEST isn’t helping your scientific credibility.
“blackadderthe4th says:
April 20, 2014 at 1:15 pm”
Linking to a a broadcast which includes Dr. Karl is like linking to Cook at SkS and their “97% concensus” report. A big fail! Dr. Karl has been on ABC TV too and made some statements about basic science that were easily proved to be completely wrong. But this is the standard we here in Australia have become to expect from the ABC.
Johan says:
April 20, 2014 at 12:08 pm
Mr Mosher is right of course: the fact that there is no discernible evidence that increased CO2 levels have led to catastrophic events so far does not in itself prove that increasing CO2 levels may not lead to such catastrophes in the future.
=================================================================
Hum?, well lets see, the alarmist make dozens of failed predictions about increased CO2, both in the scientific literature, and in the media, they ALL FAIL BADLY. The climate models based on increased CO2 ALL run to warm. They all fail the observations. The predicted disasters ALL fail to materialize. There are good documented peer reviewed studies that show where these failure occur. The benefits of increased CO2 are hard to overstate. They are demonstrated in hundreds of experiments, both in the lab, and in the FIELD. All of the observations support the NIPC studies.
So does this PROVE future CO2 increases will not lead to the failed predictions. Well no, science does not PROVE anything, being always open to other possibilities. But the conclusion Mosher rejects is highly logical and scientific. NOTHING in the pro CAGW so called “science” ever stated that CO2 would have no affect for the first 120 PPM increase, and then suddenly have disaster everywhere.