Global mean temperature will likely rise at about 0.6 degrees F per decade and sea level at about 2.5 inches per decade

The June 23, 1988 Democratic Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources hearing opened the door on climate alarmism in the nation with testimony from scientific “experts” and Committee Senators who offered speculation and conjecture on a host of weather and climate topics while sharing their scientifically unsupported and sensationalized doomsday perspectives. The complete record of the hearing’s proceedings can be found here.

Environmental Defense Fund Senior Scientist Dr. Michael Oppenheimer claimed the following regarding increasing global sea level rise acceleration as follows:

“Global mean temperature will likely rise at about 0.6 degrees F per decade and sea level at about 2.5 inches per decade.”

“These rates are about six times recent history.”

“Furthermore, as long as greenhouse gases continue to grow in the atmosphere, there is no known natural limit to the warming short of catastrophic change.”

“Because the oceans are slow to heat, there is a lag between emissions and full manifestation of corresponding warming, a lag which some estimate at 40 years.”

“The world is now 1 degree F warmer than century ago and may become another 1 degree warmer even if conditions are curtailed today.”

“Every decade of delay and implementation of greenhouse gas abatement policies ultimately adds perhaps a degree F of warming, and no policy can be fully implemented immediately in any event.”