As in all other climate conferences, the major environmental pressure groups are making their presence felt here. Friends of the Earth International (FoE) is pushing bans on genetically modified trees, promotion of hydroelectric projects by international bodies like the U.N., and climate change litigation against business and governments.
FoE are pursuing these efforts through various coalitions. It is pushing the GM tree ban alongside the World Rainforest Movement. Especially significant for the United States, however, is FoEs efforts on behalf of climate change litigation, which it is promoting in conjunction with fellow environmentalist giants Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF) and Greenpeace. The three groups are sponsoring an event–to occur minutes from now–featuring Ken Alex from the California State Attorney Generals office. The event announcement states that the speakers, “will explain the recent legal actions around the world against governments and companies, highlighting their scientific backing, and warning that there will be more to come unless deep cuts are made in emissions are victims are compensated.”
Tonight, WWF also co-hosts a reception on “Bringing Climate Change Home – How People Witness Climate Change,” at which “WWF will thank our Climate Witnesses from Nepal, India, Fiji, and Argentina, for their willingness to come to COP 10 and for their hard work in testifying about the impacts of climate change on their communities.” The event will feature “cultural perfomances,” which “will be supported with films and statements.”
So global warming is now a crime for which there are culprits and victims and that occurs within a short period of time with immediately observable effects?
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Preliminary data indicate 2004 likely will register as the fourth-warmest year in the worlds surface temperature record. Yet despite all the gloom-and-doom scenarios, we havent experienced an all-time record-setter since the big El Nio back in 1998. Our planet may be warming, but not at a torrid clip.
If global climate really were to respond the way climate models project it should, the warmest year on record would be announced every other year or so after natural variation in annual average temperatures was factored in. But the warmest year designation only is proclaimed every five years or so. At that frequency, earths climate appears to be warming at a rate somewhere near the low end of the range of estimates hypothesized by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The IPCC projects a temperature rise somewhere between 1.4C and 5.8C by 2100. The upper end of that range is a result of the IPCC researchers climate models routinely being fed extreme emissions scenarios that result in an extreme rise in global temperature.
Another indicator that global warming is an under-achiever is that the overall warming trend since 1976 has been 0.17C per decade. Things began to warm back then after 30-plus years of cooling a trend that prompted a mid-1970s fear we were plunging into an imminent Ice Age. There is no evidence the trend since 1976 is picking up despite claims things are getting worse at an ever-increasing rate (see Figure 1). A rudimentary calculation reveals the IPCC low-end warming rate to be 0.14C per decade with its upper-end 0.58C. Obviously, we are experiencing something akin to the lower rate.
This should be cause for celebration! If we cant stop the warming no matter how hard we try (and we cant) and we are pretty much stuck with the fossil-fueled energy infrastructure we have, then we should be thankful things only appear to be warming up at a relatively slow rate. If you dont feel especially thankful and are convinced there are alternative means to energize the needs of 6.5 billion people, thats fine. We celebrate your optimism and idealism. Happy New Year!
But heres our scenario: If the past three decades are any indication (we believe they are), then earths climate will continue its modest warming. In time, human dependence on fossil fuels will run its course and well move on to other sources of energy and the environmental challenges that inevitably will accompany their use. Global average temperature will be a bit higher than now as will agricultural productivity and average human life span. So heres to realism, pragmatism, and the fourth-warmest year on record 2004!
Last night, before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the Center for International Environmental Law announced a complaint on behalf of Arctic Inuit peoples against the United States “for causing global warming and its devastating impacts.”
And what are the devastating impacts?
“Apparently their snowmobiles are falling through the ice,” relays Christopher C. Horner, senior fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, who is attending this week’s global-warming negotiations in Buenos Aires.
“Leaving aside for the moment this action’s legal merits (there are none), a remarkable approach to oral argument on this case was tried at a Monday night event publicizing a report underpinning this complaint,” Mr. Horner tells this column.
The speaker was Dr. Robert Corell, “most famous for his steady hand guiding the conveniently timed November 2000 ‘National Assessment on Climate Change,’ a compendium of scary climate stories released by the Clinton-Gore administration,” he says.
“According to Dr. Corell, it seems that the Inuits, who he boasts have lived a subsistence lifestyle just as their ancestors have done for 9,000 years, now have that cold, hand-to-mouth bliss threatened by global warming.”
Wednesday, December 15, and Im finally at the COP–though its been much busier outside of the convention center.
Ironically the meeting is being held at the Argentine Rural Society (La Rural, for short), an agriculture promotion body. Next to the convention hall is an amphitheater that looks like it could be used for equestrian or cattle shows.
Myron and I arrived in Buenos Aires on Sunday, December 12, nearly 5 hours late after we were bumped from our flight and rerouted through Sao Paulo. Our luggage did not arrive, but, luckily, I did have one carry-on bag with some clothes.
I contacted Armando Ribas, the host of a live weekly political commentary TV show on which I was set to appear. We made it to the studio, and I appeared for about eight minutes near the end of the show. I focused on the fact that many of the biggest country supporters of Kyoto–mainly Europe–are projected to decline in population, while developing countries population is projected to expand. Greater population means greater energy demand. Thus, Kyoto, by leading to energy rationing, would be a disaster for the developing world.
I spent much of Monday trying to track down our luggage whlile Myron was at the COP. The bags finally arrived that evening, and I had to leave Bjorn Lomborgs Copenhagen Consensus event early to meet the delivery driver. I made it to the convention center once that day. When we found La Rural, which is quite huge, I asked a police officer where we could find the entrance. He directd us to look for “the arc that says Greenpeace.” Word had it that Myron was being denounced at various events by leftist environmentalists.
Tuesday I prepared all day for the evening event at Fundacion Atlas, who were kind enough to lend me office space for the day. The event, a forum featuing six speakers, was largely successful. We got a large crowd, most of whom stayed through what turned out to be a fairly long event. Myron made a concise presentation on the bad science beind Kyoto, while I concluded with the economic argument against it, once again citing population. The event was in Spanish; and I translated for Myron. After the event, a few people told me that theyd seen me on TV on Sunday night.
On Wednesday, we participated in a lunch discussion with local media, academic, and business leaders, also arranged by Fundacion Atlas, to whom we owe a great deal of thanks. We made some very valuable contacts at these events. We hope to collaborate with them in the future in our fight for freedom.
Kyoto global-warming negotiations have resumed in Buenos Aires, where yesterday it was 85 degrees and sunny (being that the start of summer is a week away in the Southern Hemisphere).
“With what appears to be everyone consigned to drying their clothes on the rooftop here, it is curious why such an energy-impoverished country would splurge an estimated $10 million to host thousands of bureaucrats pushing a treaty premised on too much energy use,” remarks conference attendee Christopher C. Horner, senior fellow at Washington’s Competitive Enterprise Institute.
Still, the last time Buenos Aires hosted such talks in 1998, the United States signed the Kyoto Protocol. While the United States never actually rescinded that signature, its team once again finds itself in a hostile “environment.”
“Right off the bat, U.S. negotiators publicly minced no words about joining Kyoto or anything resembling its ‘targets and timetables’ of energy rationing,” notes Mr. Horner.
Treaty negotiations are nothing without intrigue, and there is a buzz over two interesting developments. First, the Times of London late last week splashed word of Sen. John McCain, Arizona Republican, who vows a monomaniacal climate crusade to match his campaign-finance ‘reform’ victory, mediating a face-saving U.S. climate-treaty commitment for British Prime Minister Tony Blair.
“All parties denied this was the goal, but attendees here claim McCain’s visit is being quietly followed up this week by his more moderate colleague and presidential hopeful Senator Chuck Hagel, the Nebraska Republican,” reports Mr. Horner.”Blair remains under increasing pressure from neighbors such as French President Jacques Chirac to show that he has ‘gotten something’ for his cooperative relationship with President Bush over Iraq.
“If a U.S. ‘global warming’ commitment is indeed the pound of flesh that Blair seeks to shed his ‘poodle’ moniker, one wonders how replacing a claim of ‘blood for oil’ with ‘blood for Kyoto’ would sit any better with the voters he faces next year.”
Stay tuned.
University Park, Pa. — To date, most research associated with global climate change has focused on determining whether it really is happening, and trying to gauge how much — and how fast — average temperatures and precipitation levels will change.
But a researcher in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences, in a study funded by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency during the last five years, has taken a different tact. His work assumes global warming is occurring and accepts the tendency of models that predict Pennsylvania will grow slightly warmer and wetter in the not-so-distant future. His research focuses on the effect of global climate change on Pennsylvania’s agriculture, water resources and economy.
“My interest is primarily in the adaptation to climate change,” says James Shortle, distinguished professor of agricultural and environmental economics. “There are a lot of people who are worrying about modeling climate change, trying to determine to what extent it is happening and looking at influencing climate change through pollution control, but my research is much more about how we should be adjusting to what we expect is happening.”
Shortle doesn’t think there is much doubt left about global climate change. “The evidence only continues to accumulate,” he says. “Even the more credible skeptics are being converted. I had colleagues who said this is not happening, but I have seen those opinions change. People are having a hard time maintaining their skepticism of global climate change. The large societal risks cannot be ignored.”
But the effects for Pennsylvania won’t be all bad, according to research done by Shortle and his colleagues. “Climate change is likely to benefit our state’s agriculture,” he explains. “Higher levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere should stimulate photosynthesis and raise crop yields, while crops may also benefit from additional spring and summer rainfall and warmer temperatures.”
Experts are uncertain whether climate change will enhance the Keystone State’s position in the national and international agricultural markets. If Pennsylvania’s growing conditions improve while those in other regions deteriorate, the state’s production of crops and livestock could bring higher prices.
“There are clearly a number of factors that are going to influence agriculture in Pennsylvania,” Shortle says. “My guess is that climate change will be the least significant. We need to distinguish between what’s good for farmers and what’s just good for crop production. Markets will change, and competition will affect farm profits, so we really must look at agricultural changes across the globe to determine what changes might mean to Pennsylvania.”
Factors such as environmental regulations, new agricultural technology, nutrient and water resources management, and farmland preservation are important. “Of course, if we don’t save enough farmland in Pennsylvania, future market demands won’t matter much,” Shortle says. “And pests are a wildcard in this kind of prognostication, because it may be that the same warmer, wetter weather that will boost crops also will benefit pests, and we may be dealing with more and different invasive pests than we do now.”
If, as predicted, ocean levels rise, storm surges increase and the state sees more — and more-severe — hurricanes and other storms in coming decades, Pennsylvania’s neighbors with shoreline and coastal plains, such as New Jersey and Maryland, likely will have to deal with inundation of wetlands and drastically increased beach erosion. “But the Keystone State won’t get off unscathed, and we will have to deal with much less obvious changes in our ecosystem,” Shortle says. “That’s why we are involved in risk assessment now. Pennsylvania will have to adjust to the impacts of global climate change too, but it’s harder to say what they will be.
“Changes are not likely to be radical, but we have to look simultaneously at human systems and physical systems — they cannot be separated,” Shortle adds. “Global climate change will have an impact on Pennsylvania’s economic and social systems over time.”
International global warming activists will have CEI sound-science team Myron Ebell, Director of International Environmental Policy, and Ivan Osorio, CEI Editorial Director, to contend with at the 10th Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Dec. 13-17.
Contact Myron Ebell in
Ebell and Osorio will be available for interviews live from
http://www.globalwarming.org
http://commonsblog.org
Ebell and Osorio will participate in public and media events, including the conference :
Climate Change, Energy, and the Future of the World Economy, Tuesday, December 14, 6:45 pm – Conference: co-sponsored with Fundacin Atlas. For more information on this event, please email atlas@atlas.org.ar or call (54) 11.4343.3886.
CEI global warming experts Iain Murray and Fred Smith will also be available for U.S.-based interviews on the conference.
Visit http://www.cei.org/sections/section17.cfm to view CEI commentary and analysis on global warming.
Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) complained to the Washington Post in a published letter (Dec. 11) that too much space was given to the views of Myron Ebell of the Competitive Enterprise Institute in a Dec. 2 Post article on global warming. Lautenberg’s letter is below. My comments are in bold and indented.
Tell Sen. Lout-enberg what you think of his desite to censor those who dare disagree with global warming ortho-doxy.Juliet Eilperin’s Dec. 2 news story on climate change, “Humans May Double the Risk of Heat Waves,” is the latest example of the media’s “he said, she said” treatment of what reputable scientists say is one of the greatest threats to the human race.
Even worse, the article countered the findings of the world’s top climate scientists by quoting an oil industry-funded economist.I dont know what Frank is referring to here. The media usually takes the side of the global warming alarmists!
Such reporting is not credible, nor does it illuminate a subject of significant importance.Myron may not be a scientist, but I cant think of too many people that know as much as he does about the science, economics and politics of the global warming controversy.
The article began by citing a peer-reviewed study published in the revered scientific journal Nature, which reported that the risk has more than doubled for the type of lethal heat wave responsible for 35,000 deaths in Europe last year.Uh, Frank, in journalistic circles, giving adequate voice to opposing sides is called balance.
But the last half of the article is squandered on the views of Myron Ebell, an economist — not a climate scientist — whose “studies” at the American Enterprise Institute are funded by Exxon Mobil.Frank may not know this, but the journal Nature doesnt really have any credibility on the global warming issue any more. It decided in the 1990s that manmade global warming was real and that it would only print studies that supported its pre-determined position. In any event, the study in question isnt really science — like most other global warming fearmongering, its computer modeling that is constructed to produce pre-determined answers. Garbage-in, garbage-out, as they say.
The article fails to mention this shameless conflict of interest.Actually, Myron is at the Competitive Enterprise Institute — a completely different organization than the American Enterprise Institute. I guess to Frank, all free-market/limited government supporters look alike! Im not quite sure why Frank is throwing stones at AEI for being supported by ExxonMobil — Frank has accepted campaign contributions from Exxon and other energy companies in the past – more than $275,000 between 1989-1996.
Shooting the messenger is typical strategy of the junk science crowd. Rather than address the substance of Myrons comments, Frank chose to engage in ad hominen attack. And what about the conflict of interest among the authors of the Nature study? After all, the study authors are from the U.K.s Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research — an organization that is funded by the U.K. government, whose official policy is that manmade global warming is real. Hadley is so predisposed towards global warming that it even describes the science supposedly underlying the global warming movie The Day After Tomorrow as real enough.
The problem with this type of reporting was highlighted at a recent Senate Commerce Committee hearing. Robert Correll, senior fellow at the American Meteorological Society, warned, “The trouble with a debate of this nature is you put 2,600 [scientists] against two or three or four [scientists who disagree].”
Corrells statement is misleading in two respects. First, Correll has the numbers way wrong. Most importantly, it doesnt really matter how many scientists are on one side or the other. In science, hypotheses are supported by data, not opinion polls.
Ebell is not in the same league as the qualified climate scientists who report that the climate is changing before our eyes;
only the intensity and the speed of those changes are unknown.Frank, climate has always been changing and always will be changing — thats the nature of climate. Im tempted to say that Franks almost old enough to remember when advancing glaciers in the 14th century announced the onset of the deadly Little Ice Age in Europe!
Your newspaper does an injustice to its readers by giving Ebell’s caterwauling equal weight with the widely accepted viewsThe direction of climate change is also unknown – and for my money, Id rather that climate warm up than cool down, which is famine-inducing.
of reputable and unbiased scientists.Widely accepted by who? Frank Lautenberg? Environmental activist groups? The liberal media?]
I suppose that depends on what the meaning of reputable and unbiased is!
— Frank R. Lautenberg
Washington
The writer is a Democratic senator from New Jersey.
As determined by NOAA Satellite-mounted MSUs
Information from Global Hydrology and Climate Center, University of Alabama – Huntsville, USA
The data from which the graph is derived can be downloaded here
Global Mean Temperature Variance From Average, Lower Troposphere, November 2004: +0.151C
(Northern Hemisphere: +0.292C , Southern Hemisphere: +0.010C )
Peak recorded: +0.746C April 1998. Current change relative to peak recorded: -0.595C
GISTEMP Anomaly November 2004 +0.72C .
The data from which the graph is derived can be downloaded here
Peak recorded: +0.97C February 1998. Current change relative to peak recorded: -0.25C
Best estimate for absolute global mean for 1951-1980 is 14C (57.2F)
Estimated absolute global mean November 2004 14.72C (58.5F)
Discrepancy between GHCC MSU & GISTEMP November 2004: 0.569C
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Researchers used data from six sites within NASA’s AERONET (AErosol RObotic NETwork). Sites represented a wide variety of landscapes, including forests, cropland and grassland. This site in Walker Branch, Tenn., shows a sun photometer over a broadleaf deciduous forest. The sun photometer measures radiation and aerosol properties that impact light. Photo courtesy of NASA. |
Researchers at North Carolina State University have shown that the amount of aerosols dust particles, soot from automobile emissions and factories, and other airborne particles in the atmosphere has a significant impact on whether the surface area below either absorbs or emits more carbon dioxide (CO2).
The researchers discovered that changes in the levels of airborne aerosols resulted in changes to the terrestrial carbon cycle, or the cycle in which CO2 is absorbed by plant photosynthesis and then emitted by the soil.
Besides documenting the effects of aerosols on the carbon cycle, the research also showed that the type of landscape also influenced whether a surface area served as a carbon sink, an area that absorbs more CO2 than it emits, or as a carbon source, an area that emits more CO2 than it absorbs. In the research project, six locations across the United States encompassing forests, croplands and grasslands were studied. Increased amounts of aerosols over forests and croplands resulted in surface areas below becoming carbon sinks, but increased amounts of aerosols over grasslands resulted in surface areas becoming carbon sources.
Dr. Dev Niyogi, research assistant professor of marine, earth and atmospheric sciences at NC State and lead author of the study, hypothesizes that the differences among landscapes can be attributed to the amount of shade provided by tree and plant leaves in forests and croplands. The lack of shading in grasslands changes the ground surface temperature, which alters the rate of photosynthesis in plants and the CO2 emissions by soil. Since plants want to take in CO2 but also preserve water at the same time, Niyogi believes the lack of shade and increased temperatures may cause plants to slow the rate of photosynthesis, causing less CO2 to be absorbed and thus more CO2 to be effectively emitted. That would make the surface area a carbon source.
The research was published in Geophysical Research Letters, a journal of the American Geophysical Union. Niyogis co-authors on the research paper include NC State graduate student Hsin-I Chang; Dr. Vinod Saxena, professor of marine, earth and atmospheric sciences at NC State; Dr. Randy Wells, professor of crop science at NC State; Dr. Fitzgerald Booker, associate professor of crop science at NC State and USDA-ARS plant physiologist; Dr. Teddy Holt, adjunct professor of marine, earth and atmospheric sciences at NC State and a scientist at Naval Research Laboratory-Monterey; and colleagues from across the country.
Aerosols have been known to affect the climate by changing the radiation that reaches the earth surface. Increase in aerosols is often considered one possible reason that the earths surface has not seen as much warming as previously projected by climate models.
Previous studies have shown that many factors affect the carbon cycle, including rainfall and changes in land cover. But this study is believed to be the first multisite, observational analysis demonstrating that aerosols affect the carbon cycle. The study shows aerosols affect the earths regional climate in an even more profound manner by affecting its biological and chemical exchanges of the greenhouse gases.
The study examined six sites across the United States in the summertime; these locations were chosen because data on aerosols and carbon fluxes, or the changes in the carbon absorption and emission rates, were readily available. Sites ranged from grassland in Alaska to mixed forestland in Wisconsin to cropland in Oklahoma.
Before showing the effects of aerosols on the carbon cycle, the paper first showed the effects of diffuse radiation radiation that is not direct sunlight but radiation scattered by clouds, haze, or something else on carbon fluxes. The research showed that higher levels of diffuse radiation resulted in higher rates of carbon sink.
Although common sense would suggest that areas with plants receiving more constant direct sunlight would result in a surface becoming a carbon sink, that is not necessarily the case, Niyogi says. In fact, more radiation means plants more quickly reach a level of photosaturation. As Niyogi explains it, Plants absorb CO2 very efficiently. At very high levels of radiation, as is the case with direct radiation, additional increases do not necessarily cause increased photosynthesis. It doesnt matter how much more radiation you add, the plant is not going to absorb more CO2. But at lower levels of radiation, as is the case with diffuse radiation, any increase in radiation translates to additional photosynthesis.
The study then examined the effects of cloudiness on the carbon cycle. Cloudiness, which increased the amount of diffuse radiation, resulted in a greater amount of carbon sink in surface areas.
The study team then linked aerosols and diffuse radiation, and showed strong relationships between high amounts of aerosols and high amounts of diffuse radiation and between low amounts of aerosols and low amounts of diffuse radiation.
Finally, the study yielded its most important findings: Aerosols affect the carbon cycle in different types of landscapes, with forests and croplands serving as carbon sinks while grasslands served as carbon sources.
When you have more carbon being absorbed, it means that plants and forests there are going to grow faster, Niyogi said. And so it has the potential to alter the landscape. And when you have a change in landscape, or a change in the biogeochemical properties like the carbon cycle you have a landscape that is actively vulnerable to climate change.
Studies like these can really start putting forward the right processes in trying to quantify the carbon sink more accurately. Once we start introducing these reality-based processes into our models, well get better estimates of carbon budget, Niyogi said.
Niyogi now plans to add other variables to studying the carbon cycle, such as the effects of different types of aerosols, and factors like soil moisture. He is also planning regional and global analyses using satellite remote sensing and models to see if results square with the field studies.
The research was funded by NASA, the National Science Foundation, the Office of Naval Research, and an NC State Faculty Research and Professional Development Award.
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An abstract of the paper follows.
Direct Observations of the Effects of Aerosol Loading on Net Ecosystem CO2 Exchanges Over Different Landscapes
Authors: Dev Niyogi, Hsin-I Chang, V. K. Saxena, and Randy Wells, North Carolina State University; Teddy Holt, Naval Research Laboratory; Kiran Alapaty, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill; Fitzgerald Booker, USDA-ARS Air Quality-Plant Development Unit and NC State; Fei Chen, National Center for Atmospheric Research; Kenneth J. Davis, Penn State University; Brent Holben, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center; Toshihisa Matsui and Roger A. Pielke Sr., Colorado State University; Tilden Meyers and Kell Wilson, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration; Walter C. Oechel, San Diego State University; Yongkang Xue, University of California, Los Angeles
Published: Nov. 2004, in Geophysical Research Letters
Abstract: We present the first direct, multisite observations in support of the hypothesis that atmospheric aerosols affect the regional terrestrial carbon cycle. The daytime growing season (summer) CO2 flux observations from six sites (forest, grasslands and croplands) with collected aerosol and surface radiation measurements were analyzed for high and low diffuse radiation; effect of cloud cover; and effect of high and low aerosol optical depths (AOD). Results indicate that aerosols exert a significant impact on net CO2 exchange, and that their effect may be even more significant than that due to clouds. The response appears to be a general feature irrespective of the landscape and photosynthetic pathway. The CO2 sink increased with aerosol loading for forest and crop lands, and decreased for grassland. The cause for the difference in response between vegetation types is hypothesized to be canopy architecture.
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