Politics

Climate experts respond to Arctic Climate Impact Assessment

by William Yeatman on November 15, 2004

in Politics, Science

Today 11 climate experts sent a letter (please see below) to Senator John McCain (R-AZ) who is the Chairman of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation committee and is holding a full committee hearing this morning to hear testimony on the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment (ACIA).

In the letter, the climate experts respond to statements made in the ACIA that temperature changes in the Arctic provide an early indication of global warming. The signers of the letter point out that sediment and ice core samples show that the arctic has experienced past warming that can not be attributed to greenhouse gas concentrations. There is also a history of strong year-to-year variability of Arctic temperatures. The letter also calls for the need for advances in Arctic climate science in both models and measurements in order to assess a more complete picture of Arctic climate understanding.

The following climate experts signed the letter: R. Tim Patterson, PhD, Professor of Geology at Carleton University; Tim Ball, PhD, Retired – Professor of Climatology at University of Winnipeg; Anthony Lupo, PhD, Professor of Atmospheric Science at University of Missouri – Columbia; David Legates, PhD, Associate Professor in Climatology at University of Delaware; Pat Michaels, PhD, Professor of Environmental Sciences, University of Virginia; George Taylor, M.S. Meteorology; Gary D. Sharp, PhD Scientific Director, Center for Climate/Ocean Resources Study; Roy W. Spencer, PhD Principal Research Scientists, The University of Alabama in Huntsville; Jon Reisman, Associate Professor of Economics and Public Policy; University of Maine at Machias/ Maine Public Policy Institute Scholar, Willie Soon, PhD, Science Director, Tech Central Station and Sallie Baliunas, PhD, Enviro- Science Editor, Tech Central Station. 

    November 16, 2004
    The Honorable John McCain
    United States Senate
    Washington, DC 20510

Dear Senator McCain:

As you know, climate varies in the Arctic more than globally-averaged measures reveal, prompting not inconsiderable ecosystem responses.

The Arctic Climate Impact Assessment report by the Arctic Council documents significant ecosystem response to surface temperature warming trends that occurred in some areas since the mid-19th century and in the last thirty years.

Estimates of the amount of surface warming trends over those periods and their causes relies on scientific knowledge of natural and anthropogenic effects, the latter including landscape modification, urbanization, plus the air’s concentration of aerosols and greenhouse gases. Moreover, Arctic climate varies dramatically from one region to another, and over time in ways that cannot be accurately reproduced by climate models. The quantitative impacts of natural and anthropogenic factors remain highly uncertain, especially for a region as complex as the Arctic.

For example, for Greenland’s instrumental surface temperatures a team of experts headed at Los Alamos National Laboratory recently found: 

     Since 1940, however, the Greenland coastal stations data have undergone
     predominantly a cooling trend. At the summit of the Greenland ice sheet,
     the summer average temperature has decreased at the rate of 2.2 degrees C
     per decade since the beginning of the measurements in 1987. This suggests
     that the Greenland ice sheet and coastal regions are not following the
     current global warming trend.(1)

Analysis of ice corings of the Penny Ice Cap on Baffin Island show that the recent warming trend is unexceptional compared to natural variability in centuries past, when the enhanced greenhouse effect cannot have had much impact: 

     Our sea-salt record suggests that, while the turn of the [21st] century

     was characterized by generally milder sea-ice conditions in Baffin Bay,
     the last few decades of sea-ice extent lie within Little Ice Age
     variability and correspond to instrumental records of lower temperatures
     in the Eastern Canadian Arctic over the past three decades.(2)

From a detailed study of sea core sediment from the last 10,000 years in the Chukchi Sea, researchers concluded that, “in the recent past, the western Arctic Ocean was much warmer than it is today.” They also found that “during the middle Holocene [approximately 6,000 years ago] the August sea surface temperature fluctuated by 5 degrees C and was 3-7 degrees C warmer than it is today,”(3)

The relatively recent discovery of the PDO, or Pacific Decadal Oscillation,(4) points to a strong natural component of the recent warming trend. Researchers noted in 1997: 

     Our results add support to those of previous studies suggesting that the
     climatic regime shift of the late 1970’s is not unique in the century-
     long instrumental climate record, nor in the record of North Pacific
     salmon production. In fact, we find that signatures of a recurring
     pattern of interdecadal climate variability are widespread and detectable
     in a variety of Pacific basin climate and ecological systems. This
     climate pattern — hereafter referred to as the Pacific (inter)Decadal
     Oscillation, or PDO (following co-author S.R.H.’s suggestion) — is a
     pan-Pacific phenomenon that also includes interdecadal climate
     variability in the tropical Pacific.

The Great Pacific Climate Shift of 1976-1977 is typical in the documented pattern of natural climate fluctuations going back at least several centuries. In Alaska in particular, although the onset of the 1976-1977 shift ended the several-decades-long period of cold in the middle of the 20th century recorded by many of Alaska’s good weather station records, it returned temperatures to warmth seen in the early decades of the 20th century. Thus, it is unsurprising that Alaskan ecosystems have responded to recent warmth, which has the characteristic step-upward shape of the PDO, but not the gradual but large warming trend implied by the enhanced greenhouse effect.

The PDO may have shifted back in 1998-99 to its mid-20th century state, which would tend to deliver sharply cooler temperatures in the next several decades to the western U.S., including western and southern Alaska. For example, scientists from British Columbia’s Institute of Ocean Sciences, Fisheries and Oceans and Oregon State University’s College of Oceanic and Atmospheric Sciences found recent cooling of the North Pacific: 

     Subsurface upper ocean waters off Oregon and Vancouver Island were about
     1 degree C cooler in July 2002 than in July 2001. The anomalously cool
     layer coincides with the permanent halocline which has salinities 32.2 to
     33.8, suggesting an invasion of nutrient-rich Subarctic waters. The
     anomalously cool layer lies at 30-150 m.(5)

Surface air temperatures (SAT) going back 125 years were studied from “newly available long-term Russian observations of SAT from coastal stations, and sea-ice extent and fast-ice thickness from the Kara, Laptev, East Siberian, and Chuckchi seas.”(6) Those researchers found “strong intrinsic variability, dominated by multi-decadal fluctuations with a timescale of 60-80 years.” Comparing those measures of Arctic regional variability to that of computer simulations, the researchers concluded that observations do “not support amplified warming in Polar Regions predicted by GCMs [General Circulation Models].”

A comprehensive study of Arctic temperature records(7) found that “in the Arctic in the period 1951-90, no tangible manifestations of the greenhouse effect can be identified.” However, strong year-to-year variability is present, as the researcher notes that “a more recent analysis of mean seasonal and annual air-temperature trends in the Arctic (Przybylak, in press) shows that in the mid-1990s there occurred quite a large rise in air temperature,” and as a consequence, “the areally averaged annual air temperature for the whole Arctic for the last 5 year period of the 20th century was the warmest since 1950 (1.0 degree C above the 1951-90 average).”

Those examples demonstrate that Arctic climate has and will continue to exhibit intricate patterns not reliably reproduced by global climate simulations, thus underscoring their scientific incompleteness and need for advances in Arctic climate science, in measurements, theory and models.

The history of the Arctic and its ecosystems remains complex, a fact too often perceived by reporters under deadline or extremists as irrelevant nuance. Ecosystems and humans survived the warming at the beginning of the 20th century, as they survived the warmth from A.D. 900 to 1200, when Thule people migrated from Alaska across the Arctic while Vikings farmed in Greenland soil now permafrost and sailed in Arctic waters now permanent pack ice. They survived the warming of the last 15,000 years as earth emerged from the last glacial period, whose termination produced much more radical temperature shocks than those observed in the last several decades.

As Professor Richard Lindzen, Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and IPCC author concluded in testimony before your May 1, 2001 Commerce Committee hearing: 

     The question of where do we go from here is an obvious and important one.
     From my provincial perspective, an important priority should be given to
     figuring out how to support and encourage science (and basic science
     underlying climate in particular) while removing incentives to promote
     alarmism. The benefits of leaving future generations a better
     understanding of nature would far outweigh the benefits (if any) of ill
     thought out attempts to regulate nature in the absence of such
     understanding.
We appreciate your efforts to support scientific fact-finding concerning responses of Arctic ecosystems to climate variability. 
    Sincerely,
    R. Tim Patterson, PhD
    Professor of Geology
    Carleton University
    Tim Ball, PhD
    Retired – Professor of Climatology
    University of Winnipeg
    Anthony Lupo, PhD
    Professor of Atmospheric Science
    University of Missouri – Columbia
    David Legates, PhD
    Associate Professor in Climatology
    University of Delaware
    Pat Michaels, PhD
    Professor of Environmental Sciences
    University of Virginia
    Virginia State Climatologist
    George Taylor, M.S. Meteorology
    Oregon State Climatologist
    Gary D. Sharp, PhD
    Scientific Director
    Center for Climate/Ocean Resources Study
    Roy W. Spencer, PhD
    Principal Research Scientists
    The University of Alabama in Huntsville
    Jon Reisman
    Associate Professor of Economics and Public Policy
    University of Maine at Machias/ Maine Public Policy Institute Scholar
    Willie Soon, PhD
    Science Director, Tech Central Station
    Sallie Baliunas, PhD
    Enviro-Science Editor Tech Central Station
    (1) P. Chylek, J.E. Box and G. Lesins 2004 Global warming and the
        Greenland ice sheet, Climatic Change 63 201-221
    (2) N. S. Grumet, C.P. Wake, P.A. Mayewski, G.A. Zielinski, S.I. Whitlow,
        R.M. Koerner, D.A. Fisher, and J.M. Woollett, 2001, Variability of
        sea-ice extent in Baffin Bay over the last millennium, Climatic
        Change,49, 129-145
    (3) D. Darby, J. Bischof, G. Cutter, A. de Vernal, C. Hillaire-Marcel, G.
        Dwyer, J. McManus, L. Osterman, L. Polyak and R. Poore  2001, New
        record shows pronounced changes in Arctic Ocean circulation and
        climate.  EOS, Transactions, American Geophysical Union 82, 601 and
        607
    (4) N. J. Mantua, S. R. Hare, Y. Zhang, J. M. Wallace and R. C. Francis
        1997, A Pacific interdecadal climate oscillation with impacts on
        salmon production  Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 78,
        1069-1079
    (5) H. J. Freelnad, G. Gatien, A. Huyer,  and R. L. Smith 2003, Cold
        halocline in the northern California Current: An invasion of subarctic
        water. Geophysical Research Letters 30: 10.1029/2002GL016663.
    (6) I. V. Polyakov, G.V. Alekseev, R.V. Bekryaev,U.  Bhatt, R.L. Colony,
        M. A. Johnson, V.P. Karklin, A.P. Makshtas, D. Walsh, A. V. Yulin
        2002, Observationally based assessment of polar amplification of
        global warming.  Geophysical Research Letters 29:
        10.1029/2001GL011111.
    (7) R. Przybylak  2002,  Changes in seasonal and annual high-frequency air
        temperature variability in the Arctic from 1951-1990,  International
        Journal of Climatology 22, 1017-1032

Probably anti-housewarming, too

by William Yeatman on November 13, 2004

in Politics

It’s not often that a Washington lobbyist gets to be the focus of a censure motion in the British House of Commons, but anti-global warming lobbyist Myron Ebell managed that trick earlier this month.

Seems Ebell, interviewed Nov. 3 on BBC Radio, said: “We have people who know nothing about climate science, like Sir David King, your chief scientific adviser, who are alarmist and continually promote this ridiculous claim. Sir David has no expertise in climate science.”


One newspaper reported the shot and described Ebell, who works for the Competitive Enterprise Institute, as “one of President George Bush‘s top climate change advisers.”


Next thing you know there’s a censure move in the House of Commons, saying it “deplores in the strongest possible terms the unfounded and insulting criticism of Sir David King, the Government’s Chief Scientist, by Myron Ebell, an adviser to U.S. President George W. Bush, on climate change; notes that Mr. Ebell is Director of Global Warming and International Environmental Policy at the Competitive Enterprise Institute in Washington, an organization funded by, amongst others, ExxonMobil and the American Petroleum Institute; fervently hopes that Mr. Ebell’s comments do not represent official U.S. policy.”


Well, not precisely.

Air Board’s greenhouse rule: Raw deal for dealers

by William Yeatman on November 11, 2004

in Politics, Science

On September 24, Californias Air Resources Board (CARB) adopted a plan to regulate greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from new cars and trucks starting in 2009. To sell cars in California, automakers will have to reduce fleet average GHG emissions by 22 percent in 2012 and 30 percent in 2016. CARBs rulemaking is a raw deal for auto dealers in California and any other state that mimics Californias plan.


 


Unscientific. To justify its rule, CARB cites the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Changes (IPCC) scary forecast of a 2.5F to 10.4F warming over the next 100 years. However, the IPCC forecast is junk science. The IPCCs warming estimates presuppose ridiculous economic growth rates in developing countries (i.e., most of the world). For example, even the IPCCs low-end (2.5F) forecast assumes that underachievers like North Korea, Libya, and Argentina grow so rapidly their per capita incomes will surpass U.S. per capita income in 2100! CARBs rule has no credible scientific rationale.


 


Unlawful. California Assembly Bill 1493, the enabling legislation, directs CARB to achieve maximum feasible emission reductions. However, CARB cannot do so without forcing automakers to increase the average fuel economy of their fleets. Unsurprisingly, CARBs list of recommended GHG-reducing technologies closely matches the National Research Councils inventory of fuel economy-enhancing technologies. Yet the federal Energy Conservation and Policy Act prohibits states from enacting laws or regulations related to fuel economya prohibition necessary to ensure economies of scale and a competitive U.S. auto industry. CARB will surely be challenged in court.


 


Unaffordable. AB 1493 also stipulates that CARBs plan must be cost effective. CARB claims that fuel savings from the technologies automakers deploy to reduce emissions will substantially exceed the increase in vehicle sticker price. Of course, this is a tacit confession that the rule is a de facto fuel economy program.


 


Sierra Research, Inc., in a report written for the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, finds multiple problems in CARBs cost-effectiveness calculation. CARB inflated vehicle costs in the 2009 baseline (no regulation) case by assuming general adoption of expensive technologies such as 5- and 6-speed automatic transmissions. CARB knocked down by 30 percent its own contract researchers cost estimates based on nothing more specific than staffs experience and the potential for unforeseen innovations. CARB assumed that consumers benefit from fuel savings years after most cars are sold or scrapped.


 


Whereas CARB projects a net lifetime consumer saving of $1,703, Sierra estimates a net loss of $3,357. The rule will reduce vehicle sales and put the brakes on the chief source of air quality improvementreplacement of older vehicles with newer, cleaner models. CARBs rule is bad for the environment!


 


Raw Deal. If implemented, CARBs plan will hammer California auto dealers. The rule applies to automakers, not auto owners or operators. Unless CARB is prepared to build a wall around California, it cannot stop people from importing less regulated, more affordable cars from out of state.


 


Dealers elsewhere would be unwise to celebrate, however, because California is a trend setter. Any state that adopts Californias rule (seven Northeast states may do so) will similarly hobble its auto dealerships.    


 


Marlo Lewis


Senior Fellow, Environmental Policy


Competitive Enterprise Institute, Washington, D.C

Polar bear scare on thin ice

by William Yeatman on November 11, 2004

in Politics, Science

Global warming could cause polar bears to go extinct by the end of the century by eroding the sea ice that sustains them, is the dire warning contained in a new report from an international group of “researchers” called the Arctic Climate Impact Assessment.


Im not quite sure what the future holds for polar bears, but it doesnt appear that any alleged manmade global warming has anything to do with it.


The report, entitled Impacts of a Warming Arctic, pretty much debunks itself on page 23 in the graph labeled, Observed Arctic Temperature, 1900 to Present.


The graph shows that Arctic temperatures fluctuate naturally in regular cycles that are roughly 40 years long. The Arctic seems currently to be undergoing a warming phase similar to one experienced between 1920-1950 which will likely be followed by a cooling phase similar to the one experienced between 1950-1990.


The reports claim that increased manmade emissions of greenhouse gasesare causing Arctic temperatures to rise is debunked by the same graph, which indicates that the near surface Arctic air temperature was higher around 1940 than now, despite all the greenhouse gas emissions since that time.


Also self-debunking is the reports statement, Since the start of the industrial revolution, the atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration has increased by about 35 percent and the global average temperature has risen by about 0.6 degrees Centigrade.


So despite all the greenhouse gases emitted by human activity over a period of 200 years were supposed to worry, and even panic, about a measly 0.6 degree Centrigrade rise in average global temperature during that time?


Even if such a slight temperature change could credibly be estimated, it would seem to be well within the natural variation in average global temperature, which in the case of the Arctic, for example, is a range of about 3 degrees Centigrade. Remember, global climate isnt static its always either cooling or warming.


Even though manmade greenhouse gas emissions and warmer temperatures dont seem to be a problem in the Arctic according to their own data, the researchers nevertheless blamed them for causing supposed 15 percent declines in both the average weight of adult polar bears and number of cubs born between 1981 and 1998 in the Hudson Bay region.


The 1999 study in the science journal Arctic that first reported apparent problems among the Hudson Bay polar bear population suggested that their condition may be related to the earlier seasonal break-up of sea ice on western Hudson Bay a phenomenon that seems to correlate with the 1950-1990 Arctic warm-up. But, as mention previously, the 1950-1990 Arctic warming period seems to be part of a natural cycle and not due to manmade emissions of greenhouse gases.


Moreover, the notion of a declining polar bear population doesnt square well available information.


A Canadian Press Newswire story earlier this year reported that, in three Arctic villages, polar bears are so abundant theres a public safety issue. The local polar bear population reportedly increased from about 2,100 in 1997 to as many as 2,600 in 2004. Inuit hunters and international agreements since 1972.


The Arctic Climate Impact Assessment report has spurred a new round of calls for a clamp-down on carbon dioxide emissions. Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., told the Associated Press that the dire consequences of warming in the Arctic underscore the need for their proposal to require U.S. cuts in emissions of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping greenhouse gases.


Fortunately their call will likely get a chilly response from President Bush, who reiterated through a spokesman last weekend that he continues to oppose the international global warming treaty known as the Kyoto Protocol.


Steven Milloy is the publisher of JunkScience.com, an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute and the author of “Junk Science Judo: Self-Defense Against Health Scares and Scams” (Cato Institute, 2001).

The Kyoto climate debate: Overview of the state of play

by William Yeatman on November 9, 2004

in Kyoto Negotiations, Politics

[Full study available as a pdf.]


 


 


Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) likens his push for another vote on the Climate Stewardship Act (S. 139), which the Senate rejected 55 to 43 in October of last year, to his seven-year crusade to limit campaign fundraising and political advertising: Its an old strategy of mine, he said. Force votes on the issues. Ultimately, we will win. [[i]] Or, ultimately, he will lose. But this much is undeniable: McCain, chief co-sponsor Sen. Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.), and their advocacy group allies are on offense. They aggressively seek opportunities to publicize their message, expand their support base, and advance their agenda.


 


The same aggressive approach characterizes the climate alarmist camp generally. At home and abroad, in courts and legislatures, in the media and regulatory bodies, alarmists are on the attack:


 


         Environmental activist groups endlessly lambaste President Bush for withdrawing the United States from the Kyoto global warming treaty. [[ii]]


         The British Governments Chief Scientific Advisor, Sir David King, in an attempt to influence U.S. policy, called climate change the most severe problem that we are facing todaymore serious even than the threat of terrorism. [[iii]]


         European Union politicians relentlessly pressed Russian leaders to ratify the Kyoto Protocol. [[iv]]


         Twelve state attorneys general (AGs), 14 advocacy groups, and three cities are suing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for rejecting a petition to regulate carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from motor vehicles. [[v]]


         State legislators introduced at least 60 bills in 2004 proposing some form of CO2 regulation. [[vi]]


         New York Governor George Pataki and nine other Northeastern governors plan to cap CO2 emissions from their states electric power sector. [[vii]]


         Six New England governors formed a compact with five Eastern Canadian Premiers to reduce regional greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2010 and 20 percent below 1990 levels by 2020. [[viii]]  


         The California Air Resources Board approved its plan to implement AB 1493, a state law mandating maximum feasible reductions of greenhouse gas emissions from new motor vehicles. [[ix]]


         The AGs of seven states plus the New York City corporation counsel are suing Americas five largest electric power producers to require each company to cap its CO2 emissions and then reduce them by a specified percentage annually for at least a decade. [[x]]


         The National Academy of Sciences published a study predicting apocalyptic climate impacts in California, such as an 8.3C (14.1F) increase in average summertime temperatures by 2100, unless urgent action is taken to reduce emissions. [[xi]] The NAS published the study even though its dire forecasts derive from discredited emissions scenarios [[xii]] and a climate model (the U.K. Met office Hadley Centre model) found to be incapable of replicating past U.S. temperature trends regardless of the averaging period used (five-year, 10-year, or 25-year). [[xiii]]


         The Sydney Centre for International and Global Law published a report arguing that Australia has a legal obligation, under the 1972 World Heritage Convention, to ratify the Kyoto Protocol and, indeed, to cut greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 60 percent below 1990 levels by 2050. [[xiv]]


 


Despite this surge of activism, alarmists have scored few if any victories at the national level:


 


         Senate leaders kept climate language out of the Senate energy bill. [[xv]]


         As already noted, the Senate rejected the McCain-Lieberman bill. Despite pro-Kyoto activists high-profile efforts to depict President Bush as an environmental criminal, [[xvi]] the environment was not a key issue in the November 2004 elections, and the Senate lost four supporters of McCain-LiebermanTom Daschle (D-SD), John Edwards (D-NC), Bob Graham (D-Fla.), and Ernest Hollings (D-SC). In the House, legislation of the McCain-Lieberman variety has no chance of passing or even of coming to a vote.


         Kyoto remains in such disfavor with most Americans that the Democratic Partys 2004 platformin sharp contrast to the partys 2000 platformdid not even mention the climate treaty negotiated by former standard-bearer Al Gore.


 


         The Bush Administration backed away from its proposal to award Kyoto-type emission credits to companies registering voluntary greenhouse gas emission reductions. [[xvii]]


         When EPA rejected the petition to regulate CO2 emissions from motor vehicles, it also disavowed, as no longer representing the agencys views, statements by Clinton administration officials claiming authority under the Clean Air Act to adopt regulatory climate policies. [[xviii]]


 


Supporters of pro-growth energy policy have, in short, done a reasonably good job of fending off several major thrusts by climate alarmists during the past 18 months. However, in politics, as in war, staying permanently on defense rarely leads to victory. A purely defensive posture cedes the initiative to ones opponents, allowing the other team to generate the headlines, capture the public imagination, and frame the terms of debate.


 


The battle over climate policy is a protracted struggle. To win it, the friends of economic liberty, scientific inquiry, and affordable energy must advance their own vision and compel alarmists to react to it. Taking a leaf out of McCains playbook, they should introduce their own Sense of Congress resolution on climate change, recruit co-sponsors, and force votes on the bill, year after year, until it passes.


 


What kinds of information and ideas should a sensible climate bill include? Read on.


 


 







[i] McCain/Lieberman still fighting for climate amendment floor time, Energy & Environment Daily, July 7, 2004.



[ii] In reality, Bush did no such thing. The United States continues to send official representatives to the Kyoto negotiations, and the President has not renounced Americas signature on the treaty.



[iii] King, D. A. 2004. Climate Change Science: Adapt, Mitigate, Ignore?  Science 303: 176-177.



[iv] Brian Stempeck, Pressure to ratify Kyoto is undeclared war against Russia, official says, Greenwire, July 19, 2004.



[v] Brian Stempeck, Attorneys general outline argument in major CO2 litigation, Greenwire, June 23, 2004.



[vi] American Legislative Exchange Council, Sons of Kyoto: 2004 Summary of Greenhouse Gas Legislation in the States, June 2, 2004.



[vii] States take independent action on clean air plans, Greenwire, July 8, 2004.



[viii] New England Governors/Eastern Canadian Premiers, Climate Change Action Plan 2001, August 2001, http://www.negc.org/documents/NEG-ECP%20CCAP.PDF.



[ix] California Air Resources Board, Climate Change, September 24, 2004, http://www.arb.ca.gov/regact/grnhsgas/grnhsgas.htm. 



[x] Brian Stempeck, States lawsuit demands utilities reduce CO2 emissions 3 percent per year, Greenwire, July 22, 2004.



[xi] Hayhoe, K., et al. 2004. Emissions pathways, climate change, and impacts on California. PNAS   vol. 101, no. 34: 12422-12427.



[xii] See finding (17).



[xiii] Testimony of Patrick Michaels, The U.S. National Climate Change Assessment: Do the Climate Models Project a Useful Picture of Regional Climate? House Energy and Commerce Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, July 25, 2002.



[xiv] Sydney Centre for International and Global Law, Global Climate Change and the Great Barrier Reef: Australias Obligations under the World Heritage Convention, September 21, 2004, http://www.law.usyd.edu.au/scigl/SCIGLFinalReport21_09_04.pdf.



[xv] Darren Samuelsohn, Domenici drops climate change title until floor debate, Energy & Environment Daily, April 10, 2003.



[xvi] Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Crimes Against Nature: How George W. Bush and his Corporate Pals Are Plundering the Country and Hijacking Democracy (New York: HarperCollins, 2004).



[xvii] Marty Coyne, Bush administration backs away from GHG credits, Greenwire, December 3, 2003.



[xviii] Memorandum of Robert E. Frabricant, General Counsel, to Marianne L. Horinko, Acting Administrator, EPAs Authority to Impose Mandatory Controls to Address Global Climate Change under the Clean Air Act, August 28, 2003.

Russia takes “final” step, again, but not really

by William Yeatman on November 4, 2004

in Politics

For the third time in a month and fifth time in just over two years, media are breathless with Russia‘s purported ratification of the Kyoto Protocol. 

While this act seems likely to ultimately consummate as soon even as next spring, Russia continues to withhold what is in fact the only relevant step in determining whether it ratifies the “global warming” treaty covering about 35 countries.

That step is submission of Russia‘s instrument of ratification to the United Nations’ office in Bonn, which is the sole Russian act which can bring the treaty in effect.  Recently, “ratification” has been hailed with each internally meaningful, but internationally meaningless, individual step of Putin “approving” the 1997 treaty, the Duma voting in favor, the Federal Council voting in favor, and Putin signing the voted-upon act.  Previously, even passing comments prompted news articles declaring Kyoto‘s birth (e.g., August 2002).

Very soon all expect Russia to submit its ratification, an event which will prompt another in a series of increasingly self-parodying news articles declaring Kyoto in effect.  This will be followed by an identical spate of stories changing only minor details, 90 days later (according to the treaty’s terms), hailing for (it is hoped) the final time that Russia has brought the ailing treaty into effect.

At that point, however, Europe must face what it has created:  a selective treaty with which only 2 of the EU-15 will comply, leaving all EU countries by the agreement’s terms to fend for their own commitment or face sanction.  Given that certain countries, e.g., Spain, are so far over their agreed ration that compliance is beyond fantastic, this will likely prompt a collision between the cities Kyoto and Lisbon. 

Both agreements bearing these names have remained fictional, though one is about to at minimum come into force while the other appears ever smaller in the rear view mirror of the EU’s rather sputtering economic vehicle.

Negotiations over certain Kyoto details resume in Buenos Aires in December, though the first formal “Meeting of the Parties”at which the details of what exactly has been “agreed” are to be hammered outwill not occur until approximately one year later.

Even the BBC now acknowledges Russia‘s apparent agreement was in return for EU acquiescence to Russia‘s WTO membership (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3985669.stm).  The U.S. made clearas did both of its major candidates for presidentthat Kyoto is not the answer and that, having refused to ratify Kyoto, it is now certain to continue on its own path of reducing “greenhouse gas intensity”.

With the EU out of compliance, amid continued Russian expressions of concern over what energy emission rationing will do to its recovering economy, and the bulk of the world’s countriesand emissionsremaining happily and steadfastly exempt, the idea of Kyoto as written succeeding even if it goes into effect seems a pipe dream.

These realities make upcoming Kyoto negotiations important, but the real game is now how the EU addresses both its conflict between Kyoto promises and Lisbon‘s failure, and how it will address most of the world rejecting Kyoto‘s restrictions.

No to Kyoto treaty

by William Yeatman on October 31, 2004

in Kyoto Negotiations, Politics

USA TODAY’s editorial fails to make an economic case for U.S. ratification of the Kyoto Protocol (“Global warming shift gets cold shoulder,” Our view, Greenhouse gas emissions debate, Oct. 21).


It argues that, unlike businesses in Kyoto-ratifying countries, U.S.-based plants “risk being left behind in adopting new technologies that not only cut emissions but also boost efficiency and lower business costs.”


Not so. In a global marketplace, U.S. firms will adopt whatever technologies “boost efficiency and lower business costs,” whether the USA ratifies Kyoto or not. Besides, the editorial seems to confuse energy efficiency with economic efficiency. Kyoto’s emission caps are a stealth energy tax, and energy taxes raise firms’ production costs, not lower them.


Finally, Kyoto’s emission-trading scheme is not a new feature that somehow renders obsolete President Bush’s reasons for rejecting Kyoto in 2001. Kyoto has emphasized emissions trading since its inception in December 1997.


Kyoto was and remains an expensive, non-solution to an unproven problem.


Marlo Lewis
Senior fellow
Competitive Enterprise Institute
Washington

Changing political climate

by William Yeatman on October 29, 2004

in Kyoto Negotiations, Politics, Science

Lost among the charges and counter charges about lost explosives during the last week of the presidential campaign, was a last-gasp attempt by the environmental community to impact the election. The assault came from Dr. James Hansen, director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, who traveled to Iowa from his Manhattan home to charge that the Bush Administration is purposely ignoring growing evidence that sea levels could rise significantly unless prompt action is taken to reduce heat-trapping emissions from smokestacks and tailpipes.” And that “delay of another decadeis a colossal risk.”


Scary stuff if true; but is it? Dr. Hansen himself hasn’t always thought so. His own most recent research, in which he has argued mainly for quickly limiting emissions of methane, rather than CO2, contradicts this claim. Smoke stacks and tailpipes don’t emit methane; cattle and rice fields do.


It appears that Dr. Hansen’s speech in Iowa during the climax of the election is just the latest example of a willingness to change his scientific position depending on his perceived direction of the political winds. For example, Dr. Hansen told former Vice President Al Gore that he predicted high-end estimates of warming, and attributed that to emissions of CO2. More recently, Hansen has embraced lower-end estimates of warming, and suggested that we should control methane emission more than CO2. Yet policy that impacts every area of our economy should be set on sound science, not science that bends to the political winds.


Back to his current charge; is it accurate, are CO2 emissions causing sea levels to rise dramatically? He apparently bases his assertion on his own publication [Proc Nat’l Acad Sci 2004] that to preserve global coastlines, global warming must not exceed one degree Celsius. As sole support for this unusual claim, he cites his own recent article in the popular Scientific American [vol 290, pp 68-77, 2004].


All independent evidence, however, shows sea levels rising steadily – by about 400 feet in the past 18,000 years, since the peak of the most recent ice age. Significantly, empirical evidence has demonstrated that there has been no acceleration of sea level rise during the strong warming in the early 20th century. Evidently, warming leads to faster evaporation from the oceans and an increased rate of ice accumulation on the Antarctic continent – producing a drop in sea level that mostly offsets the rise from the thermal expansion of the oceans.


In addition, as is well known, prompt policy action (by cutting emissions of greenhouse gases in accord with the Kyoto Protocol) would lower the calculated temperature rise by 2050 by at most a tiny one-thirtieth of a degree C – too small to even measure.


Further, it is important to remember that President Bush did not “withdraw” from the Kyoto Protocol on global warming – as his critics so falsely claim. He simply has not submitted the treaty to the Senate for ratification; but neither did his predecessor, former President Bill Clinton. Clinton decided not to submit the treaty that was negotiated on his watch because the Senate at the time had voted unanimously against any treaty that would have such damaging economic consequences. That vote was unanimous, including the junior Senator from Massachusetts, John Kerry.


It’s hard to see how ‘prompt action’ of any kind could affect sea level. Dr. Hansen’s critique is disingenuous and not founded on science, and is a prime example of why it is important not to base important public policy decisions on any one scientist’s predictions.

Chat transcript: Implications of new California auto emissions regulations

by William Yeatman on October 27, 2004

in Politics, Science



Kenneth Green
Fraser Institute 

Dr. Kenneth Green is Chief Scientist and Director of the Risk and Environment Policy Centre at Canada’s Fraser Institute, and is an adjunct scholar with Reason Public Policy Institute, a public-policy research organization headquartered in Los Angeles. Dr. Kenneth Green is Chief Scientist and Director of the Risk and Environment Policy Centre at Canada’s Fraser Institute, and is an adjunct scholar with Reason Public Policy Institute, a public-policy research organization headquartered in Los Angeles.  Dr. Green received his doctorate in Environmental Science and Engineering (D.Env.) at UCLA in 1994, his master’s degree in molecular genetics from San Diego State University in 1988, and his bachelor’s degree in Biology from UCLA in 1983.


Green has critiqued the new California auto-emission regulations for the Orange County Register.  If you have any questions about the environmental, political, or economic ramifications of this move by California, this will be a very enlightening hour.


Moderator: Here we go.  I’ll start it off myself by asking Dr. Green to set up the situation for us.  What exactly is the CARB and how did they come to this decision?


Green: CARB stands for the California Air Resources Board – they are the highest air quality control agency in the state. 
The decision to regulate the greenhouse gas emissions of the California vehicle fleet evolved over time, but it was originally proposed by Fran Pavley about 3 years ago.
CARB’s regulation was intended to fulfill a California Assembly bill, 1493, which directed CARB to achieve “maximum feasible” reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.


Moderator: Richard in Oklahoma asks:
Californians seem to be itching to shoot themselves in the foot with this type of legislation and state spending. As a non-Californian, why should I care? Won’t it mean that California businesses will move to more business friendly states like mine?


Green: It does sometimes seem that California has an economic death wish.  But the answer to your question is fairly complicated. First, California does have massive market power when it comes to buying automobiles. Nearly 20 percent of all the new cars bought in the US are bought in California.
So, they can force the automakers to incur higher costs, at least in the California market. Of course, to get people to buy these cars (that will cost about $3,000 more over the life of the vehicle), they’re probably going to have to subsidize the market in California by raising vehicle rates somewhat in other states. And, other states tend to copy California on these things, so it probably won’t only be California that does it.
The other reason you should care is that, in truth, California’s economic prosperity contributes to overall economic prosperity in the United States. If California’s economy suffers, ripple effects spread throughout the country.


Moderator:  Phil in Florida asks:
Will California lose jobs to other states because of this policy?


Green: It’s somewhat too early to tell. It’s one thing for California to have passed a foolish law, it’s another thing for them to implement it. The National Academy of Sciences has observed that the technology for what CARB is requiring simply doesn’t exist, and isn’t on the immediate horizon.  So, as with the electric car fiasco, this could wind up being a rule that just isn’t met, and lead to endless rounds of “compromise” proposals that sock the automakers for money to be dumped in California through research projects.
What we do know is this: If California raises the cost of transportation, they’ll hinder their economic growth. If that happens, people will lose jobs, and many of those, one presumes, will seek greener pastures.


Moderator: May in Louisiana wants to know:
When most experts say that the California law will do virtually nothing to curtail greenhouse gases,  what’s the real agenda for this restrictions on car emissions?


Green: I think there are several agendas at play. One is simply that “environmentalists” hate cars. They always have. They particularly despise sport utility vehicles. In the past, they’ve tried to get people out of cars, and into trains, by raising fears of oil depletion and air pollution. Both of those problems have been largely corrected, so now the excuse is climate change.  As an agency, CARB is subject to the problem of “public choice” theory. That is, the people who work there, like everyone else, wants to advance in his/her career, and that advancement is through growth.
Growth of their department, growth of their sphere of authority, and so on. As air pollution dies out as a real threat, what’s an Air Resources Board to do?


Moderator: Ned in California wonders:
Will there be an increase in price that it costs vehicle owners to inspect their car?


Green: I doubt that there will be a change in the way that cars are tested through Inspection and Maintenance programs, though I suppose it’s possible. The real cost is going to be in the initial price of the car.  According to a report by Sierra Research, for a new passenger car sold in 2016, when the new rules are tightest, will cost $3,357 more than they would otherwise.


Moderator: Mary in Virginia asks:
Where is Schwarzenegger coming down on this issue?  What power does he have as Governor to effect it?


Green: Well, judging from his recent media circus over his hydrogen-powered Hummer, one has to assume that Schwarzenegger won’t want to change the regulation. On the air pollution and environmental issues, Schwarzenegger seems to have decided to just throw in the towel to environmental groups. As Governor, he could certainly effect change in the regulation. For one thing, I believe that several of the appointees to the governing board of the Air Resources Board are appointed by the governor.


Moderator: Alex in Virginia is worried:
As an enthusiast of older automobiles, I have read that the CARB standards would put the squeeze on older automobiles, especially ones that don’t have any emissions controls from the factory. CARB has already impacted on my hobby as there are fewer choice cars and bodies for restoration. California “Junk car” laws encourages that they be crushed instead. Is this only going to get worse? What can we do to stop the destruction of our hobby?


Green: That’s a great question. The new CARB standards for greenhouse gas emissions will only apply to new car sales, and, I believe, that classic cars are exempted from even air pollutant standards. It is true that there’s a pressure to just scrap the older cars that are just being driven, rather than treated as a classic car. I can see where that would make it harder to find parts for restoration. I can’t say how that might be remedied, other than, perhaps, to seek your parts in other states, or other countries.


Moderator: Katherine from Maryland asks:
Is it becoming a trend that states (and of course, their attorneys general) are more and more deciding that they will ignore federal regulatory agencies, in this case, NHTSA, and do their own thing?


Green: Yes, states, and particularly their AGs are, more and more often, simply setting their own agenda regardless of the federal government. They tend, not surprisingly, to do that more when the federal government is seen as not being aggressive in a given area of public policy.  Greenhouse gas control bills are popping up all over the US, as are lawsuits by the Attorneys General involving greenhouse gas emissions. The motivations for this proliferation of state actions, to me, seem to involve the prospect of generating massive state revenues through law suits, or to force the federal government to implement strong greenhouse gas controls by threatening to create such a crazy-quilt of regulation that the feds have no choice but to try to create a uniform regulatory playing field.


Moderator: John from Virginia asks:
It seems clear that CARB and green community place far more credence in global climate computer models than the proven fact (National Academy of Sciences among others) that downsizing vehicles results in more deaths and injuries.  The only way to reduce CO2 is to reduce fuel consumption.  And there are only 2 ways to reduce fuel consumption:  Use more expensive materials and technologies OR downsize the vehicle.  The consquence of Option 1 is pricing consumers out of the market, meaning that more older, polluting vehicles stay on the road longer.  The consequence of Option 2 is increasing traffic at California morgues.  How are they getting away with this literal trade of blood for oil?

Green: Well, CARB has never been averse to simply restating mistruths, until the public buys into them. In the case of the new greenhouse gas controls, you’re going to get a double dose of danger: the cars will have to be lighter, AND they’ll also be more expensive, and they may, if we’re silly enough to use hydrogen as a fuel source, be more likely to explode.  The bottom line is, the new rules will hurt motorists not only in the wallet, but also in their safety. And, those who are sensitive to our ever-lower levels of air pollution are going to see a set back in the elimination of those emissions because people will hold onto older cars longer, rather than buy the new, smaller, higher-priced, less-capable cars and trucks that will result from the new rules.


Moderator: Elizabeth in Florida wonders:
It sounds as if California is trying to force new technologies.  Have there been any prominent successes in low-emission vehicles? 


Green: The planner-types at California’s environmental agencies have long suffered from the fatal conceit, that somehow, they know better than all the people acting in free markets, about what future technologies will win, and which will lose. They have a dismal track record, however, as do all governmental agencies. The most obvious example is the electric car fiasco. Billions of dollars were spent to try to conjure up battery-cars that a consumer would want to buy. They subsidized the building, and the selling, and the charging stands, and they still couldn’t get people to buy their prize electric cars for a very simple reason: they didn’t have nearly the capability of a regular economy car.


Moderator: Patrick at an undisclosed location asks:
What states are most likely to follow California down this road?


Green: It’s hard to say. New York is a distinct possibility, as I believe that they also copied California on their “Zero-Emission Vehicle” standards. There is a group of states that have basically adopted the practice of cloning California’s emission laws, and implementing them.  Of course, we can hope that some of those states might have learned from the electric-car fiasco, and be more hesitant to adopt the new greenhouse gas standards. Either way, what I think is most likely to happen wherever they adopt these rules is simply failure. The deadlines will come, the automakers will have to spend a fortune proving they can’t meet the requirement, some deal will be cut, and the automakers will pay some hefty research bill in some politician’s home town. Motorists will pay one way or the other, as whatever costs the automakers incur in dealing with these rules, it’s ultimately the consumer who pays for it.


Moderator: Okay, that was our last question.  We want to thank Dr. Green for lending us his time and expertise!
Keep checking back at GlobalWarming.org for more live chats with the experts. 

Russian Parliament ratifies Kyoto

by William Yeatman on October 26, 2004

in Politics

 The Russian State Duma ratified the Kyoto Protocol by a vote of 334 to 73 on October 22.  The upper house of parliament approved the decision on October 27.

The parliament also passed a statement indicating that the decision was purely for political and diplomatic reasons and was not justified on an economic or a scientific basis.  The statement says that Russia‘s obligations under the protocol will have grave consequences for its economic and social development.


According to Novosti, The decision to ratify the protocol was made with due consideration for its importance for the development of international co-operation and because it could not come into effect unless Russia participates in it.  Other sources suggested the European Unions willingness to allow Russians visa-free travel to the enclave of Kalingrad had a major role in securing Duma support.


French President Jacques Chirac telephoned President Putin to hail the decision as a major contribution to the development of multiparty international cooperation andtherefore highly appreciated in Europe and the whole world (www.putin.ru, Oct. 25).


Once President Putin signs the ratification into law, the next step is for the Russian authorities to submit ratification documents to the United Nations.  Once these documents have been received, the protocol will come into force after ninety days.

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