Science

WASHINGTON, D.C., AUGUST 7, 1998 — Compared to natural climate changes spurred by the sun, any global warming resulting from increased greenhouse gases in the atmosphere would be slow and insignificant, according to astrophysicist Sallie Baliunas of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Speaking today at a briefing for Congressional staff, Dr. Baliunas said the scientific evidence for the link between solar variability and shifts in climate only began to emerge in the last decade or so. The most recent studies have strengthened that view, creating a growing interest among scientists.

The sun-climate link casts new doubts on the reliability of computer models that base their climate change scenarios on changes in greenhouse gas concentrations. It has long been noted that actual observations of global temperatures have been inconsistent with model forecasts. Nearly all of the 1 degree F warming over the last century occurred before 1940; nearly all of the increases in greenhouse gas concentrations occurred after 1940. Dr. Baliunas pointed out that global temperatures over the last 19 years, according to satellite and balloon-based measurements, have been flat.

Dr. Baliunas scoffed at statements that temperatures have been the warmest in 600 years, saying that most scientists feel the climate has simply been recovering from the “Little Ice Age,” a 450-year period of much colder temperatures that destroyed settlements in Greenland and led to crop failures and famine over much of Europe.

“It’s true that it’s warmer today than in the year 1400, but so what,” she said. “That was the beginning of the Little Ice Age.” She displayed graphs showing that temperatures were warmer than today 1000, 3000, and 6500 years ago. The Earth, she said, has already experienced warmer temperatures and more rapid climate changes than those forecast by models.

She also pointed out that during those warm periods, carbon dioxide levels remained flat, and therefore could not have been the cause. Interestingly, she said, research indicates that during the last warm period, El Nino events were not stronger and more frequent, they disappeared.

Hasty, poorly thought-through policies are uncalled for, said Dr. Baliunas. Even under the most extreme, computer-generated scenario, a delay of 30 years would produce a negligible difference in temperature. It would make a very significant difference, however, in achieving a better understanding of climate change, man-made or natural, and would mean more affordable mitigation and adaptation due to technological advances.

Dr. Baliunas’ briefing for Congressional staff was hosted by the National Consumer Coalition’s Climate Change Working Group — the “Cooler Heads.” Asked if she had experienced any retaliation because of her research, she replied, “I am a very strong person. I would not stand for that.” She added, however, that she was “dismayed” by the incivility of the climate change debate. “This is straightforward science. The computer models forecast a warming [due to increased greenhouse gases]; the observations do not agree.”

FOR MORE INFORMATION, a copy of Dr. Baliunas’ prepared speech, or to arrange an interview, call Emily McGee at (202) 331-1010.

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Warmer Temperatures Means Less Variability

One of the predictions made by climate modelers is that increases in mean global temperature will cause temperatures to become more variable and record-setting temperatures will become more frequent. An article in Climate Research (April 9, 1998) tests this hypothesis by presenting the “results from 3 different empirical analyses used to address the interrelated issues involving changes in temperature variability and trends in record-breaking extreme temperatures.”

Using land surface air temperatures from the 5 latitude by 5 longitude grid cell, the researchers discovered that for the period 1947 to 1996, there was a “general decline of the within-year variance of the monthly temperature anomalies in most locations.” The period 1897 to 1996 also showed an “overall decline in most areas” of temperature variance. “The result indicates,” say the researchers, “that as the world warms, the intra-annual variance decreases at a statistically significant rate.”

The researchers then “investigate the trends in the variation of the daily minimum and maximum temperatures within a winter and summer month (January and July),” using historical temperature data from stations in the United States, the former Soviet Union and China. They find that “[o]verall, variance in daily maximum and minimum temperatures is generally trending downwards through the period of historical records.” Januarys decline, they found, is 10 times greater then Julys.

Finally, they explore the “temporal trends in the occurrence of record-breaking extreme temperatures.” They found “no evidence for an increasing frequency in the number of days in which record high temperatures occur, and a statistically insignificant downward trend in the frequency of days in which record low temperatures are set.”

The researchers briefly discuss the new modeling studies that predict about 1.5 C warming over the next century. “The results of these new models, along with our results and other recent findings, suggest that the climate of the next century will be characterized by a modest warming, primarily in the high latitudes in winter, with decreased season-to-season and day-to-day temperature fluctuations,” they conclude.

New Light Shed on Sunspots

Professor Terry Robinson and Dr. Neil Arnold at Leicester University have constructed a computer model that may provide an explanation of how sunspots effect the climate. The model takes into account higher elevations of the atmosphere than previous models as well as the electromagnetic radiation associated with sunspots. Earlier theories argue that electromagnetic radiation heats up the outer atmosphere but is mostly dissipated by the time it reaches the Earths surface.

The Leicester model shows how pressure waves, the size of the whole planet, build up and vary with solar activity. These pressure waves interact with the jet stream leading to large climate changes. The computer models predictions correspond well with observations, but it will be some time before they can be fully tested to see if predictions of the future are born out (The Independent (London), June 27, 1998).

An article by Seth Bornstein, of Knight Ridder Newspapers, argues that the perception that the weather “has gone stark raving mad” may be more a function of “overheated media beaming each catastrophe into living rooms, and a real estate boom that has placed growing numbers of people in disaster-prone areas,” than of global warming. While this year has seen more than its fair share of extremes, we should be slow to draw any conclusions.

Supporting this point is Nicholas Graham, director of experimental forecasts at the International Research Institute for Climate Prediction in La Jolla, California, who states, “Were kind of hypersensitive because the weather during the winter was really strange. But says Graham, “The weathers always strange. How often do you see an article saying the weather around the country has sure been normal?”

William Gray, a hurricane prognosticator at Colorado State University says that, “I dont think the case can be made that theres more extremes of weather now than in the past. Weve always had unusual weather floods, droughts, and everything.”

Gary Kerney, assistant vice president of Property Claim Services, which tracks catastrophes for the insurance industry, definitely feels the media has played a major part in the erroneous perception of more extreme weather. He says that when he entered the business in 1981, “There could be tremendous damage, death and injuries caused by severe weather events in Kansas, for example, and you never heard about them in the media reports” (The Arizona Republic, July 5, 1998).

Are the Worlds Coral Reefs in Danger?

Recently there has been a lot of concern expressed about the health of the worlds coral reefs. And of course global warming has been fingered as a possible culprit. Estimates of coral damage say that 10 percent of the worlds coral reefs have been damaged beyond repair and another 60 percent will decline dramatically over the next 40 years.

But, according to Robert Ginsburg, a marine geology professor with the University of Miami, there is no way to know whether these estimates are accurate. “There are vast reef areas remote from civilization that have never been studied,” Ginsburg said. “How can anyone make a global evaluation?” Ginsburg, the founder of the International Year of the Reef, hopes to find out the truth about the condition of the planets reefs. But as of yet we do not know enough to warrant predictions of their decline (The Miami Herald, June 8, 1998).

Etc.

• Like night follows day, the Clinton Administration has once again blamed a natural disaster on manmade global warming. While surveying the wildfires in Florida Vice President Al Gore once again took the opportunity to push his global warming agenda. He said, for example, “theres only a one in one-thousandth [sic] chance that this is normal without the effects of global warming factored in” (Reuters, June 30, 1998).

Gore also argued that “These fires offer a glimpse of what global warming may mean to families across America. And that is why it is so critical that we get on with the job of cutting greenhouse gas emissions. Working together, we can spare other communities like those we have seen here today” (The White House Bulletin, June 29, 1998). Gore took the opportunity to unveil a new website called Florida Wildfires and Climate Extremes maintained by the NOAA at http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/o1/climate/research/1998/fla/florida.html#change.

• In the June issue of the Atlantic Monthly Ross Gelbspan writes, “While the climate crisis contains staggering destructive potential, it also contains a extraordinary opportunity to expand the wealth and stability of the global economy.” He goes on to say that to keep the earths atmosphere in the “hospitable state we have enjoyed for the past 10,000 years,” the nations of the world will need to cut carbon dioxide emissions by 50 to 70 percent. This would require virtually eliminating gasoline powered cars and coal fired power plants. “[T]he economic activity this would stimulate,” according to Gelbspan, “could provide significant employment for oil and coal workers, who could be retrained to manufacture . . . windmills, solar-energy systems and fuel cells” (Greenwire, June 25, 1998).

Cooler Heads Science Briefing

The Cooler Heads Coalition sponsored a science briefing on June 19 for congressional staff and media. The event featured climatologists Dr. Roy Spencer of NASAs Marshall Space Flight Center and Dr. John Christy of the University of Alabama, Huntsville.

Referring to the recent hand wringing over record high temperatures, Christy noted that record temperatures have to occur sometime and that the latest spike tells us very little about climate change. He argued that other selective statistics could just as easily be cited to argue against global warming. If one were to look at the last 100 years one would find that 37 states experienced their record temperatures before 1940 while only 13 experience their record temperature after 1940. Does this mean we are experiencing global cooling?

He also said that there is always a temperature spike with the dispersal of El Nio that releases an enormous amount of energy into the atmosphere. It happened in 1983 (though moderated by the eruption of El Chichon) and again in 1988. The 1988 temperatures and the comment by James Hansen of the Goddard Space Flight Center to Congress that “we can state with about 99 percent confidence that current temperatures represent a real warming trend rather than a chance fluctuation over the 30-year period” started the global warming scare.

Christy and Spencer are best known for their work with the satellite temperature record, which is a record of tropospheric temperatures. They discussed the importance of that data. The satellite data, according to Spencer, should be the most robust data if global warming occurs. The global warming signal should be 5 percent higher in the satellite data than in the surface temperature data. Yet the satellites record a slight cooling trend over the last 20 years.

Dr. Christy addressed recent challenges to the satellite data. One paper claimed to show that the satellite data actually show warming. The author, however, used only 9 percent on the satellite data the data with the least coverage and the greatest error. Each attack of the satellite data has disregarded the fact that this record is independently validated by a 98 percent correspondence with the radiosonde balloon data. These same scientists seem to put a lot of credence in surface temperature data that only cover 10 percent of the globe, nearly all of which is in the Northern Hemisphere.

Another Modeling Error

One of the key assumptions in the general circulation models (which are the basis for the IPCCs global warming predictions) relates to the sensitivity of climate to changes in the amount of energy reaching the earth. The models currently assume that every Watt per meter squared (W/m²) of energy added to the earth will cause the temperature to rise by .55C. A doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide, according to the model assumptions, will add 4.5 Watts per meter squared (W/m²) of energy to the earth causing the temperature to rise by 2.5C. This is the basis for model projections.

A review article appearing in Climate Research (April 9, 1998) claims that this number is too high. Dr. Sherwood Idso, of the U.S. Water Conservation Laboratory, discusses some of the research he has conducted which downgrades considerably the amount of warming that may occur from an increase of anthropogenic CO₂ emissions.

Idso first looked at changes in atmospheric water vapor that occurs in Phoenix, Arizona each year with the advent of the summer monsoon. By plotting daily minimum and maximum temperatures for the last 30 years as functions of atmospheric water content he was able to calculate a climate sensitivity factor of 0.17C per W/m², considerably less than the model assumption. He then obtained data for the annual range of solar radiation reception and compared that with the annual temperature range at 81 locations within the United States. He found a climate sensitivity of 0.17C per W/m² for the non-coastal stations and 0.087C per W/m² for coastal stations (coastal temperatures are moderated by the ocean).

By combining the two results and accounting for the relative global percentages of land and water, Idso was able to estimate a global sensitivity factor of 0.113C per W/m². Thus a doubling of atmospheric CO₂ would increase temperatures by no more than 0.45C. Idso then looked at different global data sets on various factors such as cloud cover, radiation, and temperatures over water and land and consistently found a sensitivity factor of about 0.10C per W/m² that would lead to a temperature change of 0.4C.

Since about 1900, however, there has been a 0.6C rise in temperature corresponding with a rise of only 2.45 W/m² due to human greenhouse activity. Idso believes that other factors, such as energy output from the sun, random climatic fluctuation, or recovery from the Little Ice Age, can account for the additional warming.

The History of El Nio

Vice President Al Gore recently held a press conference in which he implied a connection between manmade global warming and more frequent and more intense El Nio events. The history of El Nio, however, shows no such correlation. An article in Nature (May 28, 1998) reviews El Nios past and finds that several El Nio events “that occurred before 1880 had effects at least as intense and wide-ranging as those associated with the current event.” This is true for the events that occurred in 1396, 1685-88, 1789-93 and 1877-79, all of which occurred before the buildup of manmade greenhouse gases and when temperatures were much cooler than they are now.

One of the most severe El Nio events occurred in 1789-93 and caused severe droughts in Southern India, Australia, Mexico, the Atlantic islands and southern Africa. In the Madras Presidency of India the droughts led to 600,000 deaths, about half the population. The droughts were periodically interrupted by “highly destructive rainfall.” One three-day period at Madras experienced 25.5 inches of rain. As with so many of the catastrophic scenarios trotted out by global warming gloomies, the purported link between El Nio and global warming cannot withstand historical scrutiny.

La Nia is On the Way

The strong but shorter than average (8 months compared to 2 years) El Nio event that we have experienced is quickly giving way to its opposite, La Nia. Whereas El Nio is characterized by an accumulation of hot water in the Pacific Ocean near Peru, La Nia is characterized by colder than average sea surface temperatures in the same area. Sea surface temperatures have dropped by 15 degrees Fahrenheit from early May to early June.

The result could be a reversal of the weather patterns experienced last year. The northwestern United States could experience an abnormally cold and wet winter, while the South, which was cold and wet last winter, will be hotter and drier. And although the Peruvian fishing industry will profit from the turnaround, the eastern coast of the United States can expect a resurgence in hurricane activity which was nonexistent last year (The Washington Post, June 19, 1998).

Dont Expect Extreme Climate Swings

Scientists have found that violent temperature swings are uncommon during warm interglacial periods. Evidence from sea bed sediments going back 500,000 years show that temperatures only swing over a range of about one degree Celsius during interglacials like the one we are currently experiencing. In contrast, the latest Ice Age experienced violent temperature changes over a range of 10 degrees C from cold to warm and back again in relatively short periods of time (The Guardian [London], June 11, 1998).

Etc.

• In a speech at a Democratic National Committee fundraiser President Bill Clinton explained the continuing conflict between U.S. and Canadian commercial fisherman. He said, “I can tell you, one of my big problems with our best partner in the world, Canada, is that our salmon fisherman are fighting all the time . . . You know why? Because all the salmon are moving north, so there are more in Alaska and fewer in Canada, because of climate change.” Apparently the White House got this idea from a paper written by David Welch of the Pacific Biological Station. But Welch claims the paper said no such thing. “Its not global warming thats causing these fish to be intercepted. Its fisherman who catch a whole bunch of Canadian fish at the same time they catch U.S. fish” (Anchorage Daily News, June 19, 1998).
  
• President Bill Clinton has nominated UN Ambassador Bill Richardson as Secretary of Energy, where he will oversee the federal governments alternative energy subsidy programs. Clinton said that a top Richardson priority will be global warming. “I believe that this challenge will require the greatest energy from our labs, from our scientists and technology, from an Energy Department that can work clearly with the private sector on what plainly will be one of America’s most important priorities for years and years to come,” Clinton said (Reuters, June 18, 1998).

Greener Planet Slows Warming

NASA climate modeler James Hansen sparked the global warming revolution in 1988 with his declaration to Congress that mankind was warming the planet. His latest paper, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (April 1998) is somewhat of a contradiction. He candidly admits that global warming predictions are overblown, while proposing ways to surmount the political obstacles to limiting climate change.

“Ultimately the publicmust decide on policies that will influence future climate,” says Hansen. The “practical detection issue,” according to Hansen, “is this: when will global warming be large enough to be obvious to most people? Until then, it may be difficult to achieve consensus on actions to limit climate change.”

Hansens remedy for this apparent lack of awareness is to construct a climate index that will “provide an objective assessment of practical climate change.” He couches the index in terms of helping people avoid “perceiv[ing] the latest climate fluctuation as long-term climate change.” But given his frustration that most people arent noticing the global warming he believes is “already at hand,” it seems more likely that the climate index is intended to incite the public. There is little doubt that the Al Gores of the world would exploit every spike in the climate index to foment public support for energy controls.

The climate index is a composite of the temperature index and the moisture index. Hansen claims that changes large enough to be obvious to most people occur at around one standard deviation above or below the mean. Deviations of this magnitude, says Hansen, occur even in the absence of a long-term trend in the climate index. If, however, deviations occur more than would be expected statistically under normal conditions (about one-sixth of the time) over a sustained period of time, then we can conclude that a climate trend exists.

Hansen applies his climate index to the region 30N-90N latitude and finds that the only areas approaching and maintaining a full standard deviation from the mean is Siberia and northwest North America, the two coldest air-masses on the planet. Other research has found that the only warming detected in Siberia is in the wintertime.

Another important revelation is that the rate of growth of greenhouse gas climate forcing has been decreasing since the late 1970s where it peaked at about 0.04 W/m² (watts per meter squared) per year. “The decline,” says Hansen, “is dramatic when compared with business-as-usual scenarios, which assume continued growth of the annual increment of greenhouse gases.” Carbon dioxides growth rate, for example, has remained flat for 20 years even though there has been an increase in fossil fuel use. According to Hansen, “Apparently the rate of uptake by CO₂ sinks, either the ocean, or, more likely, forests and soils, has increased.” Methane (another important greenhouse gas) growth rates have plummeted over the last several years, though we dont know why.

Hansen concludes that “Climate forcing by greenhouse gases in the real world has been falling far short of the 1% CO₂ transient scenario,” that was assumed by transient climate change studies. In fact, actual greenhouse forcing is about half that much. As a result there has been about 0.1 degrees C warming per decade rather than the 0.3 degrees predicted by the models.

Hansens two main conclusions that warming occurs mostly in Siberia and northwest North America, and that warming is much smaller than expected because the earth is getting greener are strikingly similar to arguments that the so- called skeptics have been making all along.

Glacial Retreat

Research presented at the Boston meeting of the American Geophysical Union suggests that glaciers are retreating rapidly. In 50 to 70 years, says Mark Meier of Colorado Universitys Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research, the glaciers in Montanas Glacier National Park could disappear entirely. Other glaciers throughout the world have also been retreating. Meier blames manmade causes: “Im convinced there is a detectable human influence in the pattern of climate change that we are seeing.” (Anchorage Daily News, May 29, 1998)

The article does not address how the rate of glacier retreat has varied over the last century. Fred Singer, president of the Science and Environmental Policy Project, points out that “If recession was initially rapid and then slowed, then it is very likely the result of the rapid rise in temperature between 1860 and 1940 as the Earth recovered from the Little Ice Age and not from any global warming due to higher concentrations of CO2.”

Indeed, data shows that glaciers have been receding more slowly in recent years. The World Glacier Monitoring Service in Zurich, Switzerland, in a 1989 Science article, noted that more than 70 percent of the 625 mountain glaciers in the [mid-latitude] United States, Soviet Union, Iceland, Switzerland, Austria, and Italy were in retreat between 1926 and 1960. After 1980, 55 percent of these same glaciers were advancing (for further information, see www.sepp.org/controv/glaciers.html).

Methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, is accumulating more slowly in the atmosphere than previously thought, according to researchers at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). If the trend continues, methane concentrations in the atmosphere will soon stabilize “miraculously stemming some 20% of the burgeoning greenhouse gas problem.” The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change had projected that methane would continue to buildup in the atmosphere, doubling by the year 2100. This new research will require a rethinking of global warming projections (Greenwire, May 28, 1998).

Announcements

The Fourth Session of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention (COP-4) is being held in Buenos Aires from November 2-13, 1998. Organizations interested in applying for accreditation to the conference as an NGO should write a letter stating their interest to:

Horacio Peluffo
External Relations Officer
Conference and Information Support
United Nations – Climate Change Secretariat
Haus Carstanjen, Martin-Luther-King-Strasse, 8
D-53175 Bonn, Germany
Tel: (49-228) 815-1506
E-mail: hpeluffo@unfccc.de

FCCC Tel.: (49-228) 815-1000
Fax: (49-228) 815-1999
E-mail: secretariat@unfccc.de
Web address: http://www.unfccc.de

Global Warming is Good

A new book by Thomas Gale Moore, an economist with the Hoover Institute, challenges the global warming as catastrophe hypothesis. According to Dr. Moore mankind has done far better during warm periods than during cold periods. He comes to this conclusion by examining two periods of human history, the First Climate Optimum from 9000BC to 2000BC and the Little Climate Optimum from AD900 to AD1300.

During the First Climate Optimum, which followed an Ice Age, agriculture came into being, writing was invented, cities began to be built and other important advances occurred. “From its origins around 8000BC,” writes Moore, “agriculture spread northward, appearing in Greece about 6000BC, Hungary in 5000BC, France in 4500BC, and Poland in 4250BC. Is it chance that this northward spread followed a gradual warming of the climate that made agriculture more feasible at higher latitudes?”

The Little Climate Optimum was an unprecedented period of human progress marked by the construction of some of Europes most famous buildings, including St. Marks in Venice, the Leaning Tower of Pisa, the cathedrals at Santiago de Compostela, Notre Dame, Canterbury and Chartres. The building surge ended with the advent of a prolonged cooling, known as the Little Ice Age which lasted from 1300 to 1800. This period saw the Black Death and a general stagnation of human progress. Both of these periods, incidentally, were warmer than current temperatures and are about the same as the upper bound of the IPCC predictions.

Dr. Moore predicts that warmer temperatures coupled with increased concentrations of atmospheric carbon dioxide would increase agricultural production, reduce heating costs, improve transportation, and cut fatalities. The imposition of regulations to curb greenhouse gases would be far more damaging to human prosperity than would the minor negative effects of global warming. Copies of Climate of Fear can be purchased for $18.95 (cloth) or $9.95 (paper) by calling 1-800-767-1241.

Natural Climate Change is the Norm

A team of researchers from the University of Maine have discovered that vast lakes in the Antarcticas Dry Valleys rose and fell dramatically in as little as 400 years. Bonney Basin in Antarcticas Taylor Valley, for example, saw the water levels of a massive glacial lake rise and fall by 820 feet every 400 to 1,500 years between 11,800 years ago and 18,700 years ago.

Other glacial lakes in the area show similar rapid changes and one of the valleys shows this pattern up until 2,500 years ago. One of the researchers, Brenda Hall, a graduate student at the University of Maine says that means that whatever is causing the shifts is still happening now. Because the changes occurred in all three of the Dry Valleys glacial lakes and not just in one glacier at a time it means that the changes were caused by climatic factors.

This evidence coincides with evidence of abrupt climate change from other parts of the world. Ice cores from Greenland dating back 40,000 years, for example, show temperature changes of 5 degrees Celsius over 3 to 50 years (Bangor Daily News, May 16, 1998). No one is sure what causes such rapid climate change but one thing is certain, natural climate change is the norm and swamps even the most pessimistic scenarios concocted by the IPCC.

CO₂ Effects on Cotton

Botanists at Mississippi State University are studying the effects of atmospheric carbon dioxide on the growth of cotton. The researchers grew cotton at various temperatures under current ambient levels of CO₂ and at levels double current levels. The results were astounding. Higher levels of CO₂ at optimum temperatures increased total plant weight by 30 percent while the weight of the bolls increased by more than 20 percent.

Varying the temperature in either direction by 10 degrees C caused a decline in the production of bolls. But at any temperature increased CO₂ had a dramatic positive effect on plant growth. According to one commentator, “Everywhere we look in journal after journal carbon dioxide appears to make our best of all possible climates even better.” This is good news to a cotton industry that adds $120 billion of value to our economy each year. The journal article can be found in Environmental and Experimental Botany, 39. Additional information can be found at the World Climate Reports website at www.nhes.com/current_issue/greening.html.

Etc.

• Environmentalists are tying themselves in knots in Great Britain over what to do about wind power. Though many advocate the use of wind power to combat global warming, others see them as “gaunt, skeletal, industrial structure[s].” And it turns out that the windiest places in Great Britain are also some of the most beautiful and most “fiercely protected” landscapes (The Guardian (London), May 16, 1998).
  
• A study at Scotlands Stirling University predicts that global warming will be good for the Scottish tourist industry. The “traditional” Scottish seaside holiday will return to its former glory typical of the 1950s and 60s, according to the researchers. “The long-term effects for a zone running from the Grampian coast down to East Lothian are bound to be good, with more sunny and predictable weather providing a boost to summer tourism,” said Dr. John Harrison, one of the studies co-authors (The Scotsman, May 20, 1998).

The Competitive Enterprise Institute has produced a book and a highlights video based on The Costs of Kyoto conference held in July 1997. Both the book and the video are available for $15 or buy both for $25. To order call CEI at (202) 331-1010, or e-mail to info@cei.org.

Fred Singers book Hot Talk, Cold Science: Global Warmings Unfinished Debate is still available from the Science and Environmental Policy Project through their website at www.sepp.org.

The Society Promoting Environmental Conservation together with the David Suzuki Foundation, the West Coast Environmental Law Association, the B.C. Environmental Network and the Vancouver and District Labour Council are jointly holding a conference on climate change. The conference will be held Saturday, June 6, at Robson Square in Vancouver. For information on registering for the conference, email spec@alternatives.com.

The EPAs Energy, Clean Air and Climate Change Subcommitee of the Clean Air Act Advisory Committee is holding a meeting on Thursday, June 11, 1998, from 9:30 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. at the Tyson Corner Marriott Hotel, 8028 Leesburg Pike, Vienna, Virginia. Contact Paul Rasmussen, 202-260-6877, Anna Garcia 202-564-9492 or Brian Cook, 202-260-0825.

Is 20^th Century Climate Man Made?

Using a comprehensive compilation of proxy evidence such as sediment, ice core and tree ring data, a new article in the April 27 Nature claims that the 20th century is the warmest in the last 600 years and that the warming is due to manmade greenhouse gases. According to one of the authors, University of Massachusetts at Amherst climatologist Michael E. Mann, “Our conclusion was that the warming of the past few decades appears to be closely tied to emission of greenhouse gases by humans and not any of the natural factors,” while the changes of the previous five centuries examined by the researchers can be attributed to natural factors such as solar radiation and volcanic haze.

Dr. Mann admits, however, “We do have error bars. They are somewhat sizable as one gets farther back in time, and there is reasonable uncertainty in any given year. There is quite a bit of work to be done in reducing these uncertainties.” Others point to additional problems. Dr. Thomas Wigley, a climatologist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, said, “I don’t think we’re ever going to get to the point where [the proxy data is] going to be totally convincing.” Dr. Philip Jones of the University of East Anglia in England, questions the validity of combining proxy data and thermometer data (The New York Times, April 28, 1998).

Several problems with the study have emerged. First, the time period used by the researchers is suspect. They begin their study towards the front end of the Little Ice Age. It is not surprising that the current century is the warmest given that the Little Ice Age ended at the turn of this century. Second, the article puts forward the claim that manmade greenhouse gas emissions best explain the climate change of the 20th century. Other researchers disagree with that conclusion. We reported in our last issue about promising new evidence regarding the influence of solar activity on the earth’s climate. Jasper Kirby of the European particle physics center CERN in Geneva says that “A striking correlation has been observed between global cloud cover and the incident of cosmic rays [which are influenced by changes in sunspot activity]. . . causing estimated changes in global temperatures that are comparable to all the warming attributed to greenhouse gases from the burning of fossil fuels since the Industrial Revolution” (Reuters, May 5, 1998).

Precautionary Principle Pitfalls

Many who advocate restricting energy use to prevent global warming concede that there are many uncertainties yet to be resolved with the global warming hypothesis. Yet they insist that we should act now to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, that it is better to be safe than sorry. Meteorologists have discovered, however, that this precautionary approach is flawed and carries with it dangers of its own. In the late 1980s and early 1990s with the advent of Doppler radar meteorologists felt that they could better predict and track tornadoes. They have increased the percentage of tornado warnings from 44 percent of all twisters in 1992 to 59 percent in 1997 and the lead time between warning and touchdown has also increased form 6.2 minutes in 1992 to 10 minutes in 1997.

There is a downside, however. There has been a massive rise in false alarms. In 1997, of the 2,592 tornado warnings 2,022 of them were false alarms. False alarms for severe thunderstorms, which are considered precursors to tornadoes, reached a whopping 10,475, an increase of 50 percent since 1992. “That’s crying wolf way too often,” according to Joseph Shaefer, a meteorologist at the weather service’s center in Oklahoma. And just like the villagers in The Boy Who Cried Wolf people are tuning out the National Weather Service. People living in tornado prone areas who buy special radios that emit an alarm when a tornado warning is issued have begun to turn the radios off because they are “frustrated by the constant beeping from false alarms.”

The problem, according to Brian Peters, a meteorologist in the Birmingham office of the National Weather Service, is that “We’ve got this wonderful piece of technology giving us lots of information, but we don’t have the ability to interpret it allIt’s not quite reading tea leaves, but it is a close kin.” It is becoming more and more difficult in all scientific fields to determine when a scientist should report potentially worrisome information. Yet Americans continue to “have the attitude that if we have information, we have to act now — even if its meaning isn’t clear,” says Louise Russell an economist at Rutgers University and the author of Educated Guesses: Making Policy About Medical Screening Tests. This would be an apt description of the global warming debate.

Just as with global warming science, meteorologists are learning that what they thought they knew about tornadoes is incorrect. For example, meteorologists believed that mesocyclones resulted in tornadoes 50 percent of the time. So when these disturbances appeared they would issue immediate warnings. They have since discovered that a tornado results only 10 to 20 percent of the time, and even these numbers are very uncertain, says E. DeWayne Mitchell, a meteorologist at the National Severe Storms Laboratory in Norman, Oklahoma (The Wall Street Journal, May 5, 1998).

What can we learn from this? That acting on partial information has risks. Global warming is no exception. Restricting energy use based on inadequate knowledge will be costly and may bring us few benefits. Climatologists have said that waiting another 10 to 15 years before acting would make little difference but would give us valuable time to learn more about whether man is warming the planet.

Announcements

The Competitive Enterprise Institute has produced a book and a highlights video based on The Costs of Kyoto conference held in July 1997. Both the book and the video are available for $15 or buy both for $25. To order call CEI at (202) 331-1010, or e-mail to info@cei.org.

Thomas Gale Moore, a member of CEIs board of directors, has written Climate of Fear: Why We Shouldn’t Worry About Global Warming published by the Cato Institute. Call 1-800-767-1241 to order.

The Institute of Economic Affairs in London has published Climate Change: Challenging the Conventional Wisdom. The book can be ordered via e-mail: books@iea.org.uk.

The European Science and Environment Forum (ESEF) has published Global Warming: The Continuing Debate. It can be ordered for $25 from CEI or contact ESEF at lorraine@esef.org

The Good Side of El Nio

El Nio has been blamed for just about every negative weather occurrence this year. But it also has many beneficial side effects. “For the most part,” says Chris Landsea, a meteorologist with the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, “El Nio is a good guy. But we have seen the bad side.”

According to climate experts, every adverse event caused by El Nio brings benefits to another part of the world. Kenyan farmers who produce the araciba coffee bean, for example, have been devastated by heavy rains while Brazilian coffee growers are benefitting from the El Nio induced dry weather. On the other hand, Kenyan growers of macadamia nuts will benefit from a shortage that results from a drought in Hawaii, the worlds leading grower. Meanwhile, Indonesia and Singapores tourist industry is suffering from severe smog conditions that are caused by forest fires exacerbated by drought and Australian vintners are experiencing record harvest of high-quality grapes, all thanks to El Nio (AAP Newsfeed, April 20, 1998).

Patrick Michaels, a climatologist with the University of Virginia, argues that the warmer weather experienced in the U.S. saved energy consumers $5 billion in home heating costs. El Nio also suppressed hurricane activity in the Atlantic Ocean saving as much as $1.25 billion in storm damage costs. Michaels estimates that El Nios total benefits may be as high as $15 billion. Compare this to the $700 million in weather related losses in California and $100 million in tornado related losses in Florida and El Nio doesnt look so bad (State of the Climate Report, 1998).

More Disease or Total Baloney

Paul Reiter is the chief of the entomology section for the Centers of Disease Control’s Dengue Branch and a foremost expert in the field of vector-borne disease. He was recently interviewed for the State of the Climate Report (1998). Here is an excerpt from that interview.

SOC: People are going around glibly stating that dengue fever is spreading because of global warming. What evidence are they citing for their argument?

Reiter: Truly, I challenge you to find anyone who knows anything about dengue who doesn’t laugh at this supposition. There is absolutely no evidence for it whatsoever. The resurgence is quite clearly the result of the resurgence of the vector, the movement of people all over the world, the breakdown of public health services, and the increased urbanization of the tropics.

SOC: A few months ago, Science magazine noted many epidemiologists were complaining that global warming was being blamed for this, though it isn’t the cause. What implications does this have?

Reiter: I ran a symposium of the [2,500 to 3,000 member] American Society of Tropical Medicine, and there was virtually no dissent to the position that this whole business is total baloney. The only dissent I heard were people who came to me afterwards and suggested I might be hurting other people’s grant money.

Climate as a Pedulum

Deep ocean floor sentiments recovered over a two month period in 1995 reveals that the last 1.5 million years has experienced sharp climate changes over short periods of times. Massachusetts Insitute of Technology researcher Maureen Raymo says that if one of the swings experience in the past were to occur today, New England would experience weather like Florida for a 25 year period.

“Ten years ago, we had no idea that climate could change this quickly,” says Raymo. Temperature swings of as much as 10 degrees C within a few decades are not restricted to glacial periods of the last 800,000 years but go back much further in time. The researchers involved in the project state in their April 16 article in Nature that “Our results suggest that much of millennial-scale climate instability may be a pervasive and long-term characteristic of Earths climate rather than just a feature of the strong glacial-interglacial cycles of the past 800,000 years.” Raymo admits that “What causes climate variations on this time scale is a black box for scientists right now” (Electricity Daily, April 21, 1998).

Announcements

The Competitive Enterprise Institute has produced a book and a highlights video based on The Costs of Kyoto conference held in July 1997. Both the book and the video are available for $15 or buy both for $25. To order call CEI at (202) 331-1010, or e-mail to info@cei.org.

Thomas Gale Moore, a member of the Competitive Enterprise Institutes board of directors, has written a book, Climate of Fear: Why We Shouldn’t Worry about Global Warming published by Cato Institute. Ordering details will be forthcoming at Catos website at www.cato.org

The Institute of Economic Affairs in London has published a book, Climate Change: Challenging the Conventional Wisdom. The book can be ordered by contacting IEA by e-mail at books@iea.org.uk.

The European Science and Environment Forum (ESEF) has recently published Global Warming: The Continuing Debate. It can be ordered for $25 from CEI or by contacting ESEF at lorraine@esef.org.