Part
6: Uncertainty,
The IPCC & "Political Science"
August 30, 2001
by Bob Webster
Uncertainty
There is great uncertainty when
it comes to climate science and the forces that drive climate
change. Proponents of human-induced "global warming" claim a
"cause and effect" relationship between atmospheric CO2
levels (primarily through human activities of fossil fuel burning
and deforestation by fire) and significant climate warming since
the late 19th Century. Predictions of catastrophic
warming during the next 100 years are based on this "cause and
effect" assumption and results from unproven climate simulations
driven by incomplete (and faulty) data.
Uncertainty exists in a variety
of areas that relate to climate and climate change. Some of
those areas are briefly identified below:
From the Third Assessment
Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
(IPCC) [italics added]:
"In
sum, a strategy must recognize what is possible. In climate
research and modeling, we should recognize that we are dealing
with a coupled non-linear system, and therefore that
the prediction of a specific future climate is not possible."[1]
From An Assessment Built
on Guesswork:
"While
the U.S. team's purpose was to 'synthesize, evaluate, and
report on what we presently know about the potential consequences
of climate variability and change for the U.S. in the 21st
Century,' the assessment is mostly guesswork."[2]
From Bush Right to Oppose
Treaty:
"The
National Academy of Sciences' latest report underscores
the unsettled nature of climate science. Repeatedly, it
highlights the shortcomings of the computer simulations
that forecast climate, the assumptions used to calculate
climate change and even the way global temperatures are
measured."[3]
From Kyoto "Absurd" Says
MIT Scientist:
"a
paper ... [looked] at data to see how clouds respond to
temperature. And we find, in effect, what we referred to
as the “iris effect,” namely that in the tropics, when you
have a warm region, the clouds coverage contracts to let
out more heat. And when the temperature is less, the clouds
expand to hold heat in. They act as a very effective thermostat.
And we estimate on a global basis that this will take models
that are predicting between 1.5 and 4.5 degrees warming
due to doubling carbon dioxide and cut it back to about
a half to one. Even if the models were right in what they
had, and we further show that the models do not portray
this effect, they do not simulate the data. They show no
sign of it, and we know why. They don’t have the physics
underlying it."[4]
From Global Warming: The
Origin and Nature of the Alleged Scientific Consensus:
"Predicting
what will happen to carbon dioxide over the next century
is a rather uncertain matter. By assuming a shift toward
the increased use of coal, rapid advances in the third world's
standard of living, large population increases, and a reduction
in nuclear and other nonfossil fuels, one can generate an
emissions scenario that will lead to a doubling of carbon
dioxide by 2030--if one uses a particular model for the
chemical response to carbon dioxide emissions. The Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change Working Group It's model referred
to that as the "business as usual'' scenario. As it turns
out, the chemical model used was inconsistent with the past
century's record; it would have predicted that we would
already have about 400 parts per million by volume. An improved
model developed at the Max Planck Institute in Hamburg shows
that even the "business as usual'' scenario does not double
carbon dioxide by the year 2100.
"It is still
of interest to ask what we would expect a doubling of
carbon dioxide to do. A large number of calculations show
that if this is all that happened, we might expect a warming
of from .5 to 1.2 degrees centigrade. The general consensus
is that such warming would present few, if any, problems.
But even that prediction is subject to some uncertainty
because of the complicated way the greenhouse effect operates.
More important, the climate is a complex system where
it is impossible for all other internal factors to remain
constant. In present models those other factors amplify
the effects of increasing carbon dioxide and lead to predictions
of warming in the neighborhood of four to five degrees
centigrade...."[5]
From Kyoto Is Still Doomed:
"Despite
plenty of research, when it comes to climate, we still know
very little. We do know that the surface temperature of
the earth has warmed by one degree Fahrenheit over the past
century, but we also know that most of the rise occurred
in the early 1900s, long before the big increase in carbon
dioxide emissions from cars and power plants. Meanwhile,
satellites have found no atmospheric warming over the past
20 years.
"Worries
about the future are based on primitive computer models
that can't even describe current conditions accurately
[without the application of 'fudge factors']. And a special
panel of the National Academy of Sciences used the word
"uncertain" 43 times in 28 pages ... in a [June 2001]
review of the state of the science."[6]
From Degrees of Uncertainty
in Climate Studies:
"[A]
study published in Science ... cautions that future
emissions of greenhouse gases and their resulting environmental
and economic consequences 'are subject to large uncertainties.'
"The study
by scientists specializing in global change at the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology and the University of North Carolina
challenged the U.N. panel's forecast of rising temperatures
over the coming century.
"'This finding
is not accompanied by any quantification of the probability
of those projections ... and the reader is left to guess
whether the likelihood of exceeding this range is 1 in
10 or 1 in 1,000,' the report said."[7]
From Cooler heads on Kyoto:
"...
developing nations, such as China and India, are exempt
from the emissions restrictions, even though such countries
are likely to produce more greenhouse gases than those in
the developed world within 15 years.
"Not that
anyone is sure if such emissions will actually contribute
to global warming, since those who read beyond the first
sentence of the recently released report from the National
Academy of Sciences (NAS) recognized (as did the scientists
who prepared the report) that while there is a correlation
between the probable warming of the Earth's surface and
man's greenhouse gas producing activities, no causation
has been established between the two. As MIT meteorologist
and member of the NAS panel Richard S. Lindzen recently
opined in The Wall Street Journal, 'We are not in a position
to confidently attribute past climate change to carbon
dioxide or to forecast what the climate will be in the
future.'"[8]
From The Truth About Global
Warming:
"
When it comes to meteorology, data can be very iffy. The
United Nations specifies that thermometer readings in harsh
polar climates, for instance, should be taken in a shelter
that is freshly painted, of a specified height, ventilated
in a certain way and so forth. When the Soviet Union fell
and Siberian data collectors stopped being paid, did they
continue to maintain the shelters? In the oceans, sometimes
data collectors take the temperature of water drawn in a
bucket over the side of a ship. Other times they put their
thermometers in the water that enters the ship’s engine
intakes. Such inconsistent practices may have something
to do with why observations show a warming at the North
Pole but not at the South, while some areas even seem to
be cooling. The overall warming trend of 0.6 degrees centigrade
in the past 100 years is just discernible above these messy
readings...."[9]
Other than the obvious, why
all the concern with all this uncertainty? Well, if we proceed
on the basis of so much uncertainty, we are embarking on a path
whose destination is unknown. The adverse consequences of such
actions are rarely considered. Yet, it is the potential harm
associated with poorly founded actions that pose a huge threat.
This concern is illustrated in A Moment On The Earth:
"Richard
Benedict, a fellow at the World Wildlife Fund, argues that "the
very existence of scientific uncertainty about global warming
should lead us to action rather than delay.' ... But can 'the
very existence of scientific uncertainty' really be an argument
for reform? After all there was, in the 1970s, a great deal
of scientific uncertainty regarding that decade's fashionable
notion that an ice age was beginning. Had Congress acted then
in advance of scientific consensus, it might have legislated
a crash program of increased carbon dioxide emissions.
"Rational environmental
decision-making is possible within a context of scientific
uncertainty. The ecorealist need only concentrate on those
actions that are justified in and of themselves, regardless
of what later research might show. In greenhouse matters ample
opportunities exist for the most important reform: increased
efficiency in the use of fossil fuels. As the economics of
the greenhouse will show, reasonable energy efficiency reforms
justify themselves, whether global temperatures are going
up, down, or sideways."[10]
The "Precautionary Principle"
Because of considerable uncertainty
within the scientific community about alleged global warming
and its causes, politicians and environmentalists need a wedge
with which they can leverage power and influence over the public.
A compliant media is most helpful, but a platform upon which
pronouncements can proceed is an even more powerful tool. Thus
was born the precautionary principle, an excuse for action
founded on fear and uncertainty.
The National Center for Policy
Analysis (NCPA) provides a good brief description of the precautionary
principle and its potential danger:
"The
'precautionary principle' says that when an activity may threaten
human health or the environment, precautionary measures should
be taken -- even if some cause and effect relations are not
established scientifically.
"However, using
this principle could increase risks to public health and the
environment if it is only applied to the potential harms,
but not the possible consequences of the precautionary measures
themselves."[11]
MIT's Dr. Richard Lindzen, in
an interview with Tech Central Station's James Glassman, provides
another cautionary view of the precautionary principle:
"[Dr.
Lindzen] Fundamentally [the precautionary principle] says, even
if you don't have the data, and even if you don't have the science,
if somebody proposes a problem, you're supposed to act on it.
And the fact of the matter is that if you're as ignorant as
that, you don't have a clue as to whether your action will help
or hurt.
"[Question]
Is the precautionary principle a scientific principle that
you scientists make?
"[Dr. Lindzen]
Good God, no. It makes no logical sense at all. The way I
summarize it is this: What they want the scientists to agree
to is that everything is connected to everything, you know,
the whole world is a system. And then they want us to agree
that everything is terribly uncertain. Well, scientists can
go along with that pretty much, although it's not so reasonable
either. But once they go along with that, the conclusions
that the environmentalists and politicians come to is anything
can cause anything, and we better do something about it! And
the second part is for adopting the precautionary principle,
because you don't know what you're doing, it means if you
have no agenda, follow my agenda."[12]
In The 4P Approach To Dealing
With Scientific Uncertainty, Costanza and Cornwell describe
the precautionary principle in terms of risk and unknown probability
(uncertainty):
"It is
necessary to differentiate between risk, which is an event with
a known probability, and true uncertainty, which is an event
with an unknown probability.
"One often sees
contradictory stories in the media from 'reputable scientific
sources' who claim, one day, that 'Global warming will occur,
and the results will be catastrophic unless something is done
immediately,' and, on another day, that 'There is no direct
evidence for global warming, and people should not waste money
on something that may or may not happen.' On yet another day,
one hears that 'Toxic chemical X causes cancer,' followed
on the next day by the statement that 'Toxic chemical X occurs
in too low a concentration in the environment to cause cancer.'
These seemingly contradictory statements from the scientific
community send social decision making process into a tailspin,
On the one hand, because scientists cannot agree on what is
happening, should policymakers wait until better information
is available before acting? On the other hand, if society
fails to act, the situation may deteriorate rapidly and irreversibly.
What are people to do in these all-too-common situations,
and why has science failed to provide the certain and unbiased
answers on which good policymaking depends? What is wrong
with the link between science and policy, and how can it be
improved? Is a different, nonregulatory approach needed for
managing the environment?
"There are several
lines of thought in environmental science and economics about
how to develop an effective approach to dealing with uncertainty.
Two of the most renowned are the 'precautionary principle,'
which has gained wide acceptance in international environmental
circles, and the 'polluter pays principle,' which has long
been advocated by environmental economists. (1) Although both
of these principles have gained wide acceptance in theory,
practical applications have been severely hampered. One criticism
is that, 'though the precautionary principle provides a useful
overall orientation, it is an insufficient basis for policy
and largely lacks legal content.' (2) Large uncertainties
about ecological damages also have caused applications of
the polluter pays principle to founder on questions of 'how
much' and 'when.' However, an environmental deposit-refund
or assurance bonding system could shift the burden of proof,
incorporate uncertainty into what the polluters pay for and
when they pay it, and thus provide strong and effective economic
incentives for both environmental precaution and technological
innovation."[13]
Through the fog of all this
uncertainty, emerges the clear perception that the precautionary
principle is rooted in the unknown, the uncertain, and fear.
Yet this "principle" is being used as the underpinning for political
decisions (Kyoto Treaty) that call for massive expenditures,
massive regulation, and massive alteration of "business as usual"
with very little potential benefit[14,15,16].
In simple terms, we are being asked to pay a huge insurance
premium against an unlikely event whose very existence is unproven
and rests on very shaky scientific foundation.
The IPCC & "Political
Science"
The "Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change" (IPCC) came to life in the late 1980's just
after the cadre of "ice-age-is-coming" scientists did their
flip-flop when global temperatures began to rise again after
nearly 50 years of decline. Ostensibly, this panel was to gather
climate scientists together to examine the whether human-induced
increases in atmospheric CO2 would lead to global
warming, and, if so, to recommend corrective actions and assess
the impact of such warming.
"Recognizing
the problem of potential global climate change the World Meteorological
Organization (WMO) and the United Nations Environment Programme
(UNEP) established the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
(IPCC) in 1988. It is open to all members of the UNEP and WMO.
The role of the IPCC is to assess the scientific, technical
and socio-economic information relevant for the understanding
of the risk of human-induced climate change. It does not carry
out new research nor does it monitor climate related data. It
bases its assessment mainly on published and peer reviewed scientific
technical literature.
"The IPCC has
three working groups and a Task Force
Working Group
I assesses the scientific aspects of the climate system
and climate change.
Working Group
II addresses the vulnerability of socio-economic and natural
systems to climate change, negative and positive consequences
of climate change, and options for adapting to it.
Working Group
III assesses options for limiting greenhouse gas emissions
and otherwise mitigating climate change.
The Task Force
on National Greenhouse Gas Inventories oversees the National
Greenhouse Gas Inventories Programme"[17]
Sounds like a reasonable idea,
provided the panel is primarily composed of meteorologists
and climatologists of sound reputation and with no political
agenda. Unfortunately, the good work done "in the trenches"
of the working groups did not always prevail in the summary
report.
This discussion is primarily
concerned with perhaps the most controversial of the IPCC efforts,
the Summary for Policymakers (SPM) of Working Group I.
However, before moving on to specifics of that report, it is
worth shedding a little light on the political background
some of the "scientific" concerns over human-induced global
warming.
From Global Warming:
The Origin and Nature of the Alleged Scientific Consensus
by Dr. Richard S. Lindzen (MIT):
"The
present [global warming] hysteria formally began in the summer
of 1988, although preparations had been put in place at least
three years earlier. That was an especially warm summer in some
regions, particularly in the United States. The abrupt increase
in temperature in the late 1970s was too abrupt to be associated
with the smooth increase in carbon dioxide. Nevertheless, James
Hansen, director of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies,
in testimony before Sen. Al Gore's Committee on Science, Technology
and Space, said, in effect, that he was 99 percent certain that
temperature had increased and that there was some greenhouse
warming. He made no statement concerning the relation between
the two.
"Despite the
fact that those remarks were virtually meaningless, they led
the environmental advocacy movement to adopt the issue immediately.
The growth of environmental advocacy since the 1970s has been
phenomenal. In Europe the movement centered on the formation
of Green parties; in the United States the movement centered
on the development of large public interest advocacy groups.
Those lobbying groups have budgets of several hundred million
dollars and employ about 50,000 people; their support is highly
valued by many political figures. As with any large groups,
self-perpetuation becomes a crucial concern. 'Global warming'
has become one of the major battle cries in their fundraising
efforts. At the same time, the media unquestioningly accept
the pronouncements of those groups as objective truth.
"Within the
large-scale climate modelling community--a small subset of
the community interested in climate--however, the immediate
response was to criticize Hansen for publicly promoting highly
uncertain model results as relevant to public policy. Hansen's
motivation was not totally obvious, but despite the criticism
of Hansen, the modelling community quickly agreed that large
warming was not impossible. That was still enough for both
the politicians and advocates who have generally held that
any hint of environmental danger is a sufficient basis for
regulation unless the hint can be rigorously disproved. That
is a particularly pernicious asymmetry, given that rigor is
generally impossible in environmental sciences.
"Other scientists
quickly agreed that with increasing carbon dioxide some warming
might be expected and that with large enough concentrations
of carbon dioxide the warming might be significant. Nevertheless,
there was widespread skepticism. By early 1989, however, the
popular media in Europe and the United States were declaring
that 'all scientists' agreed that warming was real and catastrophic
in its potential.
"As most scientists
concerned with climate, I was eager to stay out of what seemed
like a public circus. But in the summer of 1988 Lester Lave,
a professor of economics at Carnegie Mellon University, wrote
to me about being dismissed from a Senate hearing for suggesting
that the issue of global warming was scientifically controversial.
I assured him that the issue was not only controversial but
also unlikely. In the winter of 1989 Reginald Newell, a professor
of meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
lost National Science Foundation funding for data analyses
that were failing to show net warming over the past century.
Reviewers suggested that his results were dangerous to humanity.
In the spring of 1989 I was an invited participant at a global
warming symposium at Tufts University. I was the only scientist
among a panel of environmentalists. There were strident calls
for immediate action and ample expressions of impatience with
science. Claudine Schneider, then a congressman from Rhode
Island, acknowledged that 'scientists may disagree, but we
can hear Mother Earth, and she is crying.' It seemed clear
to me that a very dangerous situation was arising, and the
danger was not of 'global warming' itself.
"In the spring
of 1989 I prepared a critique of global warming, which I submitted
to Science, a magazine of the American Association for the
Advancement of Science. The paper was rejected without review
as being of no interest to the readership. I then submitted
the paper to the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society,
where it was accepted after review, rereviewed, and reaccepted--an
unusual procedure to say the least. In the meantime, the paper
was attacked in Science before it had even been published.
The paper circulated for about six months as samizdat. It
was delivered at a Humboldt conference at M.I.T. and reprinted
in the Frankfurter Allgemeine.
"In the meantime,
the global warming circus was in full swing. Meetings were
going on nonstop. One of the more striking of those meetings
was hosted in the summer of 1989 by Robert Redford at his
ranch in Sundance, Utah. Redford proclaimed that it was time
to stop research and begin acting. I suppose that that was
a reasonable suggestion for an actor to make, but it is also
indicative of the overall attitude toward science. Barbara
Streisand personally undertook to support the research of
Michael Oppenheimer at the Environmental Defense Fund, although
he is primarily an advocate and not a climatologist. Meryl
Streep made an appeal on public television to stop warming.
A bill was even prepared to guarantee Americans a stable climate.
"By the fall
of 1989 some media were becoming aware that there was controversy
(Forbes and Reader's Digest were notable in
that regard). Cries followed from environmentalists that skeptics
were receiving excessive exposure. The publication of my paper
was followed by a determined effort on the part of the editor
of the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, Richard
Hallgren, to solicit rebuttals. Such articles were prepared
by Stephen Schneider and Will Kellogg, a minor scientific
administrator for the past thirty years, and those articles
were followed by an active correspondence mostly supportive
of the skeptical spectrum of views. Indeed, a recent Gallup
poll of climate scientists in the American Meteorological
Society and in the American Geophysical Union shows that a
vast majority doubts that there has been any identifiable
man-caused warming to date (49 percent asserted no, 33 percent
did not know, 18 percent thought some has occurred; however,
among those actively involved in research and publishing frequently
in peer-reviewed research journals, none believes that any
man-caused global warming has been identified so far). On
the whole, the debate within the meteorological community
has been relatively healthy and, in this regard, unusual.
"Outside the
world of meteorology, Greenpeace's Jeremy Legett, a geologist
by training, published a book attacking critics of warming---especially
me. George Mitchell, Senate majority leader and father of
a prominent environmental activist, also published a book
urging acceptance of the warming problem (World on Fire:
Saving an Endangered Earth). Sen. Gore ... published a
book (Earth in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit).
Those are just a few examples of the rapidly growing publications
on warming. Rarely has such meager science provoked such an
outpouring of popularization by individuals who do not understand
the subject in the first place.
"The activities
of the Union of Concerned Scientists deserve special mention.
That widely supported organization was originally devoted
to nuclear disarmament. As the cold war began to end, the
group began to actively oppose nuclear power generation. Their
position was unpopular with many physicists. Over the past
few years, the organization has turned to the battle against
global warming in a particularly hysterical manner. In 1989
the group began to circulate a petition urging recognition
of global warming as potentially the great danger to mankind.
Most recipients who did not sign were solicited at least twice
more. The petition was eventually signed by 700 scientists
including a great many members of the National Academy of
Sciences and Nobel laureates. Only about three or four of
the signers, however, had any involvement in climatology.
Interestingly, the petition had two pages, and on the second
page there was a call for renewed consideration of nuclear
power. When the petition was published in the New York
Times, however, the second page was omitted. In any event,
that document helped solidify the public perception that 'all
scientists' agreed with the disaster scenario. Such a disturbing
abuse of scientific authority was not unnoticed. At the 1990
annual meeting of the National Academy of Sciences, Frank
Press, the academy's president, warned the membership against
lending their credibility to issues about which they had no
special knowledge. Special reference was made to the published
petition. In my opinion what the petition did show was that
the need to fight 'global warming' has become part of the
dogma of the liberal conscience--a dogma to which scientists
are not immune.
"At the same
time, political pressures on dissidents from the 'popular
vision' increased. Sen. Gore publicly admonished 'skeptics'
in a lengthy New York Times op-ed piece. In a perverse
example of double-speak he associated the 'true believers'
in warming with Galileo. He also referred, in another article,
to the summer of 1988 as the Kristallnacht before the warming
holocaust.
"The notion
of 'scientific unanimity' is currently intimately tied to
the Working Group I report of the Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change issued in September 1990. That panel consists
largely of scientists posted to it by government agencies.
The panel has three working groups. Working Group I nominally
deals with climate science. Approximately 150 scientists contributed
to the report, but university representation from the United
States was relatively small and is likely to remain so, since
the funds and time needed for participation are not available
to most university scientists. Many governments have agreed
to use that report as the authoritative basis for climate
policy. The report, as such, has both positive and negative
features. Methodologically, the report is deeply committed
to reliance on large models, and within the report models
are largely verified by comparison with other models. Given
that models are known to agree more with each other than with
nature (even after 'tuning'), that approach does not seem
promising. In addition, a number of the participants have
testified to the pressures placed on them to emphasize results
supportive of the current scenario and to suppress other results.
That pressure has frequently been effective, and a survey
of participants reveals substantial disagreement with the
final report. Nonetheless, the body of the report is extremely
ambiguous, and the caveats are numerous. The report is prefaced
by a policymakers' summary written by the editor, Sir John
Houghton, director of the United Kingdom Meteorological Office.
His summary largely ignores the uncertainty in the report
and attempts to present the expectation of substantial warming
as firmly based science. The summary was published as a separate
document, and, it is safe to say that policymakers are unlikely
to read anything further. On the basis of the summary, one
frequently hears that 'hundreds of the world's greatest climate
scientists from dozens of countries all agreed that.|.|.|.'
It hardly matters what the agreement refers to, since whoever
refers to the summary insists that it agrees with the most
extreme scenarios (which, in all fairness, it does not). I
should add that the climatology community, until the past
few years, was quite small and heavily concentrated in the
United States and Europe.
"While the International
Panel on Climate Change's reports were in preparation, the
National Research Council in the United States was commissioned
to prepare a synthesis of the current state of the global
change situation. The panel chosen was hardly promising. It
had no members of the academy expert in climate. Indeed, it
had only one scientist directly involved in climate, Stephen
Schneider, who is an ardent environmental advocate. It also
included three professional environmental advocates, and it
was headed by a former senator, Dan Evans. The panel did include
distinguished scientists and economists outside the area of
climate, and, perhaps because of this, the report issued by
the panel was by and large fair. The report concluded that
the scientific basis for costly action was absent, although
prudence might indicate that actions that were cheap or worth
doing anyway should be considered. A subcommittee of the panel
issued a report on adaptation that argued that even with the
more severe warming scenarios, the United States would have
little difficulty adapting. Not surprisingly, the environmentalists
on the panel not only strongly influenced the reports, but
failing to completely have their way, attempted to distance
themselves from the reports by either resigning or by issuing
minority dissents. Equally unsurprising is the fact that the
New York Times typically carried reports on that panel
on page 46. The findings were never subsequently discussed
in the popular media--except for claims that the reports supported
the catastrophic vision. Nevertheless, the reports of that
panel were indicative of the growing skepticism concerning
the warming issue."[18]
You get the idea that not all
"scientists" are created equal.
Finally, reflecting the concern
that the "... summary largely ignores the uncertainty in the
report and attempts to present the expectation of substantial
warming as firmly based science"[19]
the Bush administration asked the National Academy of Sciences
to investigate "... whether there are any substantive differences
between the IPCC Reports and the IPCC summaries."[20]
That study, Climate Change Science, in addition to addressing
the IPCC question, looked at a wide range of questions about
climate change science.
The Climate Change Science
report tiptoed around the question of whether or not the IPCC
Summary reflected the IPCC Working Group Report:
"After
analysis, the committee finds that the conclusions presented
in the SPM ... are consistent with the main body of the report.
There are, however, differences. [they're
the same, only different!?!] The primary
differences reflect the manner in which uncertainties are communicated
in the SPM. ... This difference is perhaps understandable ...
However, a thorough understanding of the uncertainties is essential
to the development of good policy decisions.
"... the IPCC
SPM could give an impression that the science of global warming
is 'settled,' even though many uncertainties still remain.
Human decisions will almost certainly alter emissions over
the next century. Because we cannot predict either the course
of human populations, technology, or societal transitions
with any clarity, the actual greenhouse gas emissions could
be either greater or less than the IPCC scenarios."[21]
Well, if a "thorough understanding"
is "essential" to "good policy decisions" then how is it that
any policy decisions are contemplated without a great
deal of additional research to remove enough of the uncertainties
so that we have a reasonably clear understanding of what in
blazes is really going on with our climate? And, even with such
research to resolve scientific uncertainty, there remains the
uncertainty of human factors -- uncertainties about which no
crystal ball can provide clarity.
It's worth examining a few of
these projections of the IPCC's Working Group I Summary for
Policymakers:
"Anthropogenic
climate change will persist for many centuries.
"Emissions
of long-lived greenhouse gases (i.e., CO2, N2O,
PFCs, SF6) have a lasting effect on atmospheric
composition, radiative forcing and climate. For example,
several centuries after CO2 emissions occur,
about a quarter of the increase in CO2 concentration
caused by these emissions is still present in the atmosphere.
"Ice sheets
will continue to react to climate warming and contribute
to sea level rise for thousands of years after climate has
been stabilised. Climate models indicate that the local
warming over Greenland is likely to be one to three times
the global average. Ice sheet models project that a local
warming of larger than 3°C, if sustained for millennia,
would lead to virtually a complete melting of the Greenland
ice sheet with a resulting sea level rise of about 7 metres.
A local warming of 5.5°C, if sustained for 1000 years,
would be likely to result in a contribution from Greenland
of about 3 metres to sea level rise.
"Current ice
dynamic models suggest that the West Antarctic ice sheet
could contribute up to 3 metres to sea level rise over the
next 1000 years, but such results are strongly dependent
on model assumptions regarding climate change scenarios,
ice dynamics and other factors."[22]
The first projection of long-lingering
CO2 emissions flies in the face of the known annual
consumption of CO2 due to natural CO2
"sinks" (e.g., plant photosynthesis).
As discussed in Part 5: Warming - Human Influence
& Climate Simulation Models, according to Oak Ridge
National Laboratory estimates, natural processes release about
200 billion tons of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere each year
(through volcanic activity, natural forest fires, plant decay
and the oceans. Each year, natural processes remove about
the same amount of atmospheric CO2 through the actions
of ocean plankton, algae, chemical weathering of rock, plant
growth (primarily trees) and desert soil absorption. Only about
2% of the natural carbon cycle CO2 is present in
the atmosphere at any given time.[23]
How can something consumed so readily escape consumption for
"several centuries?"
The projection that suggests
shrinking or disappearing ice sheets flies in the face of contrary
evidence (which suggests no global warming at all):
"The
Odden ice tongue is a winter ice cover phenomenon that occurs
in the Greenland Sea with a length of about 1300 km and an aerial
coverage of as much as 330,000 square kilometers. ... the Odden
ice tongue has persisted, virtually unchanged in the mean during
the past 20-years ... along with the observational evidence
from Jan Mayen Island that temperatures there actually cooled
at a rate of -0.15 +/- 0.03°C per decade during the past
75 years, bolsters the climate realist claim that there has
been no global warming for the past 70 years."[24]
and:
"...
there's been some good news about Arctic ice that the media
have chosen to ignore. A Swedish researcher, performing a re-examination
of the data garnered on Arctic ice by U.S. submarine measurements,
reported in Geophysical Research Letters in March [2001]
that there has been no thinning of ice in the Arctic Sea for
the last dozen years."[25]
The IPCC projection that melting
of "the West Antarctic ice sheet could contribute up to 3 metres
to sea level rise over the next 1000 years" again flies in the
face of the reality:
"With
respect to Antarctic sea ice trends, the picture is much more
clear. Yuan and Martinson (2000)[26]
utilized satellite data over the past 18 years to determine
that the net trend in the mean Antarctic sea ice edge has expanded
equatorward by 0.011 degree of latitude per year. Furthermore,
Watkins and Simmonds[27] reported
finding statistically significant increases in both sea ice
area and total sea ice extent between 1987 and 1996; and combining
their results with earlier results for the period 1978-1987,
both parameters showed increases over the entire 1978-1996 period.
In addition, Watkins and Simmonds indicate that the 1990s exhibited
increases in the sea ice season length.
"In considering
all of the above results (recent sea ice increases in Antarctica
and no significant trends in the Arctic), it is likely that
the global extent of sea ice is on the rise. Such observational
evidence flies in the face of model predictions of global
warming that say climate will change first and to the greatest
extent in earth's polar regions."[28]
It would be a safe bet that
uncertainty extends beyond scientific knowledge and validity
of data. One must question "scientists" whose motivations seem
oriented politically rather than scientifically. Certainly the
IPCC Summary report has a serious credibility problem, given
its heavy reliance on unproven computer models and its dismissal
of evidence contrary to what appear to be pre-ordained conclusions
based on political considerations.
Lindzen,
Dr. Richard S. (Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology,
Massachuesetts Institute of Technology) in an interview with
James K. Glassman (Kyoto
"Absurd" Says MIT Scientist) of Tech
Central Station, March 5, 2001.
Lindzen,
Dr. Richard S. (Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology,
Massachuesetts Institute of Technology) in Global Warming:
The Origin and Nature of the Alleged Scientific Consensus,
4th & 10th paragraphs.
Glassman,
James K., in a TechCentralStation.com
article: Kyoto Is Still Doomed, July 25, 2001.
Pianin,
Eric, in a WashingtonPost.com
article: Degrees of Uncertainty in Climate Studies,
July 20, 2001.
Lindzen,
Dr. Richard S. (MIT), in an interview with J. K. Glassman
(Kyoto
"Absurd" Says MIT Scientist) of Tech
Central Station, March 5, 2001 stated "...
our personal feeling is that ... due to man's activities,
we don't expect much more than a degree [of warming] and probably
a lot less by 2100."
Baliunas,
Sallie, (An
Assessment Built On Guesswork), June 28, 2001 stated
"... according to controls envisioned
in the Kyoto Protocol the temperature difference at the end
of the next century -- if the world did nothing as
compared with holding per-capita emissions at present levels
-- would amount to about 0.25°C. That's not nearly enough
to have any environmental impact, and could prove very expensive
if done abruptly."
Baliunas,
Sallie, (Bush
Right to Oppose Treaty), July 25, 2001 stated "Even
the inflated forecasts say that at best the Kyoto Protocol
would accomplish an insignificant reduction in CO2
and a cooling of less than 0.5-degree Fahrenheit by the 22nd
century."
Lindzen,
Dr. Richard S. (Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology,
Massachuesetts Institute of Technology) in Global Warming:
The Origin and Nature of the Alleged Scientific Consensus
Ibid
Letter
from the White House to Dr. Bruce Alberts, National Academy
of Sciences, May 11, 2001.
Climate
Change Science, National Academy of Sciences report, pp
22-23.
Summary
for Policymakers - A Report of Working Group I of the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change, p 17.
Easterbrook,
Gregg, A Moment On The Earth, pp 295-296.
Yuan,
X. and Martinson, D.G., 2000, Antarctic sea ice extent variability
and its global on a short climatology, Journal of Climate
Vol. 13, pp 4441-4451.
Watkins,
A.B. and Simmonds, I., 2000, Current trends in Antarctic sea;
The 1990s impact variability and its global connectivity,
Journal of Climate Vol. 13, pp 1697-1717.
