Climate
change campaigners: 100 reasons why climate change is natural and not
man-made
Tuesday
December 15,2009
HERE are
the 100 reasons, released in a dossier issued by the European
Foundation, why
climate change is natural and not man-made:
1) There
is “no real scientific proof” that the current warming is caused by the
rise of
greenhouse gases from man’s activity.
2)
Man-made carbon dioxide emissions throughout human history constitute
less than
0.00022 percent of the total naturally emitted from the mantle of the
earth
during geological history.
3) Warmer
periods of the Earth’s history came around 800 years before rises in
CO2
levels.
4) After
World War II, there was a huge surge in recorded CO2 emissions but
global
temperatures fell for four decades after 1940.
5)
Throughout the Earth’s history, temperatures have often been warmer
than now
and CO2 levels have often been higher – more than ten times as high.
6)
Significant changes in climate have continually occurred throughout
geologic
time.
7) The
0.7C increase in the average global temperature over the last hundred
years is
entirely consistent with well-established, long-term, natural climate
trends.
8) The
IPCC theory is driven by just 60 scientists and favourable reviewers
not the
4,000 usually cited.
9) Leaked
e-mails from British climate scientists – in a scandal known as
“Climate-gate”
- suggest that that has been manipulated to exaggerate global warming
10) A
large body of scientific research suggests that the sun is responsible
for the
greater share of climate change during the past hundred years.
11)
Politicians and activiists claim rising sea levels are a direct cause
of global
warming but sea levels rates have been increasing steadily since the
last ice
age 10,000 ago
12)
Philip Stott, Emeritus Professor of Biogeography at the School of
Oriental and
African Studies in London says climate change is too complicated to be
caused
by just one factor, whether CO2 or clouds
13) Peter
Lilley MP said last month that “fewer people in Britain than in any
other
country believe in the importance of global warming. That is despite
the fact
that our Government and our political class—predominantly—are more
committed to
it than their counterparts in any other country in the world”.
14) In
pursuit of the global warming rhetoric, wind farms will do very little
to
nothing to reduce CO2 emissions
15)
Professor Plimer, Professor of Geology and Earth Sciences at the
University of
Adelaide, stated that the idea of taking a single trace gas in the
atmosphere,
accusing it and finding it guilty of total responsibility for climate
change,
is an “absurdity”
16) A
Harvard University astrophysicist and geophysicist, Willie Soon, said
he is
“embarrassed and puzzled” by the shallow science in papers that support
the
proposition that the earth faces a climate crisis caused by global
warming.
17) The
science of what determines the earth’s temperature is in fact far from
settled
or understood.
18)
Despite activist concerns over CO2 levels, CO2 is a minor greenhouse
gas,
unlike water vapour which is tied to climate concerns, and which we
can’t even
pretend to control
19) A
petition by scientists trying to tell the world that the political and
media
portrayal of global warming is false was put forward in the Heidelberg
Appeal
in 1992. Today, more than 4,000 signatories, including 72 Nobel Prize
winners,
from 106 countries have signed it.
20) It is
claimed the average global temperature increased at a dangerously fast
rate in
the 20th century but the recent rate of average global temperature rise
has
been between 1 and 2 degrees C per century - within natural rates
21)
Professor Zbigniew Jaworowski, Chairman of the Scientific Council of
the
Central Laboratory for Radiological Protection in Warsaw, Poland says
the
earth’s temperature has more to do with cloud cover and water vapor
than CO2
concentration in the atmosphere.
22) There
is strong evidence from solar studies which suggests that the Earth’s
current
temperature stasis will be followed by climatic cooling over the next
few
decades
23) It is
myth that receding glaciers are proof of global warming as glaciers
have been
receding and growing cyclically for many centuries
24) It is
a falsehood that the earth’s poles are warming because that is natural
variation and while the western Arctic may be getting somewhat warmer
we also
see that the Eastern Arctic and Greenland are getting colder
25) The
IPCC claims climate driven “impacts on biodiversity are significant and
of key
relevance” but those claims are simply not supported by scientific
research
26) The
IPCC threat of climate change to the world’s species does not make
sense as
wild species are at least one million years old, which means they have
all been
through hundreds of climate cycles
27)
Research goes strongly against claims that CO2-induced global warming
would
cause catastrophic disintegration of the Greenland and Antarctic Ice
Sheets.
28)
Despite activist concerns over CO2 levels, rising CO2 levels are our
best hope
of raising crop yields to feed an ever-growing population
29) The
biggest climate change ever experienced on earth took place around 700
million
years ago
30) The
slight increase in temperature which has been observed since 1900 is
entirely
consistent with well-established, long-term natural climate cycles
31)
Despite activist concerns over CO2 levels, rising CO2 levels of some
so-called
“greenhouse gases” may be contributing to higher oxygen levels and
global
cooling, not warming
32)
Accurate satellite, balloon and mountain top observations made over the
last
three decades have not shown any significant change in the long term
rate of
increase in global temperatures
33)
Today’s CO2 concentration of around 385 ppm is very low compared to
most of the
earth’s history – we actually live in a carbon-deficient atmosphere
34) It is
a myth that CO2 is the most common greenhouse gas because greenhouse
gases form
about 3% of the atmosphere by volume, and CO2 constitutes about 0.037%
of the
atmosphere
35) It is
a myth that computer models verify that CO2 increases will cause
significant
global warming because computer models can be made to “verify” anything
36) There
is no scientific or statistical evidence whatsoever that global warming
will
cause more storms and other weather extremes
37) One
statement deleted from a UN report in 1996 stated that “none of the
studies
cited above has shown clear evidence that we can attribute the observed
climate
changes to increases in greenhouse gases”
38) The
world “warmed” by 0.07 +/- 0.07 degrees C from 1999 to 2008, not the
0.20
degrees C expected by the IPCC
39) The
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says “it is likely that
future
tropical cyclones (typhoons and hurricanes) will become more intense”
but there
has been no increase in the intensity or frequency of tropical cyclones
globally
40)
Rising CO2 levels in the atmosphere can be shown not only to have a
negligible
effect on the Earth’s many ecosystems, but in some cases to be a
positive help
to many organisms
41)
Researchers who compare and contrast climate change impact on
civilizations
found warm periods are beneficial to mankind and cold periods harmful
42) The
Met Office asserts we are in the hottest decade since records began but
this is
precisely what the world should expect if the climate is cyclical
43)
Rising CO2 levels increase plant growth and make plants more resistant
to
drought and pests
44) The
historical increase in the air’s CO2 content has improved human
nutrition by
raising crop yields during the past 150 years
45) The
increase of the air’s CO2 content has probably helped lengthen human
lifespans
since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution
46) The
IPCC alleges that “climate change currently contributes to the global
burden of
disease and premature deaths” but the evidence shows that higher
temperatures
and rising CO2 levels has helped global populations
47) In
May of 2004, the Russian Academy of Sciences published a report
concluding that
the Kyoto Protocol has no scientific grounding at all.
48) The
“Climate-gate” scandal pointed to a expensive public campaign of
disinformation
and the denigration of scientists who opposed the belief that CO2
emissions
were causing climate change
49) The
head of Britain’s climate change watchdog has predicted households will
need to
spend up to £15,000 on a full energy efficiency makeover if the
Government is
to meet its ambitious targets for cutting carbon emissions.
50) Wind
power is unlikely to be the answer to our energy needs. The wind power
industry
argues that there are “no direct subsidies” but it involves a total
subsidy of
as much as £60 per MWh which falls directly on electricity
consumers. This
burden will grow in line with attempts to achieve Wind power targets,
according
to a recent OFGEM report.
51) Wind
farms are not an efficient way to produce energy. The British Wind
Energy
Association (BWEA) accepts a figure of 75 per cent back-up power is
required.
52)
Global temperatures are below the low end of IPCC predictions not at
“at the
top end of IPCC estimates”
53)
Climate alarmists have raised the concern over acidification of the
oceans but
Tom Segalstad from Oslo University in Norway , and others, have noted
that the
composition of ocean water – including CO2, calcium, and water – can
act as a
buffering agent in the acidification of the oceans.
54) The
UN’s IPCC computer models of human-caused global warming predict the
emergence
of a “hotspot” in the upper troposphere over the tropics.
Former researcher in the Australian
Department of Climate Change, David Evans, said there is no evidence of
such a
hotspot
56) The
manner in which US President Barack Obama sidestepped Congress to order
emission cuts shows how undemocratic and irrational the entire
international
decision-making process has become with regards to emission-target
setting.
57)
William Kininmonth, a former head of the National Climate Centre and a
consultant to the World Meteorological Organisation, wrote “the likely
extent
of global temperature rise from a doubling of CO2 is less than 1C. Such
warming
is well within the envelope of variation experienced during the past
10,000
years and insignificant in the context of glacial cycles during the
past
million years, when Earth has been predominantly very cold and covered
by
extensive ice sheets.”
58)
Canada has shown the world targets derived from the existing Kyoto
commitments
were always unrealistic and did not work for the country.
59) In
the lead up to the Copenhagen summit, David Davis MP said of previous
climate
summits, at Rio de Janeiro in 1992 and Kyoto in 1997 that many had
promised
greater cuts, but “neither happened”, but we are continuing along the
same lines.
61) The
UN’s panel on climate change warned that Himalayan glaciers could melt
to a
fifth of current levels by 2035. J. Graham Cogley a professor at
Ontario Trent
University, claims this inaccurate stating the UN authors got the date
from an
earlier report wrong by more than 300 years.
62) Under
existing Kyoto obligations the EU has attempted to claim success, while
actually increasing emissions by 13 per cent, according to Lord Lawson.
In
addition the EU has pursued this scheme by purchasing “offsets” from
countries
such as China paying them billions of dollars to destroy atmospheric
pollutants, such as CFC-23, which were manufactured purely in order to
be
destroyed.
63) It is
claimed that the average global temperature was relatively unchanging
in
pre-industrial times but sky-rocketed since 1900, and will increase by
several
degrees more over the next 100 years according to Penn State University
researcher Michael Mann. There is no convincing empirical evidence that
past
climate was unchanging, nor that 20th century changes in average global
temperature were unusual or unnatural.
64)
Michael Mann of Penn State University has actually shown that the
Medieval Warm
Period and the Little Ice Age did in fact exist, which contrasts with
his
earlier work which produced the “hockey stick graph” which showed a
constant
temperature over the past thousand years or so followed by a recent
dramatic
upturn.
65) The
globe’s current approach to climate change in which major
industrialised
countries agree to nonsensical targets for their CO2 emissions by a
given date,
as it has been under the Kyoto system, is very expensive.
66) The
“Climate-gate” scandal revealed that a scientific team had emailed one
another
about using a “trick” for the sake of concealing a “decline” in
temperatures
when looking at the history of the Earth’s temperature.
67)
Global temperatures have not risen in any statistically-significant
sense for
15 years and have actually been falling for nine years. The
“Climate-gate”
scandal revealed a scientific team had expressed dismay at the fact
global
warming was contrary to their predictions and admitted their inability
to
explain it was “a travesty”.
68) The
IPCC predicts that a warmer planet will lead to more extreme weather,
including
drought, flooding, storms, snow, and wildfires. But over the last
century,
during which the IPCC claims the world experienced more rapid warming
than any
time in the past two millennia, the world did not experience
significantly
greater trends in any of these extreme weather events.
69) In
explaining the average temperature standstill we are currently
experiencing,
the Met Office Hadley Centre ran a series of computer climate
predictions and
found in many of the computer runs there were decade-long standstills
but none
for 15 years – so it expects global warming to resume swiftly.
71)
Despite the 1997 Kyoto Protocol’s status as the flagship of the fight
against
climate change it has been a failure.
72) The
first phase of the EU’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), which ran from
2005 to
2007 was a failure. Huge over-allocation of permits to pollute led to a
collapse in the price of carbon from €33 to just €0.20 per tonne
meaning the
system did not reduce emissions at all.
73) The
EU trading scheme, to manage carbon emissions has completely failed and
actually allows European businesses to duck out of making their
emissions
reductions at home by offsetting, which means paying for cuts to be
made
overseas instead.
74) To
date “cap and trade” carbon markets have done almost nothing to reduce
emissions.
75) In
the United States , the cap-and-trade is an approach designed to
control carbon
emissions and will impose huge costs upon American citizens via a
carbon tax on
all goods and services produced in the United States. The average
family of
four can expect to pay an additional $1700, or £1,043, more each
year. It is
predicted that the United States will lose more than 2 million jobs as
the
result of cap-and-trade schemes.
76) Dr
Roy Spencer, a principal research scientist at the University of
Alabama in
Huntsville, has indicated that out of the 21 climate models tracked by
the IPCC
the differences in warming exhibited by those models is mostly the
result of
different strengths of positive cloud feedback – and that increasing
CO2 is
insufficient to explain global-average warming in the last 50 to 100
years.
77) Why
should politicians devote our scarce resources in a globally
competitive world
to a false and ill-defined problem, while ignoring the real problems
the entire
planet faces, such as: poverty, hunger, disease or terrorism.
78) A
proper analysis of ice core records from the past 650,000 years
demonstrates
that temperature increases have come before, and not resulted from,
increases
in CO2 by hundreds of years.
79) Since
the cause of global warming is mostly natural, then there is in actual
fact
very little we can do about it. (We are still not able to control the
sun).
80) A
substantial number of the panel of 2,500 climate scientists on the
United
Nation’s International Panel on Climate Change, which created a
statement on
scientific unanimity on climate change and man-made global warming,
were found
to have serious concerns.
81) The
UK’s Met Office has been forced this year to re-examine 160 years of
temperature data after admitting that public confidence in the science
on
man-made global warming has been shattered by revelations about the
data.
82) Politicians and activists push for
renewable
energy sources such as wind turbines under the rhetoric of climate
change, but
it is essentially about money – under the system of Renewable
Obligations. Much
of the money is paid for by consumers in electricity bills. It amounts
to £1
billion a year.
83) The
“Climate-gate” scandal revealed that a scientific team had tampered
with their
own data so as to conceal inconsistencies and errors.
84) The
“Climate-gate” scandal revealed that a scientific team had campaigned
for the
removal of a learned journal’s editor, solely because he did not share
their
willingness to debase science for political purposes.
85)
Ice-core data clearly show that temperatures change centuries before
concentrations of atmospheric CO2 change. Thus, there appears to be
little
evidence for insisting that changes in concentrations of CO2 are the
cause of
past temperature and climate change.
86) There
are no experimentally verified processes explaining how CO2
concentrations can
fall in a few centuries without falling temperatures – in fact it is
changing
temperatures which cause changes in CO2 concentrations, which is
consistent
with experiments that show CO2 is the atmospheric gas most readily
absorbed by
water.
87) The
Government’s Renewable Energy Strategy contains a massive increase in
electricity
generation by wind power costing around £4 billion a year over
the next twenty
years. The benefits will be only £4 to £5 billion overall
(not per annum). So
costs will outnumber benefits by a range of between eleven and
seventeen times.
88) Whilst
CO2 levels have indeed changed for various reasons, human and
otherwise, just
as they have throughout history, the CO2 content of the atmosphere has
increased since the beginning of the industrial revolution, and the
growth rate
has now been constant for the past 25 years.
89) It is
a myth that CO2 is a pollutant, because nitrogen forms 80% of our
atmosphere
and human beings could not live in 100% nitrogen either: CO2 is no more
a
pollutant than nitrogen is and CO2 is essential to life.
90)
Politicians and climate activists make claims to rising sea levels but
certain
members in the IPCC chose an area to measure in Hong Kong that is
subsiding.
They used the record reading of 2.3 mm per year rise of sea level.
91) The
accepted global average temperature statistics used by the
Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change show that no ground-based warming has occurred
since
1998.
92) If
one factors in non-greenhouse influences such as El Nino events and
large
volcanic eruptions, lower atmosphere satellite-based temperature
measurements
show little, if any, global warming since 1979, a period over which
atmospheric
CO2 has increased by 55 ppm (17 per cent).
93) US
President Barack Obama pledged to cut emissions by 2050 to equal those
of 1910
when there were 92 million Americans. In 2050, there will be 420
million
Americans, so Obama’s promise means that emissions per head will be
approximately what they were in 1875. It simply will not happen.
94) The
European Union has already agreed to cut emissions by 20 percent to
2020,
compared with 1990 levels, and is willing to increase the target to 30
percent.
However, these are unachievable and the EU has already massively failed
with
its Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), as EU emissions actually rose by
0.8
percent from 2005 to 2006 and are known to be well above the Kyoto goal.
95)
Australia has stated it wants to slash greenhouse emissions by up to 25
percent
below 2000 levels by 2020, but the pledges were so unpopular that the
country’s
Senate has voted against the carbon trading Bill, and the Opposition’s
Party
leader has now been ousted by a climate change sceptic.
96)
Canada plans to reduce emissions by 20 percent compared with 2006
levels by
2020, representing approximately a 3 percent cut from 1990 levels but
it
simultaneously defends its Alberta tar sands emissions and its record
as one of
the world’s highest per-capita emissions setters.
97) India
plans to reduce the ratio of emissions to production by 20-25 percent
compared
with 2005 levels by 2020, but all Government officials insist that
since India
has to grow for its development and poverty alleviation, it has to
emit,
because the economy is driven by carbon.
98) The
Leipzig Declaration in 1996, was signed by 110 scientists who said: “We
– along
with many of our fellow citizens – are apprehensive about the climate
treaty
conference scheduled for Kyoto, Japan, in December 1997” and “based on
all the
evidence available to us, we cannot subscribe to the politically
inspired world
view that envisages climate catastrophes and calls for hasty actions.”
99) A US
Oregon Petition Project stated “We urge the United States government to
reject
the global warming agreement that was written in Kyoto, Japan in
December,
1997, and any other similar proposals. The proposed limits on
greenhouse gases
would harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and
technology, and
damage the health and welfare of mankind. There is no convincing
scientific
evidence that human release of CO2, methane, or other greenhouse gasses
is
causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating
of the
Earth’s atmosphere and disruption of the Earth’s climate.”
100) A
report by the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change
concluded
“We find no support for the IPCC’s claim that climate observations
during the
twentieth century are either unprecedented or provide evidence of an
anthropogenic effect on climate.”