Global warming theory proving sound
The Free Press, Mankato, MN
January 16, 2012
By Tom Maertens
Thirteen of the warmest years ever recorded have occurred within the last 15 years, according to the UN’s World Meteorological Organisation. In addition, mankind’s emissions of planet-warming gases, including 36 billion tons of carbon dioxide, reached its highest level ever in 2010.
And as climate scientists predicted, we are seeing a rapid increase in catastrophic weather events. A November report by the Nobel Prize-winning United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded that rising temperatures will bring about an increase in the frequency and intensity of heat waves, along with more frequent hurricanes, droughts and floods, and will result in rising sea levels.
Indeed, in 2011, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration tallied a dozen (vice the usual 3 or 4) weather disasters — defined as costing $1 billion or more — including record heat waves, droughts and subsequent wildfires that scorched the Southwest, and extreme flooding in the Northeast and the Mississippi River Valley. The final costs will exceed $50 billion.
The American Association for the Advancement of Science, the world’s largest general-scientific society, has stated that “The scientific evidence is clear: Global climate change caused by human activities is occurring now, and it is a growing threat to society.”
The world’s leading climate scientists say that continued warming will melt polar ice caps and glaciers and raise sea levels in this century by three to six feet, drowning London, Bangkok, Venice, Cairo and Shanghai, along with low-lying countries like Bangladesh and the Maldives.
The U.S. National Academy of Sciences released a study last May that concluded: “Climate change is occurring, is very likely caused by human activities, and poses significant risks for a broad range of human and natural systems.”
According to the National Journal, the academies of science of Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Japan, Mexico, Russia, and the United Kingdom have independently published similar conclusions. So have many other scientific bodies, including the American Chemical Society, the American Geophysical Union, the American Institute of Physics, the American Medical Association, the American Meteorological Society, the American Physical Society, the American Society of Agronomy, the American Society for Microbiology, the Crop Science Society of America, the Geological Society of America, the Soil Science Society of America, and the World Health Organization.
No scientific body of national or international standing has dissented from those conclusions.
The National Intelligence Council, which produces government-wide intelligence analyses, and Pentagon advisory panels have concluded that climate change would likely affect our national security by creating food shortages, water crises and catastrophic flooding abroad, resulting in millions of economic refugees.
Faced with that overwhelming scientific consensus, you would think that the United States would be taking action to slow global warming.
But you would be wrong.
We have today in the U.S. the only major political party in the world that rejects global warming, today’s version of a flat-earth society, the Republican Party.
This same party — which disputes evolution, the age of the earth and stem cell research — has become radically anti-environment; the New York Times reported that House Republicans have forced an astonishing 170-plus anti-environment votes during 2011. Simultaneously, they are conducting a jihad against the EPA, including its recent decision requiring power plants to control mercury and 84 other toxic emissions. The EPA estimates the regulation will prevent as many as 11,000 premature deaths, 4,700 heart attacks, and 130,000 cases of childhood asthma symptoms every year.
Exxon Mobil has supported over 40 organizations paid to deny global warming and has offered to pay up to $10,000 for “scholarly” papers that deny global warming, which attracts a few contrarian scientists but even more cranks. Koch Industries and other carbon-based companies promote the same flat-earth science through front-groups such as Americans for Prosperity.
These groups and their hirelings are peddling a bogus story, based on pilfered emails from East Anglia University, that allegedly undermines global warming. Five independent investigations have concluded that the emails, while demonstrating the frustrations and anger of climate scientists at denialists’ tactics, do nothing to undermine the science.
The Republican base apparently buys into their well-financed disinformation campaign, however, even though it requires them to believe that climate scientists are all lying but Republican politicians are telling the truth — an astonishing, costly “triumph” of corporatist propaganda over the gullible and the ignorant.
January 16, 2012
By Tom Maertens
Thirteen of the warmest years ever recorded have occurred within the last 15 years, according to the UN’s World Meteorological Organisation. In addition, mankind’s emissions of planet-warming gases, including 36 billion tons of carbon dioxide, reached its highest level ever in 2010.
And as climate scientists predicted, we are seeing a rapid increase in catastrophic weather events. A November report by the Nobel Prize-winning United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded that rising temperatures will bring about an increase in the frequency and intensity of heat waves, along with more frequent hurricanes, droughts and floods, and will result in rising sea levels.
Indeed, in 2011, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration tallied a dozen (vice the usual 3 or 4) weather disasters — defined as costing $1 billion or more — including record heat waves, droughts and subsequent wildfires that scorched the Southwest, and extreme flooding in the Northeast and the Mississippi River Valley. The final costs will exceed $50 billion.
The American Association for the Advancement of Science, the world’s largest general-scientific society, has stated that “The scientific evidence is clear: Global climate change caused by human activities is occurring now, and it is a growing threat to society.”
The world’s leading climate scientists say that continued warming will melt polar ice caps and glaciers and raise sea levels in this century by three to six feet, drowning London, Bangkok, Venice, Cairo and Shanghai, along with low-lying countries like Bangladesh and the Maldives.
The U.S. National Academy of Sciences released a study last May that concluded: “Climate change is occurring, is very likely caused by human activities, and poses significant risks for a broad range of human and natural systems.”
According to the National Journal, the academies of science of Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Japan, Mexico, Russia, and the United Kingdom have independently published similar conclusions. So have many other scientific bodies, including the American Chemical Society, the American Geophysical Union, the American Institute of Physics, the American Medical Association, the American Meteorological Society, the American Physical Society, the American Society of Agronomy, the American Society for Microbiology, the Crop Science Society of America, the Geological Society of America, the Soil Science Society of America, and the World Health Organization.
No scientific body of national or international standing has dissented from those conclusions.
The National Intelligence Council, which produces government-wide intelligence analyses, and Pentagon advisory panels have concluded that climate change would likely affect our national security by creating food shortages, water crises and catastrophic flooding abroad, resulting in millions of economic refugees.
Faced with that overwhelming scientific consensus, you would think that the United States would be taking action to slow global warming.
But you would be wrong.
We have today in the U.S. the only major political party in the world that rejects global warming, today’s version of a flat-earth society, the Republican Party.
This same party — which disputes evolution, the age of the earth and stem cell research — has become radically anti-environment; the New York Times reported that House Republicans have forced an astonishing 170-plus anti-environment votes during 2011. Simultaneously, they are conducting a jihad against the EPA, including its recent decision requiring power plants to control mercury and 84 other toxic emissions. The EPA estimates the regulation will prevent as many as 11,000 premature deaths, 4,700 heart attacks, and 130,000 cases of childhood asthma symptoms every year.
Exxon Mobil has supported over 40 organizations paid to deny global warming and has offered to pay up to $10,000 for “scholarly” papers that deny global warming, which attracts a few contrarian scientists but even more cranks. Koch Industries and other carbon-based companies promote the same flat-earth science through front-groups such as Americans for Prosperity.
These groups and their hirelings are peddling a bogus story, based on pilfered emails from East Anglia University, that allegedly undermines global warming. Five independent investigations have concluded that the emails, while demonstrating the frustrations and anger of climate scientists at denialists’ tactics, do nothing to undermine the science.
The Republican base apparently buys into their well-financed disinformation campaign, however, even though it requires them to believe that climate scientists are all lying but Republican politicians are telling the truth — an astonishing, costly “triumph” of corporatist propaganda over the gullible and the ignorant.
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