Alternative Opinions (Criticisms) of Global Climate Change

 

Global Warming Information Page - http://www.globalwarming.org/

  • This web site is a project of the Cooler Heads Coalition, a sub-group of the National Consumer Coalition formed to dispel the myths of global warming by exposing flawed economic, scientific, and risk analysis.
  • National Consumer Coalition was formed by Consumer Alert in late 1996 as an on-going coalition of market-oriented national and state-level policy and activist groups, which focus on consumer issues in the policy arena. Jointly representing over 2,000,000 individuals, the NCC currently includes 24 member groups. 
  • Since many NCC members are non-profit, non-partisan 501(c)(3) organizations, NCC does not engage in lobbying. NCC promotes broad educational activities, and members have submitted comments to federal agencies and testified on behalf of consumers. The NCC's agenda is determined by the member groups.
  • Their version of global warming in brief - http://www.globalwarming.org/brochure.html
  • Featured in their section Fact vs. Fiction:  Global Warming "Consensus" Claim Doesn't Hold Water  Scientists Simply Don't Agree That Global Warming is Occurring.  Talking Points on the Environment #38 The National Center for Public Policy Research - http://www.nationalcenter.org/TP38.html
  • Student Research Page - http://www.globalwarming.org/brief/student.htm

 

CO2 Science Magazine - http://www.co2science.org/

  • The Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change was created to disseminate factual reports and sound commentary on new developments in the world-wide scientific quest to determine the climatic and biological consequences of the ongoing rise in the air's CO2 content. 
  • It meets this objective through weekly online publication of its CO2 Science Magazine, which contains editorials on topics of current concern and mini-reviews of recently published peer-reviewed scientific journal articles, books, and other educational materials. 
  • The Center attempts to separate reality from rhetoric in the emotionally-charged debate that swirls around the subject of carbon dioxide and global change.  In addition, to help students and teachers gain greater insight into the biological aspects of this phenomenon, the Center maintains on-line instructions on how to conduct CO2 enrichment and depletion experiments in its Global Change Laboratory, which allow interested parties to conduct similar studies in their own homes and classrooms
  • To support their claim that "There Has Been No Global Warming for the Past 70 Years," each week highlights the temperature record of one of the 1221 U.S. Historical Climatology Network (USHCN) stations.  The USHCN data set is one of the highest quality sources of directly-measured climate information on the planet.
  • Center Experiments http://www.co2science.org/experiments/global.htm

o       effective techniques that will enable you to conduct your own research into questions related to potential CO2-induced environmental change, showing you in both words and pictures how to set up your experiment, conduct the study, and obtain and analyze the data.  In addition, for certain specific experiments we include weekly tabulations of data, along with pictures of the plants, so you can continually check to see if your study is progressing as it should.

 

George C. Marshall Institute Program on Global Warming - http://www.marshall.org/globalwarming.htm

  • Center Experiments http://www.co2science.org/experiments/global.htm - The Marshall Institute is committed to investigating the facts behind global climate change, and problems surrounding the politicization of science in this area. In addition, the Marshall Institute has been a pioneer in the study of the implications of the Kyoto Protocol upon national security.
  • Articles include
    • Why So Hot? Don't Blame Man, Blame the Sun By Sallie Baliunas; Published in The Wall Street Journal on August 5, 1999 - http://www.marshall.org/baliunaswsj.htm
    • INCREASING CARBON DIOXIDE AND GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE.  S. Baliunas and W. Soon, Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.  Presented for the Southen Weed Science Society - http://www.marshall.org/baliunasweeds.htm
      • ABSTRACT - No evidence can be found for catastrophic global warming from the recent rise in the air’s carbon dioxide content as a result of human activities. The elevated carbon dioxide concentration in the air  has, however, had a positive impact on plant growth.

 

Hoover Institute -  http://www-hoover.stanford.edu/

  • Generate, publish, and disseminate ideas that encourage positive policy formation using reasoned arguments and intellectual rigor, converting conceptual insights into practical initiatives judged to be beneficial to society
  • Thomas Gale Moore, Senior Fellow Publications:

 

Competitive Enterprise Institute - http://www.cei.org/

  • Non-profit public policy organization dedicated to the principles of free enterprise and limited government; believe that consumers are best helped not by government regulation but by being allowed to make their own choices in a free marketplace.
  • Issue areas include air pollution and global warming
  • Supports Cooler Heads Group
  • Proclaimed “Greatest Hits” of the Institute include
    • “The Costs of Kyoto” - http://www.cei.org/books/costsofkyoto.html which suggests that the risks of global warming may be less than the risks imposed by global warming policy.
    • Earth Report 2000 - http://www.cei.org/EBBReader.asp?ID=854 - Ten premier scholars shatter the myths of overpopulation, food, global warming, and pesticides, while redirecting environmentalists' concerns to the far more urgent problems of fisheries, fresh water, and third-world pollution--and the political causes behind them.  The book is a calm and rational examination of what we do know, and what we don’t know, concerning the ecology of the planet. These issues are not only relevant to current debate, but are also hotly debated in the scientific community.

 

Heartland Institute’s Instant Expert’s Guide to Global Warming - http://www.heartland.org/studies/ieguide.htm

  • Coined term Common Sense Environmentalists, who believe:
  • The threat of catastrophic global climate change is currently the most hyped and least scientifically defensible environmental threat propounded by the national environmental movement.
  • Most scientists do not believe we are dangerously interfering with the global climate; most believe a slight warming and rising levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) would be beneficial to human progress and wildlife.
  • Mandating reductions in CO2 emissions would have devastating economic consequences, especially for rural America, and produce an almost imperceptible impact on the global climate.
  • Continued pounding on the global warming drum threatens to discredit the entire environmental movement. It's time to move on to more important, better understood, environmental issues.

·        Seven Things You Should Know About Global Warming

1.      Most scientists do not believe human activities threaten to disrupt the Earth's climate.

2.      The most reliable temperature data show no global warming trend.

3.      Global computer models are too crude to predict future climate changes.

4.      The IPCC did not prove that human activities are causing global warming.

5.      A modest amount of global warming, should it occur, would be beneficial to the natural world and to human civilization.

6.      Quickly reducing our greenhouse gas emissions would be costly and would not stop global warming.

7.      The best strategy to pursue is one of "no regrets."

 

Science & Environmental Policy Project - http://www.sepp.org//index.html

  • The Science & Environmental Policy Project was founded in 1990 by atmospheric physicist S. Fred Singer on the premise that sound, credible science must form the basis for health and environmental decisions that affect millions of people and cost tens of billions of dollars every year.
  • A non-profit, 501(c)3 educational group, its mission was to clarify the diverse problems facing the planet and, where necessary, arrive at effective, cost-conscious solutions
  • Over the years, SEPP's authoritative critiques of UN documents used to shore up the Climate Treaty negotiated at the "Earth Summit" have been widely quoted. Its debunking of NASA's announcement of "record" chlorine in the Arctic stratosphere attracted the attention of the press and Congress.
  • The Project has been tapped by both Democrats and Republicans on Capitol Hill for objective, science-based information on global warming, ozone depletion, chemical risk, clean air standards, and other issues.
  • Today, with an expanded program of policy and research analysis, and with an international network of scientists working pro bono, SEPP has an impact far greater than its size might suggest.
  • Key Issues
    •  The IPCC Controversy: In May 1996, unannounced and possibly unauthorized changes to the latest United Nations report on climate change touched off a firestorm of controversy within the scientific community. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the science group that advises the United Nations on the global warming issue, presented the draft of its most recent report in December 1995, and it was approved by the delegations. When the printed report appeared in May 1996, however, it was discovered that substantial changes and deletions had been made to the body of the report to make it "conform to the Policymakers Summary." The clandestine changes put a spin on the report's conclusions that "the balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global climate." Lead authors of the crucial--and doctored--Chapter 8, dealing with the detection and attribution of climate change, have since backed off from this conclusion and now admit that it may take 10 years or more before any human influence on climate can be detected.
    • Global Warming Issue: Computer models forecast rapidly rising global temperatures, but data from weather satellites and balloon instruments show no warming whatsoever. Nevertheless, these same unreliable computer models underpin the Global Climate Treaty, negotiated at the 1992 Rio de Janeiro "Earth Summit," and are the driving force behind United Nations efforts to force restrictions on the use of oil, gas, and coal. The Third Conference of Parties (COP-3) to the Framework Convention on Climate Change meeting in Kyoto, Japan, in December 1997 agreed to set mandatory limits and timetables. Politicians were told that the science is "settled" and "compelling," when in reality, scientific experts still strongly disagree on the evidence. Considering the economic damage from energy rationing and taxation, the plans are drawing strong negatives in the U.S. Congress. Without firm evidence that an appreciable warming will occur as a result of human activities, or that its consequences would be harmful, there can be no justification for bureaucratic remedies or any action beyond a "no-regrets" policy of energy efficiency and market-based conservation. For additional commentary, see articles on Global Warming and the Btu Tax. See also Hot Talk, Cold Science: Global Warming's Unfinished Debate and the convenient 12 point summary of Global Warming: Unfinished Business.
      • Why Are We Not Seeing Global Warming? (http://www.sepp.org//scirsrch/amsglwarm.html) S. Fred Singer, Ph.D
        • Presented at the Ninth Symposium on Global Change Studies, American Meteorological Society, January 11-16, 1998, Phoenix, Arizona.
        • Abstract:  Conventional General Circulation Models, quoted by the IPCC, predict a current "best" warming rate of 0.3°C per decade. Satellite and balloon observations, however, show a slight cooling rate since 1979. Surface observations show no warming trend in the last decade.  The explanation for this discrepancy, put forth by the IPCC, has been an assumed cooling from sulfate aerosols. That this is insufficient can readily be seen from graphs published recently by Hasselman (Science, 1997). The calculated warming rate is only slightly reduced--to about 0.25°C per decade. In addition, publications by Tett et al. (Science, 1996) and Hansen et al. (JGR, 1997) show that the negative forcing from aerosols is quite insufficient.  Perhaps the strongest argument against the aerosol model comes from satellite observations; they show a cooling trend everywhere except at northern mid-latitudes. They show a warming trend there--just where the aerosol cooling effect should be most important.  The discrepancy between models and observations must therefore be ascribed to other exogenous factors (solar variations) or to endogenous factors that are poorly treated in climate models, such as details of clouds and the vertical distribution of water vapor. Clearly, climate science is neither "settled" not "compelling"--as often claimed by politicians--but remains a challenging field for research.
      • Global Warming Will Not Raise Sea Level (http://www.sepp.org//scirsrch/slr-agu.html) - S. Fred Singer, Ph.D.
        • Presented at the 1997 Fall Meeting of the American Geophysical Union
        • Abstract:  Global sea level (SL) has undergone a rising trend for at least a century; its cause is believed to be unrelated to climate change. We observe, however, that fluctuations (anomalies) from a linear SL rise show a pronounced anti-correlation with global average temperature--and even more so with tropical average sea surface temperature. We also find a suggestive correlation between negative sea-level rise anomalies and the occurrence of El Nino events. These findings suggest that--under current conditions-- evaporation from the ocean with subsequent deposition on the ice caps, principally in the Antarctic, is more important in determining sea-level changes than the melting of glaciers and thermal expansion of ocean water. It also suggests that any future moderate warming, from whatever cause, will slow down the ongoing sea-level rise, rather than speed it up. Support for this conclusion comes from theoretical studies of precipitation increases and from results of General Circulation Models (GCMs). Further support comes from the (albeit limited) record of annual ice accumulation in polar ice sheets.