|
|
Frequently Asked
Questions |
|
|
|
1 Question
We have been
told that the science is settled on the global warming issue and that all
except a few radical scientists agree that global warming is caused by
mankind emitting carbon dioxide. |
Answer
Proponents of
man-caused global warming, including the United Nations Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change, and former Vice President Al Gore, have claimed
that there was consensus among scientists that man was causing global
warming for over two decades. The media has reinforced that belief. That was
never the case. A
large
percentage of all scientists familiar with this issue have always had
doubts at some level. There was not convincing evidence either way. In
recent years, however, emerging science is increasingly showing that the
warming of the twentieth century was not caused by greenhouse gases, but by
natural events. As this science became known, more and more scientists who
once believed man-caused global warming have abandoned the theory publicly.
|
|
|
|
2 Question |
|
Doesn't the
fact that there is a high correlation between variations in atmospheric
levels of carbon dioxide and earth's temperatures over hundreds of thousands
of years prove that carbon dioxide is somehow involved in changing earth's
temperature? |
Answer
The answer to
this question has several parts. First, a high correlation does not mean
cause and effect. For instance, there is a 100 percent correlation that
every one who breaths air will eventually die. That does not mean that
breathing air causes death. Now, let's take Al Gore's 650,000 year graph
comparing atmospheric carbon dioxide levels with earth's temperature. There
is a very high correlation indicating there is some type of relationship,
but it does not mean that increases and decreases in carbon dioxide levels
causes the earth to warm and cool. A closer examination of the data show
that a change in carbon dioxide levels does not precede changes in
temperature, but changes in temperature precedes carbon dioxide levels. If
there is a cause and effect relationship at all, it is that changes in
earth's temperature causes a change in atmospheric carbon dioxide. There is
an easy explanation for this. There is roughly 80,000 times more carbon
dioxide in the oceans than in the atmosphere. As the earth warms for
whatever reason, the oceans gradually warm. Warm water can hold less carbon
dioxide, so the carbon dioxide dissolved in the ocean diffuses into the
atmosphere. It takes hundreds of years for this to happen. That is why there
is a lag of 600 to 1200 years before atmospheric carbon dioxide responds to
earth's warming. The reverse is true when earth cools. Gradually the
oceans cool, and the atmospheric carbon dioxide dissolves back into the
ocean. This is a well established scientific fact that has been known
for many decades.
|
|
|
|
3 Question
OK, so the
long term carbon dioxide/temperature correlation does not show that carbon
dioxide cause earth's temperature to change. But there is a high correlation
between atmospheric carbon dioxide levels and earth's temperature since the
start of the twentieth century. Right? |
Answer
Well, not
really. Most of the warming in the twentieth century occurred before 1945,
when carbon dioxide levels began to increase rapidly. When carbon dioxide
levels began to increase rapidly after 1945, the earth began a 30 year
cooling cycle -- just the opposite of what should happen with the greenhouse
gas theory. Both carbon dioxide levels and temperature increased together
from 1976 to 1998, but that proves nothing. Finally, carbon dioxide levels
are still increasing, but the earth's temperature has not increased
statistically since 1999. In fact, they are now declining. When all this is
put together and analyzed statistically, there is a 44 percent correlation
between carbon dioxide levels and temperature since 1900. That is a poor
correlation. To statisticians that strongly suggests there is no correlation
whatsoever. On the other hand, there is an 85 percent correlation between
ocean current/temperatures (called oscillations) and earth's temperature.
While that is not statistically significant, it does suggest there is a fairly strong
relationship--twice as good as the CO2/temperature correlation. Scientists don't know how it works yet, but they believe it is
related to solar activity. For more on this
click here.
|
|
|
|
4 Question
If carbon dioxide does not have a major
impact on earth's temperature, what does? |
Answer
There are a number of factors which
control the earth's temperature. The earth's orbit changes over time,
changing the distance from the earth from the sun. The earth's axis shifts
which changes the seasons and therefore the average temperature. The
intensity of the sun itself changes on an approximate 11 year cycle, as
well as an 1500 year cycle which changes the amount of energy reaching the
earth's surface. During the 11 year cycle, the sun becomes more active
with solar flares, coronal mass ejections and other activity. The sun
becomes brighter, emitting more energy, which seems to be correlated with
earth's temperature. However, energy balance calculations have shown that
the increased energy is not sufficient to cause the earth to warm as much
as it has. On the other hand,
Danish scientists have conducted some amazing experiments that show
that it is not the amount of energy, but the
type of energy
that causes the earth to warm. Although still
not fully understood, when the sun is quiet, cosmic radiation from deep
space bombards the earth, which in turn causes a few more low elevation
clouds to form. These clouds are very reflective of incoming solar energy,
and most of the sun's energy is reflected and the earth cools. Conversely,
when the sun is active, solar winds do not permit as many cosmic rays to
reach the earth and therefore fewer low elevation clouds are formed and
more solar energy reaches the earth, warming it. This cycle also affects
ocean currents which have an affect on earth's temperature. The longer,
1500 year cycle also plays a major role. Solar activity is highly
correlated with sunspots. From about 1300 to 1800, the number of sunspots
declined to nearly zero, and the earth became so cold it was called the
Little Ice Age. Since then the number of sunspots has been increasing, and
the earth has been warming -- until about 2000. Since 2000 the number of
sunspots has declined to abnormally low levels and the earth's temperature no longer
increased. The solar activity and the number of sunspots should have
started increasing again in 2007, but it did not. This is leading an
increasing number of scientists to believe we are entering a cooling
period not unlike that which occurred from 1945-1975, or worse similar to
the Little Ice Age, which was accompanied by major crop failures,
starvation and pestilence.
|
|
|
- 5
Question
- Carbon dioxide has been declared a
pollutant by the U.S. Supreme Court. Does that mean that increases in
atmospheric carbon dioxide can harm humans, plants and other animals?
|
- Answer
- No. There is very good evidence
that the earth once had over 10 times the atmospheric levels of carbon
dioxide than currently exists. Life flourished. Most of the carbon
dioxide that once existed has been precipitated out in limestone and
other sedimentary rocks. Hundreds, perhaps thousands of research studies
have shown that more atmospheric carbon dioxide causes plants to grow
much faster, which increases ecosystem health. It is estimated that food
production world-wide has increased by 12 percent since the 1950s
because of increased atmospheric carbon dioxide. The reason the U.S.
Supreme Court declared carbon dioxide a pollutant is because Congress
wrote the Clean Air Act so loosely that it falls within their loose
definition of a pollutant. In reality, carbon dioxide is essential for
life (life on earth would cease without it), because it is the raw
material for photosynthesis.
|
|
|
|
6 Question
The cooling since 2000 has reversed itself during the
summer and early fall of 2009. Does this mean warming has resumed? |
Answer
No. First, the warming has not yet exceeded the global
temperatures before the cooling started in 2001. Second, many things
happened during this period. The Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) and the
Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO) shifted from a positive state
(more warming) to a negative state (more cooling). There is a far greater
occurrence of El Niņo's in the Pacific that cause warming during the
positive phase of the PDO and much fewer El Niņo's during the Negative
phase. However, it doesn't mean El don't occur during the negative phase.
There is plenty of evidence to show they do occur during the negative
phase, just fewer of them. Starting in July of 2009 a very strong El Niņo
formed in the eastern Pacific causing earth's temperature to rise. Most
scientists believe the cooling will return once the El Niņo fades. Another
factor shocking the scientific community is the once accepted theory that
when the sun is quiet like it is now, the sun's emission of solar
wind diminishes dramatically allowing more cosmic radiation to enter
earth's atmosphere, which results in more clouds, and therefore cooling.
(See question 4 above). For a completely unknown reason the sun's emission
of solar winds suddenly increased during late spring of 2009, even though
the sun was abnormally quiet. This has solar physicists in a quandary and
they are now rethinking the entire physical basics of solar emissions. The
question that dogs climate scientists is whether the increase in abnormal
solar winds has caused the El Niņo during the summer/fall season of 2009,
and what it means for climate change. One thing is for certain, however.
The phenomenon has nothing to do with CO2 warming. Stay tuned.
|
|
|
|
7 Question
Twenty
computer climate models clearly show that the earth will warm 2-3oC
by the 22nd century because of increased carbon dioxide in our atmosphere.
Are they all wrong? |
Answer
The short answer is yes, they are wrong. Very wrong.
Each one has a built in assumption that as greenhouse gases warm the
atmosphere the greatest warming will occur in the tropical zone (latitude
30o N to 30o S) and at altitudes between about 6 to
12 miles high. Every model shows that it will warm about 2-3oC
more in that area than at the surface. However, when the models are used
to project temperatures for the 1950 to 2000 period, for which there
exists very good data, the
models project much more warming than actually occurred. Also, see
video by clicking
here. The reason for this is that the greenhouse gas theory that is
built into the models assumes that CO2 induces what is known as "positive
feedback." In other words, a small increase in temperature induced by CO2
will be greatly amplified by fewer low-level clouds and more high altitude
cirrus clouds (the high thin clouds) being formed. This in turn, results
in more of the sun's energy reaching the earth, warming it and then being
trapped by the cirrus clouds--hence greater warming in the tropical zone
and at 6 to 12 miles in elevation. However, research is showing this is
just not happening. Rather than warmer temperatures causing fewer low
elevation clouds, which warms the earth, many scientists now believe there
is a negative feedback. When the Pacific Decadal Oscillation
changes to positive (or perhaps less cosmic radiation because of greater
solar activity), the positive PDO reduces the amount of low elevation
clouds thereby allowing more solar energy to reach to earth to warm it.
Its the chicken and egg question--which came first. Did increasing
temperature cause fewer clouds and therefore greater warming, or did the
PDO (or sun) cause fewer clouds and therefore warming? While this debate
is far from being settled, it offers a hypothesis that explains all the
temperature variation of the 20th century and the cooling of the 21st
century. If true, CO2 has very little to do with global temperature and
the models overestimate future temperature by up to 80 percent. Simple
models show that at most the increase will be about 0.5oC, not
2-3oC the models predict.
|
|
|
|
