A great deal of intolerance
Political commentator Dirk Maxeiner on the climate debate,
in an Interview with Alliance InsuranceGroup Journal 2007
He’s described by his opponents as an instrument of evil and industry‘s henchman. He sees himself as an impartial observer. Dirk Maxeiner (54) is among a number of commentators who are skeptical about claims concerning the causes and consequences of climate change. Formerly editor in chief of the journal natur in Germany, Maxeiner now works as a journalist and author. His books, written in collaboration with Michael Miersch, include the bestseller Eco-Optimism, Encyclopedia of Eco-Myths and Misconceptions and Life Counts – Cataloguing Life on Earth.
Mr. Maxeiner, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warns of climate collapse if we don’t reverse the current trend in greenhouse gas emissions by 2020. Is it all panic-mongering?
In many respects the debate reminds me of the acid-rain panic in the 1980s. Back then everyone agreed that, even if we did everything in our power to counteract it, large swathes of the forest would be doomed. Only pathological deniers could doubt the enormity of the disaster.
You don’t deny though that the average global temperature is rising?
That’s true. It’s been happening since the end of the Little Ice Age around 1850. However, it’s only in the past 30 years, at the most, that we can talk about a perceptible effect from human activity. The IPCC assumes a temperature rise of between 2 and 4.5 degrees if the CO2 concentration doubles compared to preindustrial levels. That’s an incredible span of time, which just goes to show the shaky ground that current forecasts are founded on. We still have absolutely no explanation, for example, for the influence of cosmic radiation on global climate and cloud formation, a key factor affecting temperature. This question is being investigated in a large-scale project at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research in Geneva. Let’s wait and see what comes out of that.
Maybe we’ve already waited far too long?
Climate change is a constant in the history of the earth. At the moment we’re acting almost as if climate change never existed before, as though we humans could halt it. We can’t even reform the healthcare system here, let alone control the climate. It’s as if we had an adjusting screw that we could just turn and it would get colder. It’s a new form of human hubris. The rate of climate change isn’t unique in the history of the earth either. There was a temperature rise similar to today’s before 1940. But it couldn’t have been triggered by carbon dioxide back then. So we have to ask what did trigger it then. On the other hand, there have been ice ages in the history of the earth during which the CO2 concentration was higher than it as today – without any industry, without cars, without coal-fired power plants. Natural influences haven’t ceased to exist just because man is emitting an increasing amount of carbon dioxide.
The IPCC has already pointed the finger at who‘s to blame for climate change – humans.
The IPCC was established to review the status of climate research in each country for the purpose of government policymaking. That’s legitimate because politicians need as wide a consensus as possible in order to make decisions. It wasn’t established to announce that scientific debate has come to an end. Consensus building is a political, not a scientific process. Hypotheses can always be reevaluated; it’s not a question of a majority vote. Up to now, there has been no direct evidence of a link between CO2 levels and today’s global warming. There’s only an indirect link: people think they can exclude all the other factors. But in any evidence-based process one or the other alibi can prove dodgy, or a new suspect arrives on the scene. Maybe several suspects are at work at the same time in this instance.
Many researchers such as the director of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, believe that all doubts have now been dispelled.
Many scientists disagree. Schellnhuber is a climate adviser to the Chancellor and as such formulates political aims. But in so doing he is departing from his research remit. It’s barely distinguishable from activism and lobbying.
Why shouldn’t a scientist also engage in political debate?
No one disputes that right. What disturbs me is that climate researchers are using their authority to engage in political debate, and that other opinions are simply being ignored. I’m not a scientist; I just read the scientific reports and studies. I’ve even noticed an increasing number of renowned scientists in the past few months who are openly contradicting some claims of the IPCC report.
What are they saying then? That we can carry on as before?
Not at all. It’s indisputable that we’re increasing CO2 levels in the atmosphere. Also that this tends to contribute to global warming. The question is how strong this effect is. We all agree that we have to save resources in order to save nature, and that we have to increase efficiency in energy production – that’s just economic sense. But we don’t need the threat of climatic disaster as a reason for doing so. Fear is a good instrument of power but a bad adviser.
Why can’t we use the new awareness of the problem to set the course for an environmentally friendly future?
Policies are based on terrifying scenarios to frighten people into making sacrifices, although it’ll take a hundred years before we know whether what we’re doing has worked. Politicians couldn’t have it better. But I don’t believe we need apocalyptic images to make the right decision. And we certainly don’t need a debate conducted in an authoritarian manner. Climate debate today is characterized by a great deal of intolerance; it’s even worse in England than in Germany. It has taken on almost religious proportions. And the media have virtually bid farewell to their role as a forum for discussion. Who’s going to oppose the self-appointed saviors of the human race?
In one of your newspaper columns you wrote that the insurance sector is exploiting the climate debate to set prices. Is it not a fact that property damage caused by extreme weather events has increased greatly in recent decades?
It’s legitimate for the insurance industry to come down so clearly on one side of the debate. It’s looking after its own interests just like everyone else. As a journalist I’m just as skeptical about their arguments as those of other economic entities, such as oil companies and the car industry. And it should be pointed out that Mother Nature has hardly ever been as kind to us as she was in 2006 – despite all the gloomy forecasts. The hurricane season was unexpectedly mild, and the number of tropical storms over the Atlantic the second lowest in the past twelve years.
That doesn’t prove a thing.
That’s right. Just as little as a warm winter or a cold summer does. But at the moment every hailstone is touted as a harbinger of climate change. The fact that property damage caused by natural disasters is on the rise is primarily due to the fact that more people are moving to high-risk zones and that they own more things for which it’s worth taking out insurance. For me, however, the decisive statistic is another one: it’s the number of deaths caused by climatic disasters, which fell sharply in the 20th century. People have apparently learned to adapt and protect themselves better.
Climate change will particularly affect poor countries, where only a minority can afford insurance.
We don’t know which countries will be poor in the future. In the 1970s we predicted that India and China would suffer the greatest famines. Today their economic growth is frightening. Increased wealth enables countries to adapt to changing environmental conditions. We have to build on that adaptability. Instead of plowing billions into dubious schemes with questionable effects that burden business, we should be helping third-world countries to increase their wealth. That would enable them to prepare for any climate change and give them the means to buy technology to lower carbon emissions.
You think measures to reduce carbon emissions are dubious?
Even well-meaning initiatives sometimes have the opposite effect. Look at biofuel, for instance. Here in Germany we’ve decreed that, for environmental reasons, biofuel should be added to ordinary fuel which, paradoxically, has put more pressure on tropical rain forests. The reason: We don’t have the land to grow the necessary plants. So forests are being cleared in other countries.
Or take nuclear power. I’m no apologist for the nuclear industry, but it should be pointed out that nuclear power is the only energy source that doesn’t generate CO2 and can reliably cover a significant percentage of the base load. And we’re in the process of shutting them down – one of the reasons being that industry would then be forced to accelerate the use of alternative energy sources. That’s like putting a hole in a lifeboat in the middle of the ocean in order to get rescued more quickly.
What would you suggest then?
Let’s do both: Develop better technology for renewable energy sources or carbon-free, coal-fired power stations while using nuclear power.
Who’s shaping the current climate debate in your view – scientists or politicians?
We’ve arrived at a curious symbiosis. Climate science has received huge sums from the state in the past few years. More jobs have been created and ever more studies have been produced. This has given rise to colossal organizations, which now have to constantly justify their existence. And the government, for its part, is finally able to demonstrate its ability to act, which is something that it would otherwise have been painfully unable to do.
It’s better than nothing.
If it wasn’t a question of pure actionism. Take the Kyoto Protocol: the measures enshrined in it will swallow public money by the billions, but the effect will be minimal. By 2050, there will only be a temperature difference of one hundredth of one degree, and only if the Protocol is fully implemented. But is anyone actually interested in who’s adhering to the guidelines? Everyone’s asking who’s signed the Protocol, but the fact that Spain or Austria, to name just two examples, are falling far short of their targets, seems of no consequence. We talk about the threat of climate change which could affect Africa at the end of the century, but no one gives a damn about the Africans of today. A certain Mr. Mugabe ruins a model African country, and everyone just sits back and watches. We discuss the fact that in 100 years’ time drought will consume the southern Sahel region of Africa, that thousands are being murdered in the Darfur region, yet the world community doesn’t intervene. We should be looking for solutions to the problems of today and dealing with the impact of our current policies on the world. The climate is actually the lesser problem in comparison.
Copyright © 1996-2011 Dirk Maxeiner and Michael Miersch.
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