They all want a piece of the action
By Dirk Maxeiner and Michael
Miersch
This Essay was firts published in the book „Carrots, Sticks and Climate Change: A primer on down-to-earth ideas for climate policy“by International policy network (IPN) in London.
In the fight against the allegedly threatening climate disaster, many scientists and environmentalists employ assumptions and exaggerations. Although the Kyoto Protocol has been vehemently defended by Europe, it is doubtful that Kyoto will afford meaningful protection from climate change. First the usual news: “A considerable change of climate inexplicable at present to us must have taken place in the Circumpolar Regions,” states a letter by the Royal Society. “2000 Square leagues of ice with which the Greenland Seas between the latitudes of 74.0 and 80.0°N have been hitherto covered, have in the last two years entirely disappeared.” The letter’s author appears to be worried: Centuries of continued Arctic cold, which had previously converted the area to an impenetrable barrier of ice, have apparently given way to higher temperatures in a very brief time period. The writer also mentions alarming signs of a rapid warming in Central Europe: “The floods which have the whole summer inundated all those parts of Germany where rivers have their sources in snowy mountains, afford ample proof that new sources of warmth have been opened.” And now the unusual news: The quoted letter was written on November 20th, 1817. The President of the Royal Society sent the letter to the British Admiralty, requesting the dispatch of a ship. The scientists wanted to investigate the dramatic climate shift in the polar sea. In Switzerland, too, the climate in those years was unusual, as local farmers suffered from a series of bad summers.
Many Swiss people believed that technology and industrialised civilisation was to blame: for instance, outraged citizens tore lightning conductors off people’s houses. On July 2nd, 1816, the Neue Zürcher Zeitung reported numerous cases of ‘violent destruction’ of the ‘weather conductors’ that were suspected to be ‘harbingers of disaster’. There is a long tradition of a search for individuals to blame for thunderstorms or bad harvests: The victims of witch burnings were often accused of having bewitched the weather in some way or having brought on the anger of God or nature through their behaviour. Nearly 200 years later, people’s fears remain the same. ‘The North Pole has disappeared’ shouted headlines in the tabloid press in the autumn of 2000. What happened? Tourists on board a Russian icebreaker discovered ice-free waters where they expected the icecovered North Pole. These reports were triggered by a New York Times cover story on August 19th, 2000. As soon as the stories about the disappearing North Pole were printed, the well-known Hamburg climatologist Mojib Latif demanded ‘immediate action against the greenhouse effect’ and environmentalists admonished the world to stop ‘wasting resources’. In our times, chimney stacks and motorcars have replaced lightning conductors as ‘harbingers of disaster’.
The story of man and earth’s climate is a serial crime story. At the beginning of every episode, the question must be answered: What happened so far? In the past 250 years, i.e. after the so-called Little Ice Age which lasted from 1550 to 1750, the global climate has become warmer. The earth’s temperature increase in the 20th century is estimated to be roughly 0.6°C. Approximately half of this warming took place between 1910 and 1945, a time when humanity’s carbon dioxide emissions did not yet play a large role in the atmosphere. Of course, a global population of six-plus billion people influences the climate in various ways. “There is no current development which would not have occurred without man’s influence,” says Gernot Patzelt, a glaciologist at the University of Innsbruck, Germany. (1) He does not want to rule out any human influence – but equally, he warns against hasty conclusions. It seems that this temperature increase has also made emotions run disproportionately high: Climate change has become the central issue of the whole environmental debate. Many environmentalists promote the greenhouse effect as the biggest threat since the atomic bomb; carbon dioxide has become the ultimate poisonous gas of modern times. There is no doubt that those involved in this debate share a serious concern about the heating of the planet and the consequences this may have for humanity and the environment. However this debate also revolves around power and money, ideologies and ideals. Politicians who are all too often clueless about dealing with other challenges have now assumed the role of climate saviours in order to demonstrate their capacity to act. Nowhere is it easier to score points with voters than in the symbolic fight against a hypothetical catastrophe. In contrast, real and present global environmental problems – especially those caused by poverty – receive far less attention in this debate. Data from the World Health Organization show that more than ten million people – mostly children – die every year from the consequences of contaminated water, polluted air (especially indoors), and preventable childhood diseases. (2) Paradoxically, in the climate change debate the poor are merely viewed as token victims in the year 2100.
Members of the public are constantly treated to permanent repetitions of frightening reports, simplified assignments of guilt and emotional charging – classic propaganda tactics. And thus, the same members of the public are well advised not to lose a healthy scepticism for the proponents of the climate change agenda. The ‘disappearance’ of the North Pole is a good example. Ten days later, amazingly, the Pole reappeared – but it only showed up on the back pages of the New York Times! In a contrite retraction, the editorial office was forced to admit that open areas in the pack ice were thoroughly normal in the Arctic summer – and therefore could not be regarded as proof of an imminent climate catastrophe. To make the matter less dramatic, it would have sufficed to look at the cruise itinerary of the icebreaker ‘Yamal’: Here one can read about ‘open water areas’ in the Arctic Ocean which ‘make the journey considerably easier’. This time, an open water area was right at the geographical North Pole. All this should have been known to Harvard oceanographer James McCarthy who was cruising on the ‘Yamal’ and eventually caused the worldwide media frenzy. But instead he was quoted as saying that according to scientific knowledge, such an opening in polar ice was possibly the first in 50 million years. (3)
What is remarkable is that Mr McCarthy is not just some badly informed oceanographer; he held a leading position in Working Group II of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). This is the advisory group, established jointly by the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), which prepares scientific information upon which political decisions are based. Thus, it probably was not a coincidence then that the North Pole ‘disappeared’ right before an international climate conference in The Hague. Hundreds of eminent, independent and distinguished scientists contribute to the work of the IPCC (altogether, the IPCC consists of a few thousand people). However, the key positions are held by just a few science functionaries who prepare the wording of a short political summary – the Summary for Policymakers – of the thousands of pages of studies and papers. The final wording is agreed not by the thousands of scientists who are involved in preparation of the report, but in negotiations with government representatives of the countries involved and who fund the IPCC.
Thus,one of the primary outputs of the IPCC procedure is not scientific but political, and politicians want their climate change measures to be legitimised by a wide scientific consensus.“The statements of the IPCC are not at all clear. Within the scientific community opinions are diverse,” says Ulrich Berner, head o fthe climate division of the Federal Institute of Geosciences and Natural Resources in Hanover. “Only the so-called Summary for Policy makers suggests an agreement – an agreement which infact does not exist.” (4) Although the IPCC continues to repeat the claim that all the world’s climatologists are in agreement, it is worth scrutinising this statement.
What do climatologists agree upon? First, that the earth’s global average temperature has risen by about 0.6 degrees over the past 100 years. Second: the earth has 6.2 billion people who use fireplaces, cars, factories and power stations, and 20 billion domestic animals, all of which are climatic factors. Everything else is highly controversial, especially the question as to how decisive is man’s influence on the climate, compared with natural factors. Politicians want to legitimize their decisions with a scientific agreement. If the facts eventually change, the politicians will say that they cannot be blamed, for they acted in accordance with their previous state of knowledge. This is understandable and reasonable. But it is neither understandable nor reasonable if a number of climatologists declare their current state of knowledge to be a dogma, and immunise themselves against scientific criticism by referring to a consensus which does not actually exist. These individuals act according to the belief that anyone who doubts their analysis is an outsider, a lunatic or has malicious intentions.
Doubt is the methodical principle of all modern sciences. Knowledge must always remain refutable. The state of science today has often been yesterday’s heresy. The numerous hypotheses about climate change must also be open to criticism, otherwise they are worth nothing. In his philosophy of science, Karl Popper has described this constant ‘process of falsifying’ as the only way to come closer to the truth, bit by bit. The IPCC’s mission and the approach of modern science to climate change are hardly compatible with this ideal. Climate censorship The very concept of ‘climate control’ presents more questions than answers. The climate of the planet was never static; it permanently swings between warmer and cooler states. So which climate do we want to protect? “Temperatures only have two possible options: They can either go up or down,” says Richard Lindzen, an American atmospheric scientist at the Massachussetts Institute of Technology. (5) This leads directly to the next question: Can humanity manipulate the climate to suit its whims or are there more powerful forces at work? “The concept that human beings are capable of causing the planet to overheat ... seems about as ridiculous as blaming the Magdalenian paintings for the last ice age,” says Kary Mullis, Nobel Prize winner for chemistry and the enfant terribleof science. He adds: We didn’t cause the last ice ages and we didn’t cause them to go away. We benefited from them. We don’t cause thunderstorms and lightning either. We don’t cause the El Niño years any more than we cause the other years. We don’t cause floods. We live on a planet that has many mysteries, including the patterns of its changing climate. We are the children of those changes, and we derive from those mysteries. (6) Politically, however, there is a large degree of consent that human activities are to blame for the warming of the planet, and correspondingly the failure of the Americans to ratify the Kyoto Protocol was met with moral indignation. “The air does not belong to us, but it is a treasure of future generations,” UN Secretary General Kofi Annan proclaimed. His German counterpart Klaus Töpfer, chairman of UNEP, opined that he was ‘concerned’ and ‘shocked’. Elder Statesmen like Mikhail Gorbachev and Jimmy Carter appeared to be just as bewildered as the Chinese Politburo.
Whenever it is comes to saving humanity, there will soon be words one should rather not use, truths one should rather not speak about, and questions one should rather not ask. In the greenhouse debate, some questions are simply not allowed anymore. First: Has the planet actually become warmer beyond than could by explained by natural causes? Second: Will it get warmer still? And third: Would this be all bad if it happened? The latter question especially is regarded as outrageously cynical. For instance, former US vice-president and dedicated climate protector Al Gore said “Denial is the strategy used by those who wish to believe that they can continue their addicted lives with no ill effects for themselves or others.” (7) Other prominent public figures have brought religion to the climate debate. The former acting chairman of the IPCC John Houghton once said: “If we take seriously the clear responsibility of care for the Earth given to humans by God, we are bound also to recognise thatt o fail in that task is not only a sin against nature but a sin against God.” (8) It is unclear where the sinning begins – but Mr Houghton has the answer: “This new sense of sin could also include a sin of too much talk and too little action.”
The open scientific competition to find the truth thus turns into a dogmatic question of faith. The fluid boundaries between politics and ideology, environmental activism and science make the work of the IPCC incredibly problematic. “We are greatly concerned that a distorted picture has been presented to the public and is being used to drive policy,” says Paul Reiter of the Pasteur Institute, one of the world’s leading experts in vector-borne diseases. (9) Reiter has a reason to be angry – since the IPCC has continually exaggerated claims about the spread of malaria as a result of global warming. To be sure: Reiter says there is no scientific basis for such claims. The propagation of malaria relies on numerous factors, only one of which is temperature. (10) Over the past centuries, malaria claimed victims in the tropics as well as in Russia and up to the polar circle – and it often did so in times that were colder than today. Only in 1970 did Holland become the last European country to be declared malaria-free. The real causes of the propagation of the Anopheles mosquito, which transmits malaria, are the deforestation of woods, the laying out of new paddy-fields and the prohibition of the chemical dichlorodiphenyl trichlorethane (DDT). Reiter is not willing to be classified as a so-called ‘climate sceptic’ or a proponent of a minority position: The bibliographies of the nine lead authors of the [IPCC’s] health section show that between them they had only published six research papers on vector-borne diseases. Nevertheless, they devoted a third of their chapter to speculation on the future of those diseases. On the other hand, if you take those of us who don’t tow their line, you will find we have well over 600 publications on the subject. It beats me why the IPCC is given such credence while we are branded as sceptics. (11)
Those who are sceptical about politically correct climatology are not just a few hobby researchers from the scientific hinterland. MIT scientist Richard Lindzen, for example, belongs to the group of scientists consulted by the IPCC – but at the same time he is one of the most trenchant critics of catastrophic greenhouse scenarios. Professor Lindzen thinks that today’s computer simulations of the climate are questionable, because clouds – one of the key elements of our climate – have not yet been fully understood and cannot be simulated accurately in computer models. It is not at all true that the all scientists involved in the process want to become ‘crown witnesses’ for the political summary of their work. And it is plainly wrong to assume that a majority of the scientists would support what politicians and journalists make out of the IPCC summary by further shortening and dramatising it. A small selection of topics that we frequently find in the media demonstrates this trend.
Will low-lying islands sink because of rising seas?
‘The UN study expects that the sea level will rise b y88 centimetres within the next 100 years. This means that large areas of the earth will disappearunderwater’, UNEP director Klaus Töpfer wrote in a newspaper article. “For islands in the Pacific this is theworst case scenario.” (12) The closer one gets to these islands, the more unlikely such claims sound. Wolfgang Scherer, director of the South Pacific environmental Monitoring Programme said at a news briefing in Tarawa/Kiribati: “What I’m trying to show from the historical data is that so far there is no signal there, in terms of a major climate change kind of signal, in the acceleration of sea level rises.”13 Reports that the atoll Tuvalu must be evacuated because of the rising high tides turned out to be a canard, albeit a persistent one. Over the last 20 years Tuvalu enjoyed a practically unchanged sealevel according to the local measuring station. However, there are some actual problems: The coast erodes primarily because sand is excavated on the beach for the booming local construction industry. Others, such as Swedish scientist Nils Axel-Mörner – an expert with decades of experience in ocean geodynamics – have confirmed this information.14 The IPCC predicts a worldwide increase in average sea levels within the next 100 years of between 11 and 88 cm. At present, satellite measurements show an annual increase of at most one to two millimetres – so this would mean 10 to 20 centimetres in 100 years. (15) Generally speaking, the sea-level has been rising very slowly for at least 10,000 years.
Will our planet’s polar icecaps melt?
The Antarctic ice has been withdrawing since the last Ice Age 10,000 years ago, and this will presumably go on for another 7,000 years until the next Ice Age. An acceleration of this development does not seem to exist. According to the IPCC’s Third Assessment Report, since 1970 there have not been significant changes in the Antarctic ice that could be discovered by satellites.Calving glaciers are a natural phenomenon in the Antarctic. Scientists say that extensive break-offs of ice in the West Antarctic Peninsula can be explained by unusual local warming for which the reasons are yet unknown. The break-offs do not increase the sea-level since the ice already floats in the water, much like an ice cube in a glass. Pedro Skvarca of the Argentine Antarctic Institute is reluctant to attribute the loss of ice to global warming without further investigation and is quite emphatic that this is a regional phenomenon. (16) The West Antarctic Peninsula reaches into the South Polar Ocean like a finger, but it actually represents only 2 per cent of the Antarctic landmass. In addition, temperature levels on the huge continent of Antarctica have actually fallen. IPCC scientists operating in the Arctic believe that since 1950 they have identified a decrease in the ice thickness and a reduction in the ice cover of between 10 and 15 per cent. In Alaska, it has actually gotten warmer. However, a number of glaciologists suspect that a cyclical process could also be occurring at the North Pole.(17) The scientific arguments about the causes, extent and consequences of the Polar events continue to rage on – and this is a good thing. The scientific magazine Nature stated: “As long as the ice covering the frozen oceans refuses to reveal all its secrets our attempts to predict the future of the world’s climate could well prove to be nothing more than a shot in the dark.” (18)
Are we are experiencing the ‘largest temperature increase of the past 1000 years’?
It may sound like a paradox: The theory that humanity is currently experiencing what is assumed to be the largest temperature escalation of the past millennium does not originate in present events and observations. It resulted because the experts have reinterpreted the last 1000 years as being the transition from a warmer to a colder phase. Using a scientifically disputed reconstruction of the earth’s climate history, which is based only on data from the northern hemisphere, the IPCC has flatly rejected the medieval temperature increase that developed over the whole planet, stating that it was merely a local phenomenon. In doing so, the period has seemingly been deleted from the pages of history. This surprising move conflicts with the opinion of most climate historians, who can easily refer to countless studies and reports documenting every detail of this global warming. In all likelihood, the medieval climate optimum experienced similar or even warmer temperatures than we know today, and was characterised by a landscape in full bloom, not to mention that Greenland was partially settled. One of the graphs in a 1995 IPCC study showed this all too clearly. Now this graph has been deleted. The global climate curve depicted in the IPCC’s Third Assessment Report of 2001 suggests that the steep increase in temperature of the modern age is the first such increase over a period of about 1000 years that were relatively cooler.16 This is enough to make even the most tranquil of souls suspicious. According to Ernest Rudel, Head of the Department of Climatology at the Central Institute for Meteorology and Geodynamics in Vienna, “the Vikings were only able to sail to North America when they did because the northern passage was ice-free.” (17) Climate researcher Ulrich Berner puts it in no uncertain terms: “This graph is statistically flawed.” (18) Meanwhile, several authors have pointed out the methodological flaws of the now infamous ‘hockey stick’ curve. Eminent climatologists who are still convinced that a manmade climate change is occurring nevertheless have distanced themselves from the diagram: for example, Hans von Storch, a climatologist at the GKSS Research Centre in Geesthacht, Germany, said that “Methodologically it is wrong: rubbish.” (19)
Is global warming increasing dramatically?
The most recent (2001) IPCC report is generally quoted as stating that over the next hundred years we could see a ‘global temperature rise of as much as 5.8 degrees’. This constitutes a dramatic worsening of the situation when compared to earlier estimates. However, this deterioration is not primarily attributable to new observations, but rather to new calculations. These are based on what the IPCC calls ‘storylines’, namely assumptions about world population, living standards, energy consumption patterns and technological development in the course of the next hundred years. These fictitious scenarios of the future were then fed into mathematically-based climate simulation programmes. The IPCC’s climate models leave much to be desired, since they cannot deal with clouds or ocean processes. Its projection system consists of 245 different scenarios – and these produce temperature estimates ranging from 1.4 to 5.8°C. Only one of these 245 calculated possibilities has since dominated the public mind-set – the maximum value of 5.8°C. Dr John Christy, one of the atmospheric scientists involved in the IPCC report, says: “This scenario will not happen. The world is in a much better state than is painted in this scenario of doom.”
Do heat waves drive up the global temperature?
The global temperature is not a temperature that really exists anywhere on the planet. It is a contrived parameter, rather like global per capita income. The 24-hour mean figure, which has been established from data supplied by hundreds of weather stations, is averaged out over the planet for the entire year. An analysis of the many thousands of figures involved reveals one thing: the increase in the average temperature level cannot in any way be blamed on exceptional heat waves. In fact it can be attributed much more to milder nights, shorter winters and slightly less-extreme winter temperatures in the northern latitudes – all of which are rather welcome developments.
Will global warming have disastrous consequences in any case?
According to the prevailing doctrine: yes. According to evolution: no. The history of the planet, and of man, has shown that warm periods produce an abundance of species and thriving civilisations. Warm phases are beneficial for growth and the propagation of crops and plants – the basis for life on this planet. In cold times, on the other hand, things go downhill. Good harvests occurred in the warmer conditions that prevailed in medieval times, in contrast to the hungry years of the Little Ice Age which followed. During the optimum conditions of the Holocene Period some six to seven thousand years ago, the earth was on average some 2–3°C warmer than today, and precipitation levels were higher. The Sahara at that time was a flourishing savannah. Yet even good news has been given a negative interpretation. A recent study announcing that grass was starting to penetrate into desert areas bore the headline: ‘Rising carbon-dioxide levels increase the risk of fire in the steppes.’ Some time ago Australian scientists were genuinely shocked by their observations on Heard Island between Australia and the Antarctic: More vegetation! More birdlife! Twenty-five thousand pairs of penguins compared with only three thousand in 1945! But what on earth is so terrible about life blossoming and flourishing? Our interpretation of climate trends and weather phenomena is now determined by the current mind-set: everything that changes is dangerous. It does not matter if there is too much snow or too little, too much rain or too little, cold or heat – every weather phenomenon that appears is now attributed to human-induced climate change. Facts are mixed up with emotions and ideas, and the general thought process now seems to be more one-dimensional than ever. It is a well-known phenomenon: if you buy a bright yellow car, you soon start to see bright yellow cars everywhere. With government research funds now available in abundance, increasing numbers of scientific disciplines are now directing their work to the service of climate research.Even distantly-related fields of study such as palaeoanthropology are now jumping on the climate bandwagon. Science too has ist fads. In the 60s, the time of the Cold War, the palaeo-anthropologists were investigating the origins of man, especially in the context of power and violence.In the70s and 80s, feminism was all the rage and all applications for research funding had to include a study of the role played by women. “Today I get my money from the climate research programme,” says German hominid researcher Friedemann Schrenk of the University of Darmstadt. (20) This focus of attention has resulted in an incessant flow of research findings which then rain down on the public via the media. “They all want a piece of the action,” says Richard Lindzen.21 Everyone wants to be involved, everyone is striving for attention and all are vying to produce the most exciting thesis.
Is the greenhouse effect a manmade phenomenon?
Carbon dioxide, along with water vapour and other trace gases, creates a natural greenhouse effect that is necessary for the survival of life. This phenomenon has sustained Homo sapiens in the course of our development, for without the greenhouse cover the planet would have remained an Arctic world of minus 18 degrees. But things are even more complicated than that: ‘If the natural greenhouse effect were left completely unchecked the earth’s temperature would rise to over 55 degrees,’ explains NASA climatologist Dr Roy W. Spencer. However, the planet has its own efficient cooling system in the form of evaporation and various weather processes, which have currently stabilised the global temperature to about 15 degrees. While research is getting increasingly better at describing the greenhouse effect, the complex series of interactions involved in this gigantic cooling system continues to defy our attempts at simulation. And this is the real crux of the climate debate: can the planetary cooling machine compensate for mankind’s relatively small contribution to the greenhouse effect – or not? Man is only responsible for less than three percent of global CO2 emissions – the rest comes from the oceans, soil and vegetation.22 In the course of time nature absorbs as much CO2 as it emits. However, some of the carbon dioxide produced by the burning of fossil-based raw materials is now not being processed by nature but is accumulating in the atmosphere at a greater level than would be normal. In addition to the significant influence of the sun and the deep oceans, this additional effect could have played a role in the recent temperature increases observed since the 1980s.
And so we arrive to an important question:
What effect will the Kyoto Protocol have on the earth’s climate?
As a precautionary measure, industrialised nations who ratified the treaty want to achieve a significant decrease in carbon dioxide emissions by the year 2012. They established a target of a 5 per cent reduction compared with 1990 levels of emissions. But something has been completely lost in the overheated atmosphere of the day: the Kyoto Protocol clearly has great symbolic significance, but it will have no practical impact on what is happening to our climate. If all countries, including the US, were to stick rigidly to the original provisions of the agreement, the temperature increase would be reduced by only a few hundredths of degrees Centigrade. This is below the level of practical verifiability. But the rift between the US and Europe over Kyoto and the future of climate policy has a deeper cultural basis. For those who live in the land of unlimited possibilities, the idea of a future fenced-in with restrictions is completely alien – whereas in Europe we now think of this as an obligation. A strong element within American environmental policy-making now points out with increasing frequency that the ‘limits of growth’ theory (upon which many apocalyptic predictions were based in the 70s and 80s) has been repeatedly disproved. The technical intelligence of Silicon Valley has been challenged by the task of finding cleaner, more efficient technologies. But it will not be dictated or patronised by a global ecological bureaucracy that is increasingly becoming a law unto itself. Pragmatic Americans believe that the carbon dioxide problem will be solved by engineers and inventors, not by ideologues or climate bureaucrats. While the restrictions imposed by the Kyoto agreement are creating a bureaucratic nightmare for the participating countries, the American plan for reducing greenhouse gases is based on freedom of choice and tax incentives. US President George Bush said on the subject: “My approach recognizes that sustained economic growth is the solution, not the problem – because a nation that grows its economy is a nation that can afford investments in efficiency, new technologies, and a cleaner environment.”23 He continued: “Prosperity is what allows us to commit more and more resources to environmental protection. And in the coming decades, the world needs to develop and deploy billions of dollars of technologies that generate energy in cleaner ways. And we need strong economic growth to make that possible.” (24) And this idea is essentially what the G8 countries have agreed upon at their 2005 summit in Gleneagles. In Europe, too, an increasing number of voices support similar approaches. “The previous and to some extent fragile consensus about the reality of climate change and the resulting need for action does no more than just lead to a dead end,” writes sociologist Nico Stehr, who is involved with the social aspects of climate policy. “It is also blocking intelligent research programmes and reducing the chances of society actively adapting to changing climate conditions.”25 German climate scientist Hans von Storch asks: “Should we pay vast amounts of money for a reduction of our carbon dioxide emissions to reduce sea-level increases in Bangladesh by maybe ten centimetres one hundred years from now or do we help people there by financing dikes today?”26 Perhaps even more surprisingly, a recent publication by the German Federal Ministry of Research states: In the past the debate about climate change was all about the reduction of emissions while the aspect of adaptation was hardly mentioned. We should stop regarding climate change as an exclusively negative thing and replace it with a view free of prejudices. The question is not about good or bad, but only about dealing rationally with the things to come.27 Implementation of the Kyoto Protocol, which is a pointless gesture as far as the climate is concerned, will cost up to US $350 billion per year. That is seven times more than the entire world development aid programme. Danish professor of statistics Bjørn Lomborg, who convened the Copenhagen Consensus and wrote the bestselling book The Sceptical Environmentalist, raises the question: “Do the industrialised nations want to help the third-world countries in an inefficient way by pouring billions into greenhouse-gas reductions – or would they not prefer to invest in economic development, so that in fifty or a hundred years time these countries can protect themselves from the impact of climate change?” After all, money can only be spent once; resources devoted to fighting an imaginary problem cannot be spent tackling real problems. Moreover, a strategy aimed at fighting poverty will be effective even if climate change is not a manmade phenomenon but fate.
1 Profil No. 5/2001, 29 January 2001.
2 World Health Organization (2002). World Health Report 2002, p. 86.
3 Ice is melting at the North Pole, The New York Times, August 19, 2000.
4 Interview with Ulrich Berner, Der Spiegel, No. 23, 2001.
5 Interview with Richard Lindzen at TechCentralStation.com, March 05, 2001.
6 Kary Mullis, Dancing Naked in the Mind Field, New York 1998.
7 Al Gore, Earth in the Balance, New York 1992, p. 223.
8 John Houghton, The Christian Challenge of Caring for the Earth, http://www.jri.org.uk/brief/christianchallenge.htm.
9 Interview with Paul Reiter, New Scientist, 23 September 2000.
10 In 2004, Reiter and several other scientists in his field wrote in protest to The Lancet. Reiter, Paul, et al. (2004) Global warming and malaria: a call for accuracy, The Lancet
11 Interview with Paul Reiter, New Scientist, 23 September 2000.
12 Welt am Sonntag, 28 January 2001.
13 South Pacific sea levels seen needing more study, in: Planet Ark Daily News Story, 30 October 2000, http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/8718/newsDate/ 30-Oct-2000/story.htm. 14 Morner, N-A. (2004) Estimating future sea level changes. Global Planetary Change 40, 49–54. Morner, N-A. New perspectives for the future of the Maldives. Global Planetary Change 40, 177–182.
15 Ibid.
16 IPCC (2001). Third Assessment Report – The Scientific Basis, Cambridge, p. 134.
17 Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung 22.3.2002.
18 Bild der Wissenschaft, 11/2001, p. 65.
19 Interviewed in Der Spiegel, No. 41/2004, p. 158.
20 Radio feature on Hessischer Rundfunk (Germany), broadcast on 09 December 2001.
21 Interview with Richard Lindzen, TechCentralStation.com, March 05, 2001.
22 Environment Canada (no date), “Information: Greenhouse gas sources and sinks”, http://www.ec.gc.ca/pdb/ghg/ gases_e.cfm.
23 http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/02/ climatechange.html.
24 http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2002/02/ 20020214-5.html.
25 Die Welt, 29 August 2002.
26 Der Spiegel, No. 24/2003.
27 Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung: Herausforderung Klimawandel, Berlin 2003, p. 54.
Copyright © 1996-2011 Dirk Maxeiner and Michael Miersch.
All rights reserved.
