The Real 'Global Warming' Cause

Kevin Roeten

It looks as if the liberal media has outdone itself. If you’ve jumped on the ‘global warming’(‘GW’) bandwagon, consider yourself a possible liberal ‘elitist’. If you think that humans can actually control ‘global warming’, consider yourself ‘divine’.

It seems as though many of the scientists ‘du jour’ have allowed their imaginations free reign. Even a movie was made about it. Most of the claims include: 1) ‘GW’ will cause widespread disaster within 10 years, 2) ‘GW’ will melt polar ice resulting in widespread flooding, 3) ‘GW’ will increase insect presence which will devastate crops and vegetation, 4) hurricanes will increase and intensify, 5) US not signing ‘Kyoto’ will create havoc in the world community.

The above sounds scary, and many believe we’re already beyond the point of no return. Can cooler heads prevail, or is earth on a predestined ‘train wreck’ of unfathomable proportions? Well, if you believe most media sources, the ‘train wreck’ is coming. In fact, reports on ‘GW’ are 15:1 in favor of dire consequences.

Environmentalists say our planet has warmed recently, but they use the wrong data. Instead of satellite data(more representative of a global temperature), they use error-prone ground-based readings, based on urban sprawl and land-use changes. Per Charles Hosler(Meteorologist/ EPA), for >90% of the earth’s history, climate was much warmer than it is today. Surface thermometers have increased about 0.7oC in the past 100 years, but almost half that warming occurred before most changes in CO2 levels. In the last 10,000 years, the CO2 content rose by 100ppm, although the average temperature today is lower. From 900-1300 AD, the earth was warmer than it is today. The 20th century shows three warming trends; the latest occurring from 1976 to 1986, after which the increase became very small.

Some scientists believe more than one million variables influence global climate. Water vapor(97%) is typically ignored because the climate models can’t include clouds, and only 2% of all greenhouse gases are from human activity. Another misconception: there is NO consensus on whether the atmosphere is currently warming.



Greenland/Antarctica temperatures have dropped recently. The mammoth Antarctic ice sheet, which contains enough water to raise all the oceans’ levels ~6 meters, is not melting. Antarctica, measured by California Institute of Technology’s Jet Propulsion Lab, was found to be growing by 26.8 billion tons of ice/year.

The big ‘secret’ is that the sun(providing all atmospheric warmth) is currently brighter than at any time during the last 400 years. Dr. Sallie Baliunas/ Dr. Willie Soon(Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics) blame variations in the Sun’s brightness, not CO2 levels, for most of any climate change. This hypothesis was further supported by Fligge and Sulanke(Geophysical Research Letters), who reported that the warming and the cooling of the earth during the past four centuries closely match variations in the Sun’s brightness.

Evidence supports the hypothesis that CO2 levels merely respond to temperature changes--but does not cause them. Historically, concentrations of CO2 have been observed to lag behind changes in atmospheric temperature by 6-8 months. Per Heinz Kothen(German Climate Alliance), ice core samples over the last 150,000 years reveal a considerable delay in CO2 increase. Just this last September, two Russian scientists(Institute of Solar Terrestrial Physics/ Duke University) were convinced that temperature change comes before the CO2 change. They put their money where their mouth is—and bet $10,000 that the planet will cool over the next decade. Interestingly, ‘alarmists’ can’t explain the retreating glaciers before America was discovered and the internal combustion engine invented.

Climate ‘alarmism’ has resulted in increased federal spending on climate research. Pre-1990, expenditures were ONLY a few hundred million dollars. Today it is $1.7 billion/yr. It also seems that many scientists have been cowed not merely by more money, but by fear. In 1992, Al Gore ran two congressional hearings, during which he tried to bully dissenting scientists(including Richard Lindzen—Alfred Sloan Professor of Atmospheric Science/ MIT) into changing their views and supporting climate ‘alarmism’. But few scientists wanted to lose climate-research funding for raising questions.

Some even believe more hurricanes are a result. Per the National Hurricane website [www.nhc.noaa.gov/pastdec.shtml], major hurricanes(cat 3,4, &5) peaked in the 1890s, 1930s, and 1940’s. Of the 92 giant hurricanes that have struck the US between 1851 and 2004, 61 of them have occurred before 1950, long before global warming was an issue.

Obviously, this political football seems to revolve around several items. Generally, if you’re repulsed by the prior elections, ‘hate’ Bush, and are convinced that the ‘sky’ is falling, you seem to fit one category. But if you look at all the available data, the ‘big’ picture, and believe that fossil fuels actually advanced civilization, you will likely fit into another category. Which do you fit?

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Comments are welcomed at roetenks@charter.net.