Global warming: man-made or natural?

IN THE PAST FEW YEARS, there has been increasing concern about global climate change on the part of the media, politicians, and the public. It has been stimulated by the idea that human activities may influence global climate adversely and that, therefore, corrective action is required on the part of governments. Recent evidence suggests that this concern is misplaced. Human activities are not influencing the global climate in a perceptible way. Climate will continue to change, as it always has in the past, warming and cooling on different time scales and for different reasons, regardless of human action. I also would argue that--should it occur--a modest warming would be, on the whole, beneficial.

This is not to say that we do not face a serious dilemma. The problem, however, is political. Because of the mistaken idea that governments can--and must--do something about climate, pressures are building that have the potential to distort energy policies in a way that severely will damage national economies, decrease standards of living, and increase poverty. This misdirection of resources adversely will affect human health and welfare in industrialized nations, and even more in developing countries. Thus, it well could lead to increased social tensions within nations and conflict among them.

If not for this economic and political damage, one might consider the present concern about climate change nothing more than just another environmentalist fad, like the Alar apple scare or the global cooling fears of the 1970s. Yet, given that so much is at stake, it is essential that people better understand the issue.

The most fundamental question is scientific: Is the observed warming of the past 30 years due to natural causes or are human activities a main, or even a contributing, factor? At first glance, it is quite plausible that humans could be responsible for warming the climate. After all, the burning of fossil fuels to generate energy releases large quantities of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. The C[O.sub.2] level has been increasing steadily since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, and now is 35% higher than it was 200 years ago. Also, we know from direct measurements that C[O.sub.2] is a "greenhouse gas" which strongly absorbs infrared (heat) radiation. So, the idea that burning fossil fuels causes an enhanced "greenhouse effect" needs to be taken seriously--although in seeking to understand recent warming, we also have to consider the natural factors that regularly have warmed the climate prior to the Industrial Revolution and, indeed, before any human presence on Earth. After all, the geological record shows a persistent 1,500-year cycle of warming and cooling extending back at least 1,000,000 years.

In identifying the burning of fossil fuels as the chief cause of warming today, many politicians and environmental activists simply appeal to a so-called "scientific consensus." There are two things wrong with this. First, there is no such consensus. An increasing number of climate scientists are raising serious questions about the political rush to judgment on this issue. For example, the widely touted "consensus" of 2,500 scientists on the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is an illusion, its shared Nobel Peace Prize with Al Gore notwithstanding. Most of the panelists have no scientific qualifications, and many of the others object to some part of the IPCC's report. The Associated Press reported that a mere 52 climate scientists contributed to the report's "Summary for Policymakers."

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Likewise, only about a dozen members of the governing board voted on the "consensus statement" on climate change by the American Meteorological Society. Rank and file AMS scientists never had a say, which is why so many of them now are rebelling openly. Estimates of skepticism within the AMS regarding man-made global warming are well over 50%.

The second reason not to rely on a "scientific consensus" in these matters is that this is not how science works. After all, scientific advances customarily come from a minority of scientists who challenge the majority view--or even just a single person (think of Galileo Galilei or Albert Einstein). Science proceeds by the scientific method and draws conclusions based on evidence, not a show of hands.

Aren't glaciers melting? Isn't sea ice shrinking? Yes, but that is not proof of human-caused warming. Any type of warming, whether natural or human caused, will melt ice. To assert that melting glaciers prove human causation is just bad logic.

What about the fact that carbon dioxide levels are increasing at the same time temperatures are rising? That is an interesting correlation but, as every scientist knows, correlation is not causation. During much of the last century, the climate was cooling while C[O.sub.2] levels were rising-and we should note that the climate has not warmed in the past eight years, even though greenhouse gas levels have increased rapidly.

What about the fact--as cited by, among others, those who produced the IPCC report--that every major greenhouse computer model (there are two dozen or so) shows a large temperature increase due to human burning of fossil fuels? There is a scientific way of testing these models to see whether current warming is due to a man-made greenhouse effect. It involves comparing the actual or observed pattern of warming with the warming pattern predicted by, or calculated from, the models. Essentially, we try to see if the "fingerprints" match--"fingerprints" meaning the rates of warming at different latitudes and altitudes.

For instance, theoretically, greenhouse warming in the tropics should register at increasingly nigh rates as one moves from the surface of the Earth up into the atmosphere, peaking at about six miles. At that point, the level should be greater than at the surface by about a factor of three--and quite pronounced--according to all of the computer models. In reality, though, there is no increase at all. Actually, the data from balloon-borne radiosondes shows the very opposite: a slight decrease in warming over the equator. The fact that the observed and predicted patterns of warming do not match indicates that the man-made greenhouse contribution to current temperature change is insignificant. This emerges from data and graphs collected in the Climate Change Science Program Report, published by the Federal government in April 2006. It is remarkable and puzzling that few have noticed this disparity between observed and predicted patterns of warming and drawn the obvious scientific conclusion.

What explains why greenhouse computer models predict temperature trends that are so much larger than those observed? The answer lies in the proper evaluation of feedback within the models. Remember that, in addition to carbon dioxide, the real atmosphere contains water vapor, the most powerful greenhouse gas. Every one of the climate models calculates a significant positive feedback from water vapor--i.e., a feedback that amplifies the warming effect of the C[O.sub.2] increase by an average factor of two or three, but it is quite possible that the water vapor feedback is negative rather than positive and thereby reduces the effect of increased C[O.sub.2]. There are several ways this might occur. For example, when increased C[O.sub.2] produces a warming of the ocean, a higher rate of evaporation might lead to more humidity and cloudiness (provided the atmosphere contains a sufficient number of cloud condensation nuclei). These low clouds reflect incoming solar radiation back into space and thereby cool the Earth. Climate researchers have discovered other possible feedbacks and are busy evaluating which ones enhance and which diminish the effect of increasing C[O.sub.2].

A quite different question, but scientifically interesting, has to do with the natural factors influencing climate. This is a big topic about which much has been written. Natural factors include continental drift and mountain-building, changes in the Earth's orbit, volcanic eruptions, and solar variability. Different factors operate on different time scales, but, on a time scale important for human experience--a scale of decades, let us say--solar variability may be the most important. Solar influence can manifest itself in different ways: fluctuations of solar irradiance (total energy), which has been measured in satellites and related to the sunspot cycle; variability of the ultraviolet portion of the solar spectrum, which, in turn, affects the amount of ozone in the stratosphere; and variations in the solar wind that modulate the intensity of cosmic rays, which, upon impact into the Earth's atmosphere, produce cloud condensation nuclei, affecting cloudiness and, thus, climate.

Scientists have been able to trace the impact of the sun on past climate using proxy data (since thermometers are relatively modem). A conventional proxy for temperature is the ratio of the heavy isotope of oxygen, Oxygen-18, to the most common form, Oxygen-16.

A paper published in Nature in 2001 describes the Oxygen-18 data (reflecting temperature) from a stalagmite in a cave in Oman, coveting a period of more than 3,000 years. It also shows corresponding Carbon-14 data, which is related directly to the intensity of cosmic rays striking the Earth's atmosphere. One sees there a remarkably detailed correlation, almost on a year-by-year basis. While such research cannot establish the detailed mechanism of climate change, the causal connection is quite clear: Since the stalagmite temperature cannot affect the sun, it is the sun that affects climate.

If this line of reasoning is correct, human-caused increases in the C[O.sub.2] level are quite insignificant to climate change. Natural causes of climate change, for their part, cannot be controlled by man. They are unstoppable. Several policy consequences would follow from this simple fact:

* Regulation of C[O.sub.2] emissions is pointless and even counterproductive, in that no matter what kind of mitigation scheme is used, such regulation is hugely expensive.

* The development of nonfossil fuel energy sources, like ethanol and hydrogen, might be counterproductive, given that they have to be manufactured, often with the investment of great amounts of ordinary energy. Nor do they offer much reduction in oil imports.

* Wind power and solar power become less attractive, being uneconomic and requiring huge subsidies.

* Substituting natural gas for coal in electricity generation makes less sense for the same reasons.

None of this is intended to argue against energy conservation. On the contrary, conserving energy reduces waste, saves money, and lowers energy prices--irrespective of what one may believe about global warming.

You will note that this has been a rational discussion. We asked the important question of whether there is appreciable man-made warming today. We presented evidence that indicates there is not, thereby suggesting that attempts by governments to control greenhouse gas emissions are pointless and unwise. Nevertheless, we have state governors calling for C[O.sub.2] emissions limits on cars; city mayors demanding mandatory C[O.sub.2] controls; the Supreme Court declaring C[O.sub.2] a pollutant that may have to be regulated; every industrialized nation (with the exception of the U.S. and Australia) signed on to the Kyoto Protocol; and ongoing international demands for even more stringent controls when Kyoto expires in 2012. What is going on here?

To begin, perhaps even some of the advocates of these anti-warming policies are not so serious about them, as seen in a feature of the Kyoto Protocol called the Clean Development Mechanism, which allows a C[O.sub.2] emitter--i.e., an energy user--to support a fanciful C[O.sub.2] reduction scheme in developing nations in exchange for the right to keep on emitting C[O.sub.2] unabated. "Emission trading" among those countries that have ratified Kyoto allows for the sale of certificates of unused emission quotas. In many cases, the initial quota simply was given away by governments to power companies and other entities, which, in turn, collect a windfall fee from consumers. All of this has become a huge financial racket that someday could make the UN's "Oil for Food" scandal in Iraq seem minor by comparison. Even more fraudulent, these schemes do not reduce total C[O.sub.2] emissions--not even in theory.

Consumers take the hit

It also is worth noting that tens of thousands of interested persons benefit directly from the global warming scare--at the expense of the ordinary consumer. Environmental organizations--such as Greenpeace, the Sierra Club, and the Environmental Defense Fund--have raked in billions of dollars. Multibillion-dollar government subsidies for useless mitigation schemes are large and growing. Emission trading programs soon will reach the $100,000,000,000 a year level, with large fees paid to brokers and those who operate the scams. In other words, many people have discovered they can benefit from climate scares and have formed an entrenched interest. Of come, there also are many sincere believers in an impending global warming catastrophe, spurred on in their fears by the growing number of one-sided books and movies, as well as media coverage.

The irony is that a slightly warmer climate with more carbon dioxide is, in many ways, beneficial rather than damaging. Economic studies have demonstrated that a modest warming and higher C[O.sub.2] levels will increase gross national product and raise standards of living, primarily by improving agriculture and forestry. It is a well-known fact that C[O.sub.2] is plant food and essential to the growth of crops and trees--and ultimately to the well-being of animals and humans.

You would not know it from Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth," but there are many upsides to global warming: Northern homes could save on heating fuel; Canadian farmers could harvest bumper crops; Greenland may become awash in cod and oil riches; shippers could count on an Arctic shortcut between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans; forests may expand; Mongolia could become an economic superpower.

This is all speculative, even a little facetious. Still, might there be a silver lining for the frigid regions of Canada and Russia? "It's not that there won't be bad things happening in those countries," economics professor Robert O. Mendelsohn of the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies indicates, "but the idea is that they will get such large gains, especially in agriculture, that they will be bigger than the losses." Mendelsohn has looked at how gross domestic product around the world would be affected under different warming scenarios through 2100. Canada and Russia tend to come out as clear gainers, as does much of northern Europe and Mongolia, largely because of projected increases in agricultural production.

To repeat a point made earlier--climate has been changing cyclically for at least 1,000,000 years and has shown huge variations over geological time. Human beings have adapted well, and will continue to do so.

The nations of the world face a number of difficulties. Many have societal problems like poverty, disease, lack of sanitation, and a severe shortage of clean water. There are grave security issues arising from global terrorism and the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Any of these situations are vastly more important than the imaginary problem of man-made global warming. It is a great shame that so many of our resources are being diverted from potentially crisis situations to this nonissue. Perhaps, in 10 or 20 years, this will become apparent to everyone, particularly if the climate should stop warming (as it has for eight years now) or even begin to cool.

We only can trust that reason will prevail in the face of an onslaught of propaganda like Gore's movie and despite the incessant misinformation generated by the media. Today, the imposed costs still are modest, and mostly hidden in taxes and charges for electricity and motor fuels. If the scaremongers have their way, these expenses will become enormous. Yet, I believe that sound science and good sense will prevail in the face of irrational and scientifically baseless climate fears.

S. Fred Singer is professor emeritus of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, a distinguished research professor at George Mason University, Fairfax, Va., and president of the Science and Environmental Policy Project, Arlington, Va. He is the founding dean of the School of Environmental and Planetary Sciences at the University of Miami, Coral Gables, Fla., founding director of the U.S. National Weather Satellite Service, Silver Spring, Md., and served for five years as vice chairman of the U.S. National Advisory Committee on Oceans and Atmosphere, Washington, D.C. Prof Singer has written or edited more than a dozen books and monographs, including, most recently, Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1,500 Years. This article is adapted from a speech delivered at Hillsdale (Mich.) College during a seminar entitled "Economics" and the Environment"; manuscript provided by Imprimis.