NZCLIMATE TRUTH NEWSLETTER NO 74
6TH JUNE 2005

THE IPCC

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was jointly established by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) in 1988. Its terms of reference include:
(1) To assess available scientific and socio-economic information on climate change and its impacts and on the options for mitigating climate change and adapting to it, and

(2) To provide, on request, scientific/technical/socio-economic advice to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

It will be noted that the IPCC was set up to deal, exclusively, with "Climate Change" and this  is embodied in its title.

The Framework Convention on Climate Change (1992) defined "Climate Change" as

"a change of climate which is attributed directly or indirectly to human activity that alters the composition of the global climate and which is natural climate variability observed under comparable periods

All the industrial nations of the world (including New Zealand) signed the Framework Convention, so this definition is legally binding on all of us.

There is no need for any evidence, scientific or otherwise, for "Climate Change". All that is needed is for some effect to be "attributed" to human influence, even if there is no evidence.

The terms of reference of the IPCC make it plain that its only task is to provide "attribution" and, possibly, even evidence, that human-induced "Climate Change" exists. The Governments, the politicians, the media, and the environmental enthusiasts all assume that this is its function, and they also assume that the IPCC has provided conclusive evidence that "Climate Change" is not only "attributed" to human emissions of greenhouse gases but that this relationship has been proven scientifically beyond all doubt.. In addition, these opinions are also freely expressed by the officials of the IPCC, and by several prominent scientists.

These opinions are untrue. The IPCC has not provided a scientific proof that human emissions of greenhouse gases are responsible for warming of the earth, or have any harmful effect on the climate.

Many of the scientists whose work is summarized in the IPCC reports are unhappy at the thought that they are merely a rubber stamp approval mechanism for the UNFCCC. definition of "Climate Change". In a footnote to page 2 of "Climate Change 2001" is the following statement

"Cllmate Change in IPCC usage refers to any change in climate over time, whether due to natural variability or as a result of human activity. This usage differs from that of the fFramework Convention on Climate Change"

These are brave words, as they contradict the terms of reference of the IPCC. But they are not brave enough to change the Title of their Reports to something which is unbiased, such as "Climate Science". It is true that the reports do contain information on climate effects considered to be "natural" but this information is  mostly marginalized at the back of the Chapters. The main emphasis throughout is to display "evidence" which can be considered to support the "Climate Change" mantra.

It was admitted from the beginning that the reports are biased. The first report  Climate Change 1990 said  "there is a minority of opinions which we have not been able to accommodate" The 1995 Report became notorious because the Final Draft was modified after it had been approved to comply with the "Summary for Policymakers. Altough a few scientists who are openly critical of "Climate Change" participate in the IPCC process (examples are R.S. Lindze, J. Christry) choice of the lead authors usually falls on sympathisers

The "Summary For Policymakers" which appears in all the Reports is an openly political document compiled by the Governments sponsoring the report. It is actually a Summary BY Policymakers as it is agreed line-by-line by Government representatives. It is compiled by a panel of senior scientists, but there is no reason to suppose that it is agreed by any other  contributing scientists..

There are many subtle ways in which any scientist who disagrees with the UNFCCC definition of "Climate Change" can be discouraged, marginalized, or even deprived of income. Most of the more prestigious scientific journals are firm supporters of "Climate Change" and they usually have a group of faithful "peer reviewers" who can be relied upon to delay or refuse any dissenting scientific work. A recent example was the paper Benny Peiser submitted to Science in rebuttal of a previous article boosting greenhouse science.

Many of us have suffered from this form of discrimination. My paper on "Regional Temperature Change", when submitted to Geophysical Research Letters, took so long to be modified  I published it on the web. There are several scientific journals that have less severe peer reviewers. One of these "Climate Research" has a New Zealand Editor, Chris De Freitas, who is a critic of "Climate Change". They have published one of my papers, and, recently a senior editor resigned because they are too liberal. Yet another journal "Energy and Environment"  has also published one of my papers. Recently it published the paper by McIntyre and McKitrick which proved that the "Hockey Stick" graph of Mann and Bradley had been mis-calculated. The journal Nature  felt compelled to admit that they were right and published a "Corrigendum" to Mann's paper, with the untrue comment that it made no difference to their results. However, Nature  could not even bear to admit the existence of such a journal as Energy and Environment  so they gave no reference to the original article. Presumably they were scared that some of their customers might read the article, and that would never do.

The IPCC Reports only review papers from the "respectable" journals. These do seem to include Climate Research but not Energy and Environment. They also ignore the increasing number of scientific papers which appear on the web because of the hassles of getting into the major journals.

The last IPCC scientific Report, Climate Change 2001 contains the truth about "Climate Change" in the following statement on page 97

"The fact that the global mean temperature has increased since the late 19th century and that other trends have been observed does not necessarily mean that an anthropogenic effect on the climate has been identified. Climate has always varied on all time scales, so the observed change may be natural"

It is hardly surprising that this correct statement does not appear in the "Summary For Policymakers. Instead we have a number of deliberately misleading half-truths, none of which claim a proven relationship between greenhouse gases and "global warming"

The most frequently quoted is the statement originally made in the 1995 report

"The balance of the evidence suggests a discernible  human influence on global climate"

There is unanimous agreement amongst scientists that human activities can affect the climate. Orchardists erect shelter belts around their trees. Pollution in cities, and heating of buildings can obviously affect climate. But this statement cannot be used to support the UNFCCC definition of "Climate Change". because it does not mention greenhouse gases or the global warming that is supposed to result from them.  The discenible human influence" may not involve them. Note also the use of tentative phrases "balance of" "suggests" "discernible", all intended to avoid discussion of evidence or proof.

Then, we have

"There is new and stronger evidence that most of the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities"

It is only "most" of the warming and the evidence does not "prove", only "attribute"

The statement is deliberately intended to concentrate on the combined weather station record and to  eliminate from consideration the "warming": shown by NASA satellites and weather balloons, since these records do not go back as long as 50 years. Also they show a much smaller "warming" than that shown by that derived from weather stations.The statement does not say, or imply that the "human activities" involved included the emission of greenhouse gases. Actually, the most plausible reason for the warming displayed by the weather station record is the "human activity" of building larger cities in their vicinity.

And what about this!

"In the light of the new evidence and taking into account the remaining uncertainties, most of the observed warming over the last 50 years is likely to have been due to the increase in greenhouse gas concentrations"

This time, there is no mention of "human activity". The IPCC reports attempt to conceal the fact that the most important of all the greenhouse gases is water vapour. If what they say here were true, then the "observed warming" could be changes in water vapour, unaffected by humans. But, as I say above, the most "likely" explanation for the "observed warming": is the increased size of cities near the weather sttions, not greenhouse gases.

Most of the "new evidence" anyway comes from computer-based climate models which have never succeeded in predicting any future climate change and ought not to be believed.

It doesn't seem to matter that the IPCC scientists have failed to establish any proven relationship between the climate and greenhouse gas emissions. The whole world depends on "attribution", or dogmatic belief.


Vincent Gray
75 Silverstream Road
Crofton Downs
Wellington 6004
New Zealand
Phone/Fax 064 4 9735939