Environmental Heresy
Failing to question the scientific assumptions
underlying Kyoto isn't fair to citizens concerned about climate change
Vancouver Sun
Thursday, June 8, 2006
Page: A23
Section: Editorial
Byline: Tom Harris
Dateline: OTTAWA
Source: Special to the Sun
OTTAWA - Opposition parties are attacking the Harper government for backing
away from Kyoto targets. Environmental lobbyists are demanding the
resignation of Environment Minister Rona Ambrose as chair of the United
Nations discussions on climate change.
And yet, scientists -- those men and women whose work is supposed to be the
basis for all pro-Kyoto policy -- continue to speak out more and more
against the establishment view on climate change.
Is this mere irony, or are we witnessing a trend?
Here are four examples:
- Last week, Victoria-based climatologist Tim Ball made a whirlwind visit to
Ottawa. After appearing as guest on CFRA talk radio's Lowell Green show,
Ball made a presentation to MPs on Parliament Hill, and gave a public
lecture at the Westin Hotel.
The next morning he appeared before an editorial board meeting of the Ottawa
Citizen. All the while he delivered the same message: Check the science of
climate change; it is different from what most people think.
"Over the past 10 years the public have been hoodwinked into thinking our
emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) are leading to a climate catastrophe,"
Ball said at the Westin. "In reality, CO2 is essential for photosynthesis
and its rise and fall has never been closely correlated with the warming and
cooling of the planet."
- The week before, participants in an Ottawa-Carleton Geoscience Seminar
witnessed a similar incident at the University of Ottawa. It was
ex-Environment Canada research scientist Madhav Khandekar explaining to an
audience of 60 professors, students and Natural Resources Canada scientists
that much of the climate science that is accepted by the public as being
"settled" is, at best, seriously in doubt.
Like Ball, Khandekar completely dismantled the notion that the recent rise
in CO2, the greenhouse gas most restricted by Kyoto, is the major cause of
warming of the Earth's surface.
Instead, Khandekar concluded in his lecture, land use change due to
urbanization and variations in the sun's brightness -- the effects of which
he believes the UN's intergovernmental panel on climate change have not
fully taken into account -- are the primary drivers of the past century's
modest warming.
Khandekar also demonstrated that there has been no increase in extreme
weather events in Canada. "The link between warming and extreme weather
events is tenuous at best -- it is really more perception than reality and
is due primarily to today's nearly instantaneous media coverage of disasters
worldwide, a capability we did not have until very recently," Khandekar
explained. Globally, extreme weather trends do not appear unusual either, he
says.
- Two days earlier, Carleton University earth sciences professor Tim
Patterson gave a comparable message in a CBC-TV News special report. "People
in our group feel that the science has progressed now . . . we now feel that
climate is driven by changes in the sun," Patterson said. As he testified
before the House of Commons committee on environment and sustainable
development last year, Patterson told the CBC, "We think that by going after
CO2, which is basically plant food, and which, if we look at the longer
geologic record, there is no correspondence between CO2 and the temperature
record, that we're wasting our money."
Patterson puts the cost of Kyoto into perspective: "Five million people a
year die in Africa because they do not have clean drinking water. The money
allocated towards Kyoto in one year would provide clean drinking water to
Africa in perpetuity."
- Appearing on CTV NewsNet at the end of the same week, Ian Clark, professor
of earth sciences at the University of Ottawa, summed up, "The science has
progressed dramatically in this field; in particular we are seeing new
evidence -- new hard science -- showing that solar forces, not CO2, is what
really is the main driver of climate."
To the dismay of the environmentalist on the CTV panel, Clark continued,
"There's actually been no evidence that CO2, which is a benign gas, a
nutrient for plants, has ever had a measurable impact on our climate."
All four scientists were among the 61 climate experts who signed the April 6
open letter to Prime Minister Stephen Harper asking for open hearings on the
science of climate change. However, judging from the reaction of
environmental groups and pro-Kyoto scientists, public science consultations
will face stiff resistance.
But those who advocate such consultations are used to such opposition. Like
others on his side, Khandekar responds simply, "I base my conclusions on
what the data is really telling us, not on computer models of hypothetical
futures. We need a reality check, using observed data, about how the climate
is changing."
Questioning the scientific assumptions underlying Kyoto has become
tantamount to environmental heresy in Canada. And yet, as citizens concerned
about the implications of climate change -- on our health, on our
environment, and on our economy -- isn't it fair to assume that the science
behind policy to address the issue is being properly scrutinized?
We need to hear more, not less, about this intense controversy if we are to
develop good public policy.