Climate & Environment Review: July 15, 2006

Climate & Environment Review
July 15, 2006

Climate & Environment Weekly is brought to you by The Center for Science and Public Policy (CSPP). CSPP is a non-profit, non-partisan public policy organization.

CSPP relies on scientific experts in many nations and the vast body of peer-reviewed literature to help lawmakers, policy makers, and the media distinguish between scientific findings that are agenda-driven and those that are based on accepted scientific methods and practices. In a timely manner, the Center's Science Watch Team alerts policy makers, the media, and the public to unreliable scientific claims and unjustified alarmism which often lead to public harm. We strive for a fair and balanced examination of science.

REALITY CHECK: 2.4 BILLION PEOPLE SUFFER FROM ENERGY POVERTY
Worldwide 2.4 billion people lack any access to modern energy services and 1.6 billion people lack any electricity at home, according to the United Nations. Because of this, in parts of the developing world simple tasks like preparing a meal or warming a home are fraught with health risks... >>Read More<<

OPINION: AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH FOR GORE
Apparently Gore was unaware that Canadian election law caps company donations at $1,000 a year, or that natural resources are controlled by provincial governments and not the feds. But why let facts get in the way of a good smear?... >>Read More<<

OPINION: CLIMATE CHANGE CAN WAIT. WORLD HEALTH CAN'T
With $50bn, we could make the planet a better place but money spent on global warming would be wasted... >>Read More<<

GLOBAL WARMING MAY CAUSE COLD SPELL
AUSTRALIA is in the grip of a nationwide cold snap - and paradoxically, it could be another result of global warming... >>Read More<<

OPINION: GLOBAL WARMING'S REAL INCONVENIENT TRUTH
"Global warming may or may not be the great environmental crisis of the next century, but -- regardless of whether it is or isn't -- we won't do much about it. We will (I am sure) argue ferociously over it and may even, as a nation, make some fairly solemn-sounding commitments to avoid it. But the more dramatic and meaningful these commitments seem, the less likely they are to be observed. Little will be done... Global warming promises to become a gushing source of national hypocrisy... >>Read More<<

HURRICANES: A PRIMER ON FORMATION, STRUCTURE, INTENSITY CHANGE AND FREQUENCY
The 2005 hurricane season devastated the lives of thousands of people on the Gulf Coast. Financial losses related to the hurricanes far exceeded previous records and the loss of life was the largest in the United States since the Florida Keys hurricane of 1928... >>Read More<<

DROWNING POLAR BEARS
We are in the midst of a major effort by environmental activists, sympathetic scientists, and supporters in the media to hammer home to the American public the reality and dangers of global warming... >>Read More<<

ENERGY SECURITY: "USA CAN COUNT ON ENERGY SUPPLY FROM CANADA," HARPER SAYS
July 6 (Bloomberg) -- Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said U.S. President George W. Bush can count on a secure flow of oil and gas from its biggest energy supplier and trading partner after the price of crude surged to a record... >>Read More<<

CORAL REEF PROXY DATA SUGGEST PACIFIC COOLING DURING WARMING PERIOD
Close examination of coral reef reveals that when the rest of the world was experiencing warm weather, the Pacific was cold. And during a period of cold weather elsewhere in the world, the Pacific was warm and stormy... >>Read More<<

VIENNA SUMMIT DECLARATION
We, the leaders of the European Union (EU) and the United States of America (U.S.), met today in Vienna to respond to the concerns of our citizens for peace, security, stability and prosperity in an increasingly globalised world... >>Read More<<

GLOBAL WARMING WON'T HURT POLAR BEARS, WILDLIFE DIRECTOR SAYS
Global warming won't hurt polar bears, GN says. They're "intelligent and quick to adapt to new circumstances... >>Read More<<

MORE DOUBTS ABOUT HURRICANE/GLOBAL WARMING LINKAGE
We have covered many papers in the recent scientific literature that do not support the hypothesis that global warming has led, or will lead, to large changes in the intensity of tropical cyclones (see here and here and here)... >>Read More<<

USUSAL SUSPECTS BLAME GLOBAL WARMING FOR HEAVY RAIN
BOSTON (Reuters) - Images of swamped homes in the U.S. Northeast deepened suspicions over global warming, giving ammunition to scientists and others who say greenhouse gas-spewing cars and factories are fueling extreme weather... >>Read More<<

OPINION: WHY G8 COULD JEOPARDISE THE FATE OF DEMOCRACY IN RUSSIA
Why G8 could jeopardise the fate of democracy in Russia. Russia meets only one criterion for membership of the Group of Eight of the leading industrialised democracies: the size of its economy... >>Read More<<

CONFESSIONS OF AN 'EXX-CON'
Global-warming alarmists take it for granted that they have the "scientific consensus" on their side. The truth is that their views can be as much an article of faith that avoids or elides basic facts... >>Read More<<

FIRE AND ICE: A SHORT HISTORY OF CLIMATE ALARMISM
It was five years before the turn of the century and major media were warning of disastrous climate change. Page six of The New York Times was headlined with the serious concerns of "geologists." Only the president at the time wasn't Bill Clinton; it was Grover Cleveland. And the Times wasn't warning about global warming - it was telling readers the looming dangers of a new ice age... >>Read More<<

MORE EVIDENCE OF ARCTIC WARMING (A LONG TIME AGO)
There are a lot of folks running around shouting that recent Arctic warming is, to use a favorite alarmist word, "unprecedented"-which means, to them at least, that we are approaching "dangerous" levels of climate change... >>Read More<<

CLIMATE CHANGE EVAPORATES FROM G8 AGENDA
ROME (Reuters) - At the last G8 summit, political leaders vowed to "act with resolve and urgency'' on climate change. A year on, global warming has been sidelined by concerns on how the world can satisfy its growing appetite for energy... >>Read More<<

GLOBAL WARMING AND CORAL REEFS
If the climate is warming due to greenhouse gas emissions, there could be many plausible consequences, such as melting ice and polar bears not having a home. However, of all the ecosystems in the world, coral reefs are in virtually the best position to come through unscathed. They are certainly not the world’s canary as has sometimes been stated... >>Read More<<

COLD DARK FUTURE FOR EUROPE DUE TO KYOTO FIASCO, SAYS FORMER PUTIN ADVISOR
A 'chilly war' has already begun, says Putin's former advisor, in which the very basic pillars of Western society are at stake... >>Read More<<