Lies, Damned Lies, and Environmentalist's "Truths"

Climate change: On the edge
Greenland ice cap breaking up at twice the rate it was five years ago, says scientist Bush tried to gag

By Jim Hansen
Published: 17 February 2006
The Indepentdent

A satellite study of the Greenland ice cap shows that it is melting far faster than scientists had feared - twice as much ice is going into the sea as it was five years ago. The implications for rising sea levels - and climate change - could be dramatic.

Yet, a few weeks ago, when I - a Nasa climate scientist - tried to talk to the media about these issues following a lecture I had given calling for prompt reductions in the emission of greenhouse gases, the Nasa public affairs team - staffed by political appointees from the Bush administration - tried to stop me doing so. I was not happy with that, and I ignored the restrictions. The first line of Nasa's mission is to understand and protect the planet.

This new satellite data is a remarkable advance. We are seeing for the first time the detailed behaviour of the ice streams that are draining the Greenland ice sheet. They show that Greenland seems to be losing at least 200 cubic kilometres of ice a year. It is different from even two years ago, when people still said the ice sheet was in balance.

Hundreds of cubic kilometres sounds like a lot of ice. But this is just the beginning. Once a sheet starts to disintegrate, it can reach a tipping point beyond which break-up is explosively rapid. The issue is how close we are getting to that tipping point. The summer of 2005 broke all records for melting in Greenland. So we may be on the edge.

Our understanding of what is going on is very new. Today's forecasts of sea-level rise use climate models of the ice sheets that say they can only disintegrate over a thousand years or more. But we can now see that the models are almost worthless. They treat the ice sheets like a single block of ice that will slowly melt. But what is happening is much more dynamic.

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How far can it go? The last time the world was three degrees warmer than today - which is what we expect later this century - sea levels were 25m higher. So that is what we can look forward to if we don't act soon. None of the current climate and ice models predict this. But I prefer the evidence from the Earth's history and my own eyes. I think sea-level rise is going to be the big issue soon, more even than warming itself. [Emphasis added]

I get it Chicken Little, the old I'm right but everyone else is wrong routine. We're all doomed unless we go back to horse drawn carriages right now. Can you imagine the amount of pollution that would result from 150 million households using fireplaces? Or perhaps you want us to use solar panels have you any comprehension at all how much of a heat load you would be adding to the Earth's environment if you used solar energy instead of chemical energy? Maybe you would prefer wind power...say good by to our bird population. Oh yeah, did I mention that there is no solid evidence that global warming is caused by anything other than the Earth's natural cycle? Man made? Come on, you can't really believe that. It that was true, then how do you explain the global warming we are witnessing on Mars? Is that man made pollution to?

God save us from self-deluded experts who see visible only to them. Man made global warming is and always has been a self-generated cause celebre because those who support the theory earn their livings off of it. If you are a scientist who has unshakable faith in your theory, then every effort you make to research it is inherently biased toward proving it correct. Every shred of evidence, even if it is contradictory is seen as proof of it, explained away by further enhancements to it. Record heatwave...global warming, record cold spell...global warming, severe drought...global warming, record rainfall...global warming. That's not science, that's poofery. ABRACADABRA!

By the way, you lied in your headline, President Bush did not attempt to shut you up, the NASA Public Affairs Team did. It never occurred to you that they might have had a legitimate reason...like you're wrong, did it?

Full Story: Global Whining

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