By Will Alexander

My colleagues and I have developed and verified a multi-year, regional, hydrometeorological prediction model. Last year my article titled Likelihood of a Global Drought in 2009—2016 was published in the South African Civil Engineer, circulation 8,000. The drought has just started in parts of South Africa.

On 12 August our Minister of Water and Environmental Affairs announced that parts of the lower Limpopo River catchment have been declared a water supply disaster area. This is in the far northern region of South Africa. The Albasini Dam that supplies the Louis Trichardt area is only 26 percent full. The Middle Letaba Dam is only 6 percent full.

On Sunday 16 August, prayers for rain were held in George, which is in the southern coastal area of South Africa. The dams in this region are also at a very low level. These two events not only confirm my prediction but also the views of others that global climatic disturbances are on the way. How will they affect the Copenhagen discussions and beyond?

Our predictions were based on observation theory applied to a wealth of hydrometeorological data. The essence was the presence of statistically significant, 95 percent, 21-year periodicity in the data. The periodicity is synchronous with variations in solar activity. This provided the causal relationships but was not necessary for the predictions. These were based solely on the observed periodicity in the data, whatever its cause.

Despite a prolonged and thorough study we were unable to detect any unexplained anomalies in the data that could be attributed to human activities. It is unlikely that our studies will influence the Copenhagen discussions, but hopefully all those participating in the discussions will have the sense to consider the likely future consequences regardless of the outcome of the discussions.

Recall the United Nations Secretary General’s recent appeal. We have just four months to secure the future of our planet. If we fail to act, climate change will intensify droughts, floods and other natural disasters. Water shortages will affect hundreds of millions of people. Malnutrition will engulf large parts of the developing world. Tensions will worsen. Social unrest - even violence - could follow.

It is an all or nothing declaration with no room for uncertainties or degrees of probability. There is no way whatsoever that any emissions control measures that the world undertakes can meaningfully reduce the future occurrence of extreme floods, droughts, and threats to water resources. These are as inevitable as night follows the day. Now consider the consequences when these climatic extremes occur in the years ahead.

Here in South Africa with our economic problems, unemployment and poverty what will be the social and political consequences of the unfulfilled assurances? What will be the consequences in the African countries to the north of us? They have neither the finances nor the scientific expertise to evaluate the measures that will be agreed to at Copenhagen. Like many other nations, they rely on the knowledge and integrity of the developed nations of the world who insist that these measures be implemented.

What about the international relations, particularly the reaction of those nations that have been forced to adopt stringent emissions control measures, which the subsequent events will demonstrate are fruitless? Also, what about all those countries that accepted the IPCC recommendations in good faith? What about the universal perception of science as an honourable profession?

The assumption that large financial donations from the affluent countries will solve these difficulties is nonsensical. In my position as a member of United Nations Scientific and Technical Committee Natural Disasters we discussed all these possible preventative and adaptation measures in detail.
The problems have not yet been solved. This United Nations body is still functioning. It will serve no purpose to duplicate its work based on decades of experience with the nonsensical proposals that we see in the climate change literature.

If no agreement is reached at Copenhagen, this will not solve the problem. It will only worsen it. The whole climate change issue will become a blame game where the developed nations blame the developing nations for the breakdown and its consequences. The threats to international trade and cooperation in other fields are obvious.

OTHER DEVELOPMENTS IN SOUTH AFRICA

South Africa is still in the process of finalising its policy ahead of Copenhagen, but always within economic constraints. Authorities have just announced that South Africa will still have to build many more coal-fired power stations. In another article on the same date it was stated that South Africa needs 40 new coal mines to prevent electricity shortages over the long term.

Last week our national electricity supplier announced that five new projects have been put on ice due to financial difficulties. Commentators said that this may deepen South Africa’s recession, halt opportunities in employment creation, and affect supplies of cement, steel and other commodities.
Three of the abandoned projects are a pumped storage project, a solar power plant, and a wind farm. These were to contribute to South Africa’s reduction in the use of coal for power generation. These objectives are now indefinitely postponed.

There is no pre-Copenhagen legislation in the pipeline. No present or future South African government would dare introduce legislation that had a negative economic impact. No African government would accept promises of financial assistance in exchange for the implementation of emissions control measures. We have heard them all before. The prospects of success at Copenhagen are increasingly remote. We should now concern ourselves with the issues beyond Copenhagen.

Cobb County Conservative Examiner

Eighty prominent scientists, researchers and environmental business leaders - many of them physicists - have called on the American Physical Society (APS), the nation’s leading physics organization, to revise its policy statement on climate change. The century-old APS is the premier scholarly group in the U.S. dedicated to the advancement and dissemination of the knowledge of physics.

The signers of an open letter to the APS Council, the governing body of APS, are current and past members of APS. They disagree with the current APS policy statement on climate change, which contains such language as, “Emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities are changing the atmosphere in ways that affect the Earth’s climate,” and “The evidence is incontrovertible: Global warming is occurring.”

The group of 80 scientists and academic leaders is urging APS to revise its statement on climate change to read as follows:

Greenhouse gas emissions, such as carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide, accompany human industrial and agricultural activity. While substantial concern has been expressed that emissions may cause significant climate change, measured or reconstructed temperature records indicate that 20th [and] 21st century changes are neither exceptional nor persistent, and the historical and geological records show many periods warmer than today. In addition, there is an extensive scientific literature that examines beneficial effects of increased levels of carbon dioxide for both plants and animals.

Studies of a variety of natural processes, including ocean cycles and solar variability, indicate that they can account for variations in the Earth’s climate on the time scale of decades and centuries. Current climate models appear insufficiently reliable to properly account for natural and anthropogenic contributions to past climate change, much less project future climate.

The APS supports an objective scientific effort to understand the effects of all processes - natural and human - on the Earth’s climate and the biosphere’s response to climate change, and promotes technological options for meeting challenges of future climate changes, regardless of cause.

This is a far cry from what we are reading in the very unscientific mainstream media. As a matter of fact, it would be a great surprise if the major media even report the challenge of these courageous scientists to the APS status quo.

When asked for a comment on the open letter, APS Executive Officer Kate Kirby issued the following statement: “The APS president Cherry Murray has formed an ad hoc committee to examine the APS statement. The committee will advise Dr. Murray and the APS council on whether any changes to the statement are necessary.”

The current APS policy statement on climate change was issued in November 2007. But since then, a growing body of evidence has been emerging that challenges the facts and conclusions of the APS statement. It remains to be seen if APS will consider all of the available evidence and recent research. Much of this new information would be embarrassing to politicians, including the President of the United States, because it will show that global warming as a result of human activity is a myth.

The Administration and congressional leaders are in the heat of a legislative battle over health care, but they are also pushing a radical climate change or “cap-and-trade” bill that would dramatically increase the cost of energy for U.S. consumers and businesses. If APS reviews its statement in light of recent, more accurate research, its council may be inclined to adopt the revised statement on climate change from the open letter. But will APS leaders have the courage to do so in the face of intimidation by political leaders who don’t want to change their policies? It wouldn’t be the first time that political power trumped science.

This open letter is just one more piece of evidence that the theory of man-made global warming is losing credibility. Is anyone in Washington listening, or will misguided members of Congress enact their big-government “cap-and-trade (tax)” legislation without so much as a healthy debate about whether man-made global warming theory is even scientifically valid? See post here.

Also note in Bloomberg the story Democrats say Climate Change Legislation Should Be Set Aside.  The U.S. Senate should abandon efforts to pass legislation curbing greenhouse-gas emissions this year and concentrate on a narrower bill to require use of renewable energy, four Democratic lawmakers say.

“The problem of doing both of them together is that it becomes too big of a lift,” Senator Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas said in an interview last week. “I see the cap-and-trade being a real problem.”

(Bloomberg)—Australia’s Senate rejected the government’s climate-change legislation, forcing Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to amend the bill or call an early election. Senators voted 42 to 30 against the law, which included plans for a carbon trading system similar to one used in Europe. Australia, the world’s biggest coal exporter, was proposing to reduce greenhouse gases by between 5 percent and 15 percent of 2000 levels in the next decade.

Rudd, who needs support from seven senators outside the government to pass laws through the upper house, can resubmit the bill after making amendments. A second rejection after a three-month span would give him a trigger to call an election.

“We may lose this fight, but this issue will not go away,” Climate Change Minister Penny Wong told the Senate in Canberra. “Australia cannot afford for climate change to be unfinished business.”

Five members from the Australian Greens party sought bigger cuts to emissions while the opposition coalition and independent Senator Nick Xenophon wanted to wait for further studies on the plan’s impact on the economy.

Australia’s rainfall is the lowest of the world’s continents, excluding Antarctica, according to the Web site of Melbourne Water, a water management authority owned by the Victorian state government. Years of drought have cut farm output and water supplies in the Murray Darling Basin, the nation’s biggest river system and home to almost half its farms.

Sydney Opera House

Lower rainfall, higher sea and land temperatures, severe storms, increased acidity in the ocean or rising sea levels could all threaten World Heritage sites such as the Sydney Opera House and the Great Barrier Reef, a report from the Australian National University said last week.

Rudd planned to pursue a steeper 25 percent emissions cut pending an international accord stabilizing carbon levels. His administration wants the legislation in place before a December meeting of 200 countries in Copenhagen to replace the Kyoto Protocol. China and the U.S., the world’s largest polluters, have yet to commit to targets for cutting greenhouse gases.

“This defeat doesn’t make any difference to our position in global negotiations and it doesn’t add to momentum for those discussions,” said Andrew Macintosh, an analyst from Australian National University’s Center of Law and Climate Policy. “Copenhagen will provide some impetus for further negotiations on Australian laws.”

Corporate Opposition

The Australian legislation faced opposition from some companies that said the planned cuts were too deep and would have damped economic growth without making much difference to global warming. Advocates of tougher measures to combat climate change said the plan didn’t go far enough. Royal Dutch Shell Plc’s Australian unit urged the government in May to revise the plan to avoid reducing the ability of local companies to compete internationally.

The U.S. House of Representatives approved legislation in June to limit heat-trapping pollution and create a trading system for pollution permits. The U.S. cap-and-trade bill must still pass the Senate.

The architects of Australia’s plan, approved by the lower house of parliament on June 4, sought to create an economic incentive to cut emissions by forcing heavy polluters to buy carbon credits. Emissions from Australia will grow to 120 percent of the 2000 level without a pollution reduction plan, Wong said earlier this month. “Australia going it alone before Copenhagen will not make a jot of difference,” Liberal Senator Eric Abetz said. “It is a dog of a plan and we will not support it in its current form.”

Bill Amendments

The government can resubmit legislation after negotiating with industry, Senators and conservationists. Parliament will hold three more two-week sessions this year starting on Sept. 7, Oct. 19 and Nov. 16. It then adjourns until 2010. “The government will consider any serious amendment,” Wong said. “We will press on for as long as we have to, we will bring this bill back before the end of the year.”

The Copenhagen accord aims to reach an agreement to slow greenhouse-gas emissions and shift the world to low-carbon energy sources. China and other developing nations reject calls for binding targets, arguing that rich nations fueled their growth while polluting for decades. Getting China, the world’s fastest- growing major economy, to commit to lowering emissions is a key goal for Copenhagen.

The global credit crisis, which has plunged most developed economies into recession, has blunted the fight to tackle climate change. Australia’s government has spent A$90 billion ($75 billion) on economic stimulus.

“Climate has slipped down the list of priorities for Australians and they won’t like going to an early poll on it,” Macintosh said. “Climate has gone on the backburner because of the economic climate we have found ourselves in.”