The average African life span is lower than it was in the United States and Europe 100 years ago. But Africans are being told we shouldn’t develop, or have electricity or cars because, now that those countries are rich beyond anything Africans can imagine, they’re worried about global warming. Al Gore and UN climate boss Yvo de Boer tell us the world needs to go on an energy diet.

Well, I have news for them. Africans are already on an energy diet. We’re starving! Al Gore uses more electricity in a week than 28 million Ugandans together use in a year. And those anti-electricity policies are keeping us impoverished. Not having electricity also means disease and death. It means millions die from lung infections, because they have to cook and heat with open fires; from intestinal diseases caused by spoiled food and unsafe drinking water; from malaria, TB, cholera, measles and other diseases that we could prevent or treat if we had proper medical facilities. Hypothetical global warming a hundred years from now is worse than this?

Telling Africans they can’t have electricity and economic development - except what can be produced with some wind turbines or little solar panels - is immoral. It is a crime against humanity.

Read more here.

See this Heartland story Commentary: Is Al Gore the Reincarnation of the Xhosa Prophetess Nongqawuse? by Gail Heriot here.

I don’t know much about global warming, but I do know a little something about the dangers of precipitous action, especially when its advocates appear to be caught up in something akin to religious fervor. That’s why I was both heartened and disheartened to read Dana Milbank’s “Washington Sketch” column in the Washington Post entitled “With All Due Respect, We’re Doomed.” It gives an account of Al Gore’s recent testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, where apparently he was treated like a prophet. Quoth the tongue-in-cheek Milbank: “The lawmakers gazed in awe at the figure before them. The Goracle had seen the future, and he had come to tell them about it.”

Senate Shenanigans

What the Goracle saw in the future was not good: Temperature changes that would “bring a screeching halt to human civilization and threaten the fabric of life everywhere on the Earth - and that is within this century, if we don’t change.” The chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, John Kerry (D-MA), appealed for more of the Goracle’s premonitions.

“Share with us, if you would, sort of the immediate vision that you see in this transformative process as we move into this new economy,” Kerry beseeched.
The article is well worth reading in full, but you get the idea. The bad news is that even Republicans on the committee, such as Sen. Bob Corker (TN), treated Gore with a reverence ordinarily reserved for the likes of Isaiah and Ezekiel. But there’s good news here too: Milbank himself, a card-carrying member of the [mainstream media], gets it. He knows we need to take that deep breath before we plunge ahead at the behest of the Goracle. I suspect more and more liberals are going to go skeptical on this issue.

Leading People to Ruin

The prophet whom Gore most resembles may turn out to be Nongqawuse, who led her people to ruin in the mid-nineteenth century. Nongqawuse was a teenager and a member of the Xhosa tribe in South Africa. Read more about her (shown to the right of another prophetess below).

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See Policy Peril video by Marlo Lewis here.

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The science and economics of global warming are not too complicated for the average person to consider and make up his or her own mind. We urge you to do that. Go here and view some of the articles linked under “What’s New” or “A Primer on Global Warming.” Or go here and read about the new report from the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC), which comprehensively rebuts the claims of the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Go here for the sources for the factual statements in the ads.

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And from the Marshall Institute,

Read more here. Download the Cocktail Party Conversation Guide to Global Warming here.

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We need your financial support! As a 501(c)(3) public charity, ICECAP accepts corporate, foundation and individual donations to fund its educational activities. We are planning a series of videos on climate change for use in the classroom and public education. All donations are kept confidential. If you have browsed our website or utilized our material in the past year, please consider making a financial contribution. Donate button is on the left column.

Also now available some items that will gore your alarmist friends (part of the proceeds go to support Icecap) SOME NEW ITEMS:

See full size display here.

And “My carbon footprints are bigger than yours and plants love me for it” items here and here

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The relative electrial energy potential of various sources thanks to Bill DiPucchio. Larger version here. It clearly shows why wind and solar must be considered supplemental sources in any sane energy plan.

Humans and Their CO2 Save the Planet!

As the Senate considers the fate of the cap-and-trade bill, we should consider what it means for more carbon dioxide to be added to the atmosphere, something the bill intends to prevent.

Carbon dioxide is first and foremost a plant food. In fact, plants take carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and use the energy from sunlight to combine the CO2 with water to yield glucose, the simplest sugar molecule. Carbon dioxide is also the source of all organic - this word just means “contains carbon” - molecules synthesized by plants. Without carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, there would be no organic molecules synthesized by plants. The less carbon dioxide there is in the atmosphere, the fewer organic molecules synthesized by plants. All animals depend on plants to synthesize essential organic molecules. Without the organic molecules synthesized by plants, the animal world could not exist. Without plants, there would be no biosphere.

Several million years ago, a disaster struck the terrestrial biosphere: there was a drastic reduction in the percentage of CO2 in the atmosphere. The flowering plants evolved to be most efficient when the percentage of CO2 in the atmosphere was about 1,000 parts per million. But the percentage had dropped to a mere 200 parts per million. Plants tried to adapt by evolving a new, more efficient way of using the little remaining CO2. The new mechanism, the C4 pathway, appeared in grasses, including corn and wheat, which enabled these plants to expand into the plains. If the carbon dioxide percentage had stayed low - or worse, had decreased further - the entire biosphere would have been endangered.

Fortunately for the plants and the rest of the biosphere depending on them, a wonderful thing happened about 150,000 years ago: a new animal species, Homo sapiens, evolved. This creature was endowed with a huge brain, enabling it to invent a way to help the plants with their CO2 problem. Gigantic amounts of carbon had been deposited deep underground in the form of coal, oil, and natural gas. Not only were these reservoirs of carbon locked away in rock, but they were in forms of carbon that the plants could not use.

These wonderful humans, however, worked hard to help the plants. Not only did the humans dig the coal, oil, and natural gas, bringing it to the surface, but they converted these raw materials into the only form of carbon that plants could use: carbon dioxide. Due to the diligent plant-saving efforts of the humans, the CO2 atmospheric percentage is now at nearly 390 parts per million. Were humans to continue in their biosphere-rescuing efforts at the present rate, the CO2 level will be returned to normal in a mere few hundred years.

The cap-and-trade bill is designed to stop this effort to save the biosphere. This is a profoundly evil act. In the words of the Nobel Prize winning economist Paul Krugman, anyone who supports the bill, or any measure aimed at reducing the increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, is “guilty of treason against the planet”!

Those who want to reduce the use of fossil fuels are the mortal enemies of the biosphere. They must be stopped at all costs! Write your senator at once!

The astute reader will have noted that Krugman actually accused those who opposed the cap-and-trade bill of “treason against the planet.” What I have done is use well-known science to show that, from the biosphere’s point of view, it is the cap-and-trade bill that is “treasonable.” Remarkably, Krugman assumes that the climatic conditions of a mere century or so ago are the “natural” ones that must not be changed. A very anthropomorphic point of view is being used to denounce humanity. An ultraconservative reactionary political position is being called “progressive.”

Frank J. Tipler is Professor of Mathematical Physics at Tulane University. He is the co-author of The Anthropic Cosmological Principle (Oxford University Press).

My colleagues and I thought you would be interested in this letter-to-the-editor, ”Petitioning for a revised statement on climate change,” published in the July 23 issue of the scientific journal Nature.  It briefly describes the objectives and status of our initiative relating to the American Physical Society statement on climate change.  The Nature letter is signed by Professors S. Fred Singer (University of Virginia), Hal Lewis (University of California at Santa Barbara), Will Happer and Robert H. Austin (Princeton University), Laurence I. Gould (University of Hartford), and myself.  We are joined by more than sixty other members and former members of the Society who have signed the attached Open Letter.  The Open Letter includes a proposed Alternative Statement which the signatories find a more accurate representation of the current state of the science than the unsupported assertion of the APS: “The evidence is incontrovertible.” The signatories are a diverse group who share only a background in physics and a concern for the integrity of the science process.  They come from academia, industry, and government.  Many are distinguished prize winners (including a Nobel laureate), members of national academies, authors of books, chairs of studies of historical significance, and leaders of important activities in industry and government.

Please do not hesitate to contact me if you would like more information.

Sincerely,
Roger W. Cohen, Fellow, American Physical Society, July 23, 2009

Open Letter to the Council of the American Physical Society

As physicists who are familiar with the science issues, and as current and past members of the American Physical Society, we the undersigned urge the Council to revise its current statement on climate change as follows, so as to more accurately represent the current state of the science: 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 - 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. 

On June 16, 17, and 18, The Heartland Institute ran three full-page ads in the Washington Post calling for an open debate over the science of global warming. Please forward links to this page to friends and colleagues, and/or post these ads on your blog or Web site.

See larger version here.

See larger version here.

See larger version here.

Each of these ads make specific claims, such as “some of the most distinguished scientists in the world have called fear of global warming ‘preposterous’ and ‘grossly exaggerated,’” and “a recent national poll found only 34% of Americans believe global warming is man-made.” Sources backing up these statements appear below.

We placed these ads because the mainstream media refuse to report the views of many scientists - by some accounts, most scientists - who believe global warming is not a crisis. The media also fail to accurately report the enormous cost to workers and consumers of legislation that would limit greenhouse gas emissions and the extensive public opposition to “cap and tax” legislation.

The science and economics of global warming are not too complicated for the average person to consider and make up his or her own mind. We urge you to do that. Go here and view some of the articles linked under “What’s New” or “A Primer on Global Warming.” Or go here and read about the new report from the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC), which comprehensively rebuts the claims of the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Go here for the sources for the factual statements in the ads.

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The Accumulated Cyclone Energy Index as compiled by FSU’s Ryan Maue is nearing a 50 YEAR LOW! (larger image here)

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Finally from our Friends at Minnesotans for Global Warming this chart showing how since the release of the Al Gore movie An Inconvenient Truth, global temperatures declined 0.74F.

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See Dr. Dewpoint reincarnated library of posts here. See recent post is El Nino in a Cold PDO - Are They Different?

Try this site for energy and innovation stories. 

Try this site for the Weather/Climate and Health connection.

Try this for long range forecasts for almost any location in the world.

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Also now available some items that will gore your alarmist friends (part of the proceeds go to support Icecap) SOME NEW ITEMS:

See full size display here.

And “My carbon footprints are bigger than yours and plants love me for it” items here and here

There is a You Tube video by Peter Sinclar titled “Climate Denial Crock of the Week” which ridicules the important contribution of Anthony Watts in identifying poor siting issues with the US Historical Climate Network (see his report). The video is clearly a biased presentation of what Anthony has accomplished, even resorting to the absurd connection of climate to how the health issues of tobacco were reported.  The video fails to recognize that the National Climate Data Center (NCDC) invited Anthony to present his work in Asheville, and recently, one of the NCDC scientists invited him to co-author a research paper with him.

I will report if NCDC refutes this personal attack against a well respected colleague who has provided a much needed analysis to the climate science community. Stay tuned also for at least two peer reviewed papers which are quantitatively analyzing, using Anthony’s data, the impact of the poor sitings of the HCN sites on the long term surface temperature trends and anomalies.

This is typical knee jerk reaction of the alarmists when they have no answer for the science, go after the scientist and any supporting affiliation. In this case they go after the Heartland and make the tired false claim they are funded by big oil and tobacco. Anthony will have the last laugh. Science in the end will win out against the agenda-driven, rent-seeking phonies like Sinclair.

Now with the climate bill forced through the house even before it was finished being written and with the last minute addition of over 300 pages and certainly before it was read, the action shifts to the senate. We all need to turn our attention to our senators and make it known this bill is bad for America and that they will be held accountable for the damages done if it passes.

The administration is trying another path through the EPA as you likely know. They prefer the congressional route as the EPA regulation route could be/will be tied up in the courts. The time for public comments on the EPA endangerment findings here and the Technical Support Document has past. 3,717 comments were filed. Go to this site to see them. Some comments were asked not to be posted but considered in evaluation. Here are just a few of those most relevant that we found and or were sent to Icecap as well as those we submitted.

U.S. Chamber of Commerce filings: The Alliance for Clear Climate Economics and Science Solutions (ACCESS) was created to ensure that any regulation of greenhouse gases using existing environmental laws not harm the economy and American jobs, be based on sound science and allow for public review of all underlying data and scientific analysis. On June 23, 2009, the Chamber filed a Petition for a Formal “On the Record” Endangerment Finding using Administrative Procedure Act §§ 556 and 557.  The Chamber also filed extensive written comments in response to EPA’s proposed endangerment finding for motor vehicles, analyzing the scientific, legal and policy grounds EPA has set forth for making such a finding. You can access the filings here. There was an important attachment to the main comment by Wolff here on the EPA approach taken to the relevant scientific literature in the TSD and briefly comments on the peer-review process for the TSD.

The very detailed comments Of The American Farm Bureau Federation, Deseret Power Electric Cooperative And Sunflower Electric Power Corporation on the EPA’S Proposed Endangerment Finding are here. Commenters believe that the Endangerment Finding Proposal, including the attached Technical Support Document ("TSD"), presents an incomplete discussion of climate change science. The Environmental Protection Agency ("EPA" or “Agency") has ignored literally hundreds of peer-reviewed scientific articles that are at odds with major portions of EPA’s conclusions. These studies were also not accounted for in the reports of the United Nations International Panel on Climate Change ("IPCC") and the United States Climate Change Science Program ("CCSP") on which EPA heavily relies.

Heartland’s excellent EPA comment is here. They have a listing of other posted comments here.

CEI filing is here. Chris Horner of CEI here. CEI also filed an EPA internal study autrhored by Alan Carlin that was suppressed here.

One of Dr. Roy Spencer’s comments is here.

One of Dr. John Christy’s comments is filed here.

Parts of Dr. Roger Pielke Sr.’s testimony to congress was put on file as a comment here.

Anthony Watts submitted a letter with his publication Is the US Surface Station Record Reliable.

The Heartland and Dr. Singer and Dr. Idso submitted the NIPCC report Climate Change Reconsidered .

Steve McIntyre commented on the EPA findings. Here is one of his comments.

William DiPucchio submitted this comment.

John McLean’s document on the IPCC here was resubmitted. 

Icecap submitted 9 comments, summarized here with links to principal comment content.

Invited presentation video by Dr. Nicola Scafetta, Duke University to EPA February 2009 here. Powerpoint PDF is here.

Please send me other comments you think our readers would benefit from.

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See Dr. Dewpoint reincarnated library of posts here. Latest post is El Nino in a Cold PDO - Are They Different?

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Also now available some items that will gore your alarmist friends (part of the proceeds go to support Icecap) SOME NEW ITEMS:

See full size display here.

And “My carbon footprints are bigger than yours and plants love me for it” items here and here

The average arctic temperature is still holding near 32F--this the latest date in fifty years of record keeping that this has happened. Usually it is beginning to level off now and if it does so, it will stay near the melting point on average in the arctic leading to still less melting than last summer which saw a 9% increase in arctic ice than in 2007. H/T FredM and MarcM

Note: It popped a little above 32F on the 25th and back to 32F on the 26th and 27th. We will follow where it goes in the days ahead as will wrong way Flannagan. UPDATE 7/2/09 - It has dropped below the melting point in the last day (July 1) for the first time in the historical record for July.

See larger image here. Compare with charts in other years here.

The AMSR-E shows the ice situation on June 23rd:

See where we stand relative to recent years in terms of total extent here. We are using JAXA-IJIS AMSR-E data to track ice as NSIDC is using older satellites and the new director Mark Serreze has proven untrustworthy. The next two months will be interesting. Temperatures usually begin flatlining in late June which would suggest less ice loss, although the water temperature beneath plays a key role and all of the warm water that entered the Arctic when the Atlantic was very warm in the middle 2000s (now is nearer normal) may not have circulated out yet.

The other question is what effect the early spring Mt. Redoubt and the June Russian Sarychev eruptions may be having. Are the sulfate aerosols trapped in the arctic stratosphere reflecting back some of what sunlight reaches the high latitudes?  Especially this year with solar activity so low.

Along the edge of the arctic, Ross Hays who worked for CNN and then NASA who last year posted from Antarctica sent this note to me “They have me working in arctic Sweden until mid July. One of the Esrange staff members told me that so far Kiruna had had the coldest June in 150 years!”

See PDF here.

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1984 Twenty-Five Years Later

Can Big Brother be green? Absolutely. If carbon dioxide were the planetary poison that global warming alarmists claim, then every aspect of our lives would be fair game for government control. Al Gore pushes this top down Orwellian approach here.

See larger CEI youtube video here.

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See Dr. Dewpoint reincarnated library of posts here. Latest post is El Nino in a Cold PDO - Are They Different?

-------------------------

Also now available some items that will gore your alarmist friends (part of the proceeds go to support Icecap) SOME NEW ITEMS:

See full size display here.

And “My carbon footprints are bigger than yours and plants love me for it” items here and here

1.  Twisted Science, Crooked Policy
The White House weather forecast is not the last word on climate: it marks the last stand of the ‘global warming’ profiteers, and the last gasp of the
scientific-technological elite.

2.  Warming Sideshow
As the scientific community debates the probable impact of human industry on the Earth’s climate, many in the environmental lobby, determined to dominate the political debate, wage an effective public relations campaign in the public arena. Believing fervently in their version of the facts, they cleverly tailor their rhetoric to have the strongest possible impact on the political process, without regard for the ongoing scientific debate. It is quite ironic that, while those who argue that we face a “climate crisis” like to think of themselves as the advocates for science and reason, their tactics and rhetoric are often reminiscent of a sideshow, relying on hype and fear to capture the public’s imagination.

3. Climate Change Regime is Immoral
To inflict intense pain for no environmental gain is immoral.  To ram such legislation through with backroom deals and no substantive debate - and unleash bureaucrats to control our energy use and lives - is dictatorial and un-American.  When The People finally catch on, it won’t be a pretty sight.

4. Not Too Late to Kill Cap-and-Tax Bill
Perhaps the most destructive legislation in our country’s history will, as soon as this week, be voted on in the House of Representatives: the Waxman-Markey tax bill in the guise of addressing climate change. It will have adverse and lingering consequences for every American. It will raise the cost of electricity in our homes, the fuel for our cars and the energy that produces our manufacturing jobs, with little or no environmental benefit.

5. Talking Points
Talking points to the issue that “Global Warming” is no global crisis.