DoctorDoom
04-24-2008, 04:28 PM
Foreword
In his speech at the United Nations’ climate conference on September 24, 2007, Dr. Vaclav Klaus, president of the Czech Republic, said it would most help the debate on climate change if the current monopoly and one-sidedness of the scientific debate over climate change by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) were eliminated. He reiterated his proposal that the UN organize a parallel panel and publish two competing reports.
The present report of the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC) does exactly that. It is an independent examination of the evidence available in the published, peer-reviewed literature – examined without bias and selectivity. It includes many research papers ignored by the IPCC, plus additional scientific results that became available after the IPCC deadline of May 2006.
The IPCC is pre-programmed to produce reports to support the hypotheses of anthropogenic warming and the control of greenhouse gases, as envisioned in the Global Climate Treaty. The 1990 IPCC Summary completely ignored satellite data, since they showed no warming. The 1995 IPCC report was notorious for the significant alterations made to the text after it was approved by the scientists – in order to convey the impression of a human influence. The 2001 IPCC report claimed the twentieth century showed ‘unusual warming’ based on the now-discredited hockey-stick graph. The latest IPCC report, published in 2007, completely devaluates the climate contributions from changes in solar activity, which are likely to dominate any human influence.
The foundation for NIPCC was laid five years ago when a small group of scientists from the United States and Europe met in Milan during one of the frequent UN climate conferences. But it got going only after a workshop held in Vienna in April 2007, with many more scientists, including some from the Southern Hemisphere. The NIPCC project was conceived and directed by Dr. S. Fred Singer, professor emeritus of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia. He should be credited with assembling a superb group of scientists who helped put this volume together.
Singer is one of the most distinguished scientists in the U.S. In the 1960s, he established and served as the first director of the U.S. Weather Satellite Service, now part of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and earned a U.S. Department of Commerce Gold Medal Award for his technical leadership. In the 1980s, Singer served for five years as vice chairman of the National Advisory Committee for Oceans and Atmosphere (NACOA) and became more directly involved in global environmental issues.
Since retiring from the University of Virginia and from his last federal position as chief scientist of the Department of Transportation, Singer founded and directed the nonprofit Science and Environmental Policy Project, an organization I am pleased to serve as chair. SEPP’s major concern has been the use of sound science rather than
exaggerated fears in formulating environmental policies.
Our concern about the environment, going back some 40 years, has taught us important lessons. It is one thing to impose drastic measures and harsh economic penalties when an environmental problem is clear-cut and severe. It is foolish to do so when the problem is largely hypothetical and not substantiated by observations. As NIPCC shows by offering an independent, non-governmental ‘second opinion’ on the ‘global warming’ issue, we do not currently have any convincing evidence or observations of significant climate change from other than natural causes.
Frederick Seitz
President Emeritus, Rockefeller University
Past President, National Academy of Sciences
Past President, American Physical Society
Chairman, Science and Environmental Policy Project
February 2008Nature, Not Human Activity, Rules the Climate (http://www.sepp.org/publications/NIPCC_final.pdf) (PDF)
In his speech at the United Nations’ climate conference on September 24, 2007, Dr. Vaclav Klaus, president of the Czech Republic, said it would most help the debate on climate change if the current monopoly and one-sidedness of the scientific debate over climate change by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) were eliminated. He reiterated his proposal that the UN organize a parallel panel and publish two competing reports.
The present report of the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC) does exactly that. It is an independent examination of the evidence available in the published, peer-reviewed literature – examined without bias and selectivity. It includes many research papers ignored by the IPCC, plus additional scientific results that became available after the IPCC deadline of May 2006.
The IPCC is pre-programmed to produce reports to support the hypotheses of anthropogenic warming and the control of greenhouse gases, as envisioned in the Global Climate Treaty. The 1990 IPCC Summary completely ignored satellite data, since they showed no warming. The 1995 IPCC report was notorious for the significant alterations made to the text after it was approved by the scientists – in order to convey the impression of a human influence. The 2001 IPCC report claimed the twentieth century showed ‘unusual warming’ based on the now-discredited hockey-stick graph. The latest IPCC report, published in 2007, completely devaluates the climate contributions from changes in solar activity, which are likely to dominate any human influence.
The foundation for NIPCC was laid five years ago when a small group of scientists from the United States and Europe met in Milan during one of the frequent UN climate conferences. But it got going only after a workshop held in Vienna in April 2007, with many more scientists, including some from the Southern Hemisphere. The NIPCC project was conceived and directed by Dr. S. Fred Singer, professor emeritus of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia. He should be credited with assembling a superb group of scientists who helped put this volume together.
Singer is one of the most distinguished scientists in the U.S. In the 1960s, he established and served as the first director of the U.S. Weather Satellite Service, now part of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and earned a U.S. Department of Commerce Gold Medal Award for his technical leadership. In the 1980s, Singer served for five years as vice chairman of the National Advisory Committee for Oceans and Atmosphere (NACOA) and became more directly involved in global environmental issues.
Since retiring from the University of Virginia and from his last federal position as chief scientist of the Department of Transportation, Singer founded and directed the nonprofit Science and Environmental Policy Project, an organization I am pleased to serve as chair. SEPP’s major concern has been the use of sound science rather than
exaggerated fears in formulating environmental policies.
Our concern about the environment, going back some 40 years, has taught us important lessons. It is one thing to impose drastic measures and harsh economic penalties when an environmental problem is clear-cut and severe. It is foolish to do so when the problem is largely hypothetical and not substantiated by observations. As NIPCC shows by offering an independent, non-governmental ‘second opinion’ on the ‘global warming’ issue, we do not currently have any convincing evidence or observations of significant climate change from other than natural causes.
Frederick Seitz
President Emeritus, Rockefeller University
Past President, National Academy of Sciences
Past President, American Physical Society
Chairman, Science and Environmental Policy Project
February 2008Nature, Not Human Activity, Rules the Climate (http://www.sepp.org/publications/NIPCC_final.pdf) (PDF)