Exxon Offered $10k to Scientists to Debunk U.N. Global Warming Report

There have been rapid shifts in climate in the past *suprise* without an industrial revolution.



Chinese Scientists Predict Imminent Global Cooling
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Reference
Zhen-Shan, L. and Xian, S. 2007. Multi-scale analysis of global temperature changes and trend of a drop in temperature in the next 20 years. Meteorology and Atmospheric Physics 95: 115-121.
What was done
The authors say they used a novel multi-timescale analysis method known as Empirical Mode Decomposition (EMD) to "diagnose the variation of the annual mean temperature data of the globe, Northern Hemisphere and China from 1881 to 2002."

What was learned
First of all, Zhen-Shan and Xian report finding that the temperature histories they studied "can be completely decomposed into four timescale quasi-periodic oscillations including an ENSO-like mode, a 6-8-year signal, a 20-year signal and a 60-year signal, as well as a trend." This latter residual, which they determined could account for no more than 40% of the global temperature variation, was attributed by them to the historical increase in the atmosphere's CO2 concentration; but it is clear that some unknown portion of it could well be due to other factors. In addition, they report that "temperature variation in China precedes that [of] the globe and Northern Hemisphere," thereby providing "a denotation for global climate changes." Consequently, by projecting the four oscillatory modes of temperature change they identified into the future, together with the residual temperature trend, they came to the conclusion that "global climate will be cooling down in the next 20 years."

What it means
In light of their findings and what those findings imply, the Chinese researchers say that "although the CO2 greenhouse effect on global climate change is unsuspicious, it could have been excessively exaggerated [our italics]." Consequently, they conclude that "it is high time to reconsider the trend of global climate change."

This warning is especially appropriate in light of Zhen-Shan and Xian's demonstration of CO2's less-than-dominant role in the global warming of the last hundred and twenty years (which may itself be inflated), plus their conclusion that if the atmosphere's CO2 content were to be suddenly stabilized, "the CO2 greenhouse effect will be deficient in counterchecking the natural cooling of global climate in the following 20 years."

Reviewed 17 January 2007

http://www.co2science.org/scripts/CO2ScienceB2C/articles/V10/N3/C1.jsp

 

Wait - is this your reponse to the physics of radiation absorption by GHGs?

Sigh.

FACTSHEET: Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change, Center for the Study of CO2 and Climate Change
DETAILS

P.O Box 25697 Tempe, AZ 85285-5697
Phone: 480-966-3719
Fax: 480-966-0758

The Center's current mission is to "disseminate factual reports and sound commentary on new developments in the world-wide scientific quest to determine the climatic and biological consequences of the ongoing rise in the air's CO2 content."

The Center means of disseminating information, their magazine and website CO2 Science, includes articles both questioning the existence of climate change as well as touting the benefits to the biosphere from carbon dioxide enrichment. All aspects of climate change and its predicted effects - from melting ice caps to species extinction, to more severe weather - are criticized by the Center and either refuted or presented as beneficial. Fred Palmer, head of Western Fuels, said about the center: "The Center's viewpoint is a needed antidote to the misleading and usually erroneous scientific claims emanating from the Federal scientific establishment and adopted by leading politicians, such as Vice President Al Gore." The Center has since tried to distance itself from the Western Fuels Association, however, the Center is run by Keith and Craig Idso, along with their father, Sherwood. Both Idso brothers have been on the Western Fuels payroll at one time or another. Keith Idso, then a doctoral candidate at the University of Arizona, was a paid expert witness for Western Fuels Association at a 1995 Minnesota Public Utilities commission hearing in St. Paul, MN, along with MIT's Richard Lindzen, Patrick Michaels, and Robert Balling (The Heat is On). According to news from Basin Electr ic, a Western Fuels Association member, Craig Idso produced a report, "The Greening of Planet Earth." Its Progression from Hypothesis to Theory," in January 1998 for the Western Fuels Association (Basin Electric Latest News no date given).

KEY QUOTES

25 July, 2001
"Suffice it to say for now, there is no compelling reason to believe there will necessarily be any global warming as a result of the activities of man, especially those activities that result in CO2 emissions to the atmosphere."
Source: Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change website 4/04

KEY DEEDS

3 November, 2003
Issued a report, entitled "Enhanced or Impaired? Human Health in a CO2-Enriched Warmer World," arguing that global warming would be beneficial to humans.
Source: Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change website 4/04

29 July, 2003
Issued a report entitled "Study Debunks Claims of Warming-Induced Extinctions" arguing that global warming will be beneficial to biodiversity, rather than decreasing it as is generally accepted.
Source: Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change Report 7/29/03

FUNDING

Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change has received $90,000 from ExxonMobil since 1998.

1998
$10,000 ExxonMobil Corporate Giving
Source: ExxonMobil 1998 grants list

2000
$15,000 ExxonMobil Foundation
project support
Source: ExxonMobil Foundation 2000 IRS 990

2003
$40,000 ExxonMobil Foundation
Climate Change Activities
Source: ExxonMobil 2003 Corporate Giving Report

2005
$25,000 ExxonMobil Foundation
Source: ExxonMobil 2005 DIMENSIONS Report (Corporate Giving)

Enough is enough.

 

The logical fallacy of this whole view that the funding of a study means the findings are inaccurate is very clear.

You can doubt them and then deal with the issues but you can't say that just because it's funded by a certain group the findings are any more or less true. Period. If you do, you're engaging in the same type of behavior that we've been talking about.

 

I don't disagree. But there is something to be said about Exxon "just happening" to fund so many researchers/groups that publish and/or tout the opposite of the general consensus. That's the point.

For the record, Hayes' linked article was published in Meteorology and Atmospheric Physics 95: 115-121.

 

Obviously the models are far from perfect and far from maybe impossible to make accurate predictions. That said the argument for doing something about greenhouse gas reduction is do we want to make that gamble?

The ice core and other information shows that at this time greenhouse gases are being added faster into the atmosphere than at any other time in the earths history short of major volcanic periods. We're running a massive experiment on the Earth's climate that we can't fully understand the outcome. It is possible that things might be OK but it is also possible that it could be disaster. As you point out there is a threat to regional biomes so the Global Warming threat while nebulous there still are some very real consequences that we are witnessing even now. Why wait to see if the worst will happen instead of doing something now?

 

Of course that's possible but at the sametime funding by a group with an interest in a particular result should be taken with some skepticism. Also the funding aside still doesn't mean that research from any scientists shouldn't be subject to peer review. Whether Exxon funds the research or Greenpeace the findings still need to be subject to strict peer review before they are accepted.

 

It is my response to the position that the rapidity of the warming necessarily proves the cause it man made. I think you are also overstepping a little bit with by seemingly claiming that the laws of physics undeniably support the theory that gw is man made. That is a vast overexaggeration of even what the new IPCC report would back up.

What does that have to do with the Chinese study? The site just reported it. Your charge of the Idso's being paid by oil and gas doesn't do anything to that. There is no indication Exxon sponsored the study.

I agree with this, and that's why I am generally in favor of some action. But I also think it needs to be seen through this perspective rather than from the "IPCC says = the laws of physics prove" lens.

 

I never said any of that! I said the laws of physics and the chemical properties of GHGs verify and explain the greenhouse effect and the associated impact on climate.

There is a strong correlation between CO2 concentration in the atmosphere and the advent of the industrial revolution. It is stupid to argue whether it is or is not man-made, since it is obvious that humanity has greatly increased the level of CO2 in the atmosphere. Are we the sole cause? Maybe, maybe not. But it's a MOOT POINT. The effect is the only debate that honestly matters - unless your Exxon.

Stop trying to change the bloody argument.

Ask yourself why a exxon sponsored website would be so enthusiastic to link to the chinese study, and not those espousing the opposite view. Try to find any pro-global-warming linkage on the co2science site. The original point of this thread was that exxon was underhandedly supporting views which furthered its business interests.

 

I agree with Rhad that greenhouse gases follow the laws of physics and lead to heat retention. Where things are problematic though is that the Earth's climate is a huge and incredibly complex system so we don't understand fully how much greenhouse gases in the atmosphere lead to how much warming and for that matter what is the affect of that warming.

Given that the models and working theories show the strong probabilty of warming and affects that wouldn't be considered good to us and life on Earth as we currently know it why take the risk.

I think most of us are on basic agreement that something should be done but are debating the specifics of how to frame the argument for reducing greenhouse gases.

 

Exxon doesn't dispute that it is happening, so figuring out what pushes us beyond an acceptable threshold would seem to be important. If the effect isn't man made, or if it would be happening regardless of human induced CO2 increases, isn't that relevant to the debate?

Still not clear why that makes any difference. Environmental group sites are unlikely to link to contrary theories, does that mean their position is false? As you pointed out it's a reprint from another journal.

 

What you guys don't understand is that Hayesstreet believes in global warming, it's just that he believes in arguing for the sake of arguing a lot more.

 

I know. But it drives me nuts when he twists the arguments just slightly enough to make it seem like he has some point.

EDIT: arguing anymore is dull - and I have work to do.

 

It's a good thing we have you around to keep us from arguing for arguments sake.

 

I'm not advocating a do-nothing/business as usual strategy. We're treating the symptom but not the cause. We have the technology to reduce waste, improve efficiency, and increase conservation. All of these efforts would reduce our greenhouse emissions more than any emission control standard with the best available technologies.

Businesses point to market demands, the public. The public now agrees that anthropogenic GW is more than likely true, but they're shifting responsibility to the government. Governments shift responsibility to future generations (like past UN ecological summits).

If we treat these issues one problem at a time because the root is about the habits of the public, then we will be overwhelmed with seemingly unrelated issues.

[/soapbox]

 

Climate of Fear
Global-warming alarmists intimidate dissenting scientists into silence.

BY RICHARD LINDZEN
Wednesday, April 12, 2006 12:01 a.m. EDT

There have been repeated claims that this past year's hurricane activity was another sign of human-induced climate change. Everything from the heat wave in Paris to heavy snows in Buffalo has been blamed on people burning gasoline to fuel their cars, and coal and natural gas to heat, cool and electrify their homes. Yet how can a barely discernible, one-degree increase in the recorded global mean temperature since the late 19th century possibly gain public acceptance as the source of recent weather catastrophes? And how can it translate into unlikely claims about future catastrophes?

The answer has much to do with misunderstanding the science of climate, plus a willingness to debase climate science into a triangle of alarmism. Ambiguous scientific statements about climate are hyped by those with a vested interest in alarm, thus raising the political stakes for policy makers who provide funds for more science research to feed more alarm to increase the political stakes. After all, who puts money into science--whether for AIDS, or space, or climate--where there is nothing really alarming? Indeed, the success of climate alarmism can be counted in the increased federal spending on climate research from a few hundred million dollars pre-1990 to $1.7 billion today. It can also be seen in heightened spending on solar, wind, hydrogen, ethanol and clean coal technologies, as well as on other energy-investment decisions.

But there is a more sinister side to this feeding frenzy. Scientists who dissent from the alarmism have seen their grant funds disappear, their work derided, and themselves libeled as industry stooges, scientific hacks or worse. Consequently, lies about climate change gain credence even when they fly in the face of the science that supposedly is their basis.

To understand the misconceptions perpetuated about climate science and the climate of intimidation, one needs to grasp some of the complex underlying scientific issues. First, let's start where there is agreement. The public, press and policy makers have been repeatedly told that three claims have widespread scientific support: Global temperature has risen about a degree since the late 19th century; levels of CO2 in the atmosphere have increased by about 30% over the same period; and CO2 should contribute to future warming. These claims are true. However, what the public fails to grasp is that the claims neither constitute support for alarm nor establish man's responsibility for the small amount of warming that has occurred. In fact, those who make the most outlandish claims of alarm are actually demonstrating skepticism of the very science they say supports them. It isn't just that the alarmists are trumpeting model results that we know must be wrong. It is that they are trumpeting catastrophes that couldn't happen even if the models were right as justifying costly policies to try to prevent global warming.

If the models are correct, global warming reduces the temperature differences between the poles and the equator. When you have less difference in temperature, you have less excitation of extratropical storms, not more. And, in fact, model runs support this conclusion. Alarmists have drawn some support for increased claims of tropical storminess from a casual claim by Sir John Houghton of the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that a warmer world would have more evaporation, with latent heat providing more energy for disturbances. The problem with this is that the ability of evaporation to drive tropical storms relies not only on temperature but humidity as well, and calls for drier, less humid air. Claims for starkly higher temperatures are based upon there being more humidity, not less--hardly a case for more storminess with global warming.

So how is it that we don't have more scientists speaking up about this junk science? It's my belief that many scientists have been cowed not merely by money but by fear. An example: Earlier this year, Texas Rep. Joe Barton issued letters to paleoclimatologist Michael Mann and some of his co-authors seeking the details behind a taxpayer-funded analysis that claimed the 1990s were likely the warmest decade and 1998 the warmest year in the last millennium. Mr. Barton's concern was based on the fact that the IPCC had singled out Mr. Mann's work as a means to encourage policy makers to take action. And they did so before his work could be replicated and tested--a task made difficult because Mr. Mann, a key IPCC author, had refused to release the details for analysis. The scientific community's defense of Mr. Mann was, nonetheless, immediate and harsh. The president of the National Academy of Sciences--as well as the American Meteorological Society and the American Geophysical Union--formally protested, saying that Rep. Barton's singling out of a scientist's work smacked of intimidation.

All of which starkly contrasts to the silence of the scientific community when anti-alarmists were in the crosshairs of then-Sen. Al Gore. In 1992, he ran two congressional hearings during which he tried to bully dissenting scientists, including myself, into changing our views and supporting his climate alarmism. Nor did the scientific community complain when Mr. Gore, as vice president, tried to enlist Ted Koppel in a witch hunt to discredit anti-alarmist scientists--a request that Mr. Koppel deemed publicly inappropriate. And they were mum when subsequent articles and books by Ross Gelbspan libelously labeled scientists who differed with Mr. Gore as stooges of the fossil-fuel industry.

Sadly, this is only the tip of a non-melting iceberg. In Europe, Henk Tennekes was dismissed as research director of the Royal Dutch Meteorological Society after questioning the scientific underpinnings of global warming. Aksel Winn-Nielsen, former director of the U.N.'s World Meteorological Organization, was tarred by Bert Bolin, first head of the IPCC, as a tool of the coal industry for questioning climate alarmism. Respected Italian professors Alfonso Sutera and Antonio Speranza disappeared from the debate in 1991, apparently losing climate-research funding for raising questions.

And then there are the peculiar standards in place in scientific journals for articles submitted by those who raise questions about accepted climate wisdom. At Science and Nature, such papers are commonly refused without review as being without interest. However, even when such papers are published, standards shift. When I, with some colleagues at NASA, attempted to determine how clouds behave under varying temperatures, we discovered what we called an "Iris Effect," wherein upper-level cirrus clouds contracted with increased temperature, providing a very strong negative climate feedback sufficient to greatly reduce the response to increasing CO2. Normally, criticism of papers appears in the form of letters to the journal to which the original authors can respond immediately. However, in this case (and others) a flurry of hastily prepared papers appeared, claiming errors in our study, with our responses delayed months and longer. The delay permitted our paper to be commonly referred to as "discredited." Indeed, there is a strange reluctance to actually find out how climate really behaves. In 2003, when the draft of the U.S. National Climate Plan urged a high priority for improving our knowledge of climate sensitivity, the National Research Council instead urged support to look at the impacts of the warming--not whether it would actually happen.

Alarm rather than genuine scientific curiosity, it appears, is essential to maintaining funding. And only the most senior scientists today can stand up against this alarmist gale, and defy the iron triangle of climate scientists, advocates and policymakers.

Mr. Lindzen is Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Atmospheric Science at MIT.

http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110008220

 

I agree with that and also believe that economic development and reducing greenhouse gases need not be in opposition.

 

An interesting article but it is heavy on sour grapes and light on science stating why people who think global warming should be taken more seriously.

Where it does list some science I find some problems.

I'm not a climate scientists but from my lay person understanding is that strength of storms is largely driven by the amount of heat input into a storm system. If the reduction of temperature differences the poles and the equator is due to the poles heating up wouldn't that be added more heat to fuel extra-tropical storms? For that matter the heating of the poles results in the melting of ice sheets which act as a cap on evaporation of water bodies, for instance the failure of Lake Superior anually freezing over is considered to be contributing to reduced water levels due to evaporation occuring in winter as well as summer, adding the more atmospheric moisture into the climate. From my understanding that would mean warming poles should lead to more storms.

The problem with this statement is that the amount of moisture that air can hold is dependent on temperature so 100% humidity at 50 degrees is a lot less atmospheric moisture than 100% humidity at 90 degrees. Atmospheric moisture is itself a greenhouse gas so that increased moisture in the air increases the carrying capacity of the air. So a hotter climate can be more humid than a colder climate so the argument that evaporation is dependen on only on drier air ignores how increased temperature increases the carrying capacity of air.

As I said though I'm only a lay person but I can see why this scientist isn't being taken as seriously by other climate scientists.

 

LOL, I knew the usual suspects of GW Deniers would make an appearance be raised so I'm not surprised to see Lindzen's name popping up. Too bad he only is against global warming when he's getting paid, when he has to put his own money on the line he's a little less vocal in his criticism:

 

I think that does hurt his cause.

If he really believed what he's saying, he'd be willing to change his name to Peyton Manning if he lost a bet.

 

Lindzen? Good grief. Why not just quote the CEO of OPEC.

• Lindzen charged "oil and coal interests $2,500 a day for his consulting services; [and] his 1991 trip to testify before a Senate committee was paid for by Western Fuels and a speech he wrote, entitled 'Global Warming: the Origin and Nature of Alleged Scientific Consensus,' was underwritten by OPEC." -Journalist Ross Gelbspan (Harper, 1995)

• Another member of Tech Central Science Foundation

-------ExxonMobil gave the Foundation $95,000 in 2003 for "Climate Change Support."
-------Total funding that year was $150,000 (exxonsecrets.org)

• Also a member of the George C. Marshall Institute

-------Exxon likes this group a lot: Donated $630,000 since 1999.

• And the Cato Institute, to which Exxon gave $90,000 since 1998.

Lindzen's "arguments" have been repeatedly either debunked or shown to be linked to highly controversial donors/interests. He is a tool. Might I suggest you do a bit of research....

Oh to hell with it. Whatever. You guys are just goofy.