Since 2006 is coming to a close - a year in which the media fell all over themselves to ratchet up fears of manmade catastrophic global warming - it is a good time to re-examine the year in terms of climate news and science developments. 

Below is an oldie but a goodie. A press release from October 17 of this year from the Environment & Public Works (EPW) Majority details the new developments in climate change.    The release titled ' Renowned Scientist Defects From Belief in Global Warming - Caps Year of Vindication for Skeptics, ' surely contains information that the mainstream media, environmental alarmists and some of our elected leaders do not want the public to know.  

So in that spirit, we urge you to disseminate the below release far and wide to help counteract the climate alarmism that has infected so much of our popular culture today.  Enjoy.  - Marc Morano - EPW Communications Director   ( marc_morano@epw.senate.gov ) 

[P.S. Don 't forget that Senator Inhofe has made available free to the public the Senate published 68 page color booklet titled “The Skeptic ' s Guide to Debunking Global Warming Alarmism.” The book gives citizens invaluable information to battle the claims of climate alarmists. No home, particularly with school age children, should be without a copy of this important resource book. To download your free  copy go to: https://www.epw.senate.gov/fact.cfm?party=rep&id=266711 ]

Majority Press Release

 

https://www.epw.senate.gov/pressitem.cfm?party=rep&id=264777

 

 

Renowned Scientist Defects From Belief in Global Warming - Caps Year of Vindication for Skeptics

 

Contact:  MARC MORANO (202) 224-5762 (marc_morano@epw.senate.gov), MATT DEMPSEY (202) 224-9797 (matthew_dempsey@epw.senate.gov)

 

October 17, 2006

 

Washington DC - One of the most decorated French geophysicists has converted from a believer in manmade catastrophic global warming to a climate skeptic. This latest defector from the global warming camp caps a year in which numerous scientific studies have bolstered the claims of climate skeptics. Scientific studies that debunk the dire predictions of human-caused global warming have continued to accumulate and many believe the new science is shattering the media-promoted scientific “consensus” on climate alarmism. 

 

Claude Allegre, a former government official and an active member of France's Socialist Party, wrote an editorial on September 21, 2006 in the French newspaper L'Express titled “The Snows of Kilimanjaro” (For English Translation, click here: https://www.epw.senate.gov/fact.cfm?party=rep&id=264835  ) detailing his newfound skepticism about manmade global warming. See: http://www.lexpress.fr/idees/tribunes/dossier/allegre/dossier.asp?ida=451670 Allegre wrote that the “cause of climate change remains unknown” and pointed out that Kilimanjaro is not losing snow due to global warming, but to local land use and precipitation changes. Allegre also pointed out that studies show that Antarctic snowfall rate has been stable over the past 30 years and the continent is actually gaining ice. 

 

“Following the month of August experienced by the northern half of France, the prophets of doom of global warming will have a lot on their plate in order to make our fellow countrymen swallow their certitudes,” Allegre wrote. He also accused proponents of manmade catastrophic global warming of being motivated by money, noting that “the ecology of helpless protesting has become a very lucrative business for some people!” 

 

Allegre, a member of both the French and U.S. Academy of Sciences, had previously expressed concern about manmade global warming. "By burning fossil fuels, man enhanced the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere which has raised the global mean temperature by half a degree in the last century," Allegre wrote 20 years ago. In addition, Allegre was one of 1500 scientists who signed a November 18, 1992 letter titled “World Scientists' Warning to Humanity” in which the scientists warned that global warming's “potential risks are very great.” See: http://homepages.ihug.co.nz/~sai/sciwarn.html 

 

Allegre has authored more than 100 scientific articles, written 11 books and received numerous scientific awards including the Goldschmidt Medal from the Geochemical Society of the United States. 

 

Allegre's conversion to a climate skeptic comes at a time when global warming alarmists have insisted that there is a “consensus” about manmade global warming. Proponents of global warming have ratcheted up the level of rhetoric on climate skeptics recently. An environmental magazine in September called for Nuremberg-style trials for global warming skeptics and CBS News “60 Minutes” correspondent Scott Pelley compared skeptics to “Holocaust deniers.” See: https://www.epw.senate.gov/fact.cfm?party=rep&id=264568 & http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2006/03/22/publiceye/entry1431768.shtmlIn addition, former Vice President Al Gore has repeatedly referred to skeptics as "global warming deniers." 

 

This increase in rhetorical flourish comes at a time when new climate science research continues to unravel the global warming alarmists' computer model predictions of future climatic doom and vindicate skeptics. 

 

60 Scientists Debunk Global Warming Fears 

 

Earlier this year, a group of prominent scientists came forward to question the so-called “consensus” that the Earth faces a “climate emergency.” On April 6, 2006, 60 scientists wrote a letter to the Canadian Prime Minister asserting that the science is deteriorating from underneath global warming alarmists. 

 

“Observational evidence does not support today's computer climate models, so there is little reason to trust model predictions of the future…Significant [scientific] advances have been made since the [Kyoto] protocol was created, many of which are taking us away from a concern about increasing greenhouse gases. If, back in the mid-1990s, we knew what we know today about climate, Kyoto would almost certainly not exist, because we would have concluded it was not necessary,” the 60 scientists wrote. See: http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/financialpost/story.html?id=3711460e-bd5a-475d-a6be-4db87559d605 

 

“It was only 30 years ago that many of today's global-warming alarmists were telling us that the world was in the midst of a global-cooling catastrophe. But the science continued to evolve, and still does, even though so many choose to ignore it when it does not fit with predetermined political agendas,” the 60 scientists concluded. 

 

'Climate Change is Nothing New' 

 

In addition, an October 16, 2006 Washington Post article titled “Climate Change is Nothing New” echoed the sentiments of the 60 scientists as it detailed a new study of the earth's climate history. The Washington Post article by reporter Christopher Lee noted that Indiana University geologist Simon Brassell found climate change occurred during the age of dinosaurs and quoted Brassell questioning the accuracy of computer climate model predictions. 

 

“If there are big, inherent fluctuations in the system, as paleoclimate studies are showing, it could make determining the Earth's climatic future even harder than it is,” Brassell said. See: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/15/AR2006101500672.html 

 

Global Cooling on the Horizon? 

 

In August, Khabibullo Abdusamatov, a scientist who heads the space research sector for the Russian Academy of Sciences, predicted long-term global cooling may be on the horizon due to a projected decrease in the sun's output. See: http://en.rian.ru/russia/20060825/53143686.html 

 

Sun's Contribution to Warming 

 

There have also been recent findings in peer-reviewed literature over the last few years showing that the Antarctic is getting colder and the ice is growing and a new 2006 study in Geophysical Research Letters found that the sun was responsible for up to 50% of 20th-century warming. See: http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2006/2006GL027142.shtml 

 

“Global Warming” Stopped in 1998 

 

Paleoclimate scientist Bob Carter has noted that there is indeed a problem with global warming - it stopped in 1998. “According to official temperature records of the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia in the UK, the global average temperature did not increase between 1998-2005. “…this eight-year period of temperature stasis did coincide with society's continued power station and SUV-inspired pumping of yet more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere,” noted paleoclimate researcher and geologist Bob Carter of James Cook University in Australia in an April 2006 article titled “There is a problem with global warming... it stopped in 1998.” See: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2006/04/09/do0907.xml&sSheet=/news/2006/04/09/ixworld.html 

 

“Global?" Warming Misnamed - Southern Hemisphere Not Warming 

 

In addition, new NASA satellite tropospheric temperature data reveals that the Southern Hemisphere has not warmed in the past 25 years contrary to “global warming theory” and modeling. This new Southern Hemisphere data raises the specter that the use of the word “global” in “global warming” may not be accurate. A more apt moniker for the past 25 years may be “Northern Hemisphere” warming. See: http://motls.blogspot.com/2006/09/southern-hemisphere-ignores-global.html 

 

Alaska Cooling 

 

According to data released on July 14, 2006 from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the January through June Alaska statewide average temperature was “0.55F (0.30C) cooler than the 1971-2000 average.” See: http://www.publicaffairs.noaa.gov/releases2006/jul06/noaa06-065.html 

 

Oceans Cooling 

 

Another bombshell to hit the global warming alarmists and their speculative climate modeling came in a September article in the Geophysical Research Letters which found that over 20% of the heat gained in the oceans since the mid-1950s was lost in just two years. The former climatologist for the state of Colorado, Roger Pielke, Sr., noted that the sudden cooling of the oceans “certainly indicates that the multi-decadal global climate models have serious issues with their ability to accurately simulate the response of the climate system to human- and natural-climate forcings.“ See: http://climatesci.atmos.colostate.edu/2006/09/