O Tempora!: Richard H. Timberlake Jr. guest editorial: Global warming is political, not scientific, issue

Tuesday, November 04, 2014

Richard H. Timberlake Jr. guest editorial: Global warming is political, not scientific, issue

This article originally appeared in the Athens, GA Banner-Herald on October 31, 2014.

Dr. Richard H. Timberlake Jr. is a retired University of Georgia economics professor. His most recent book is titled “Constitutional Money: A Review of the Supreme Court’s Monetary Decisions.”

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Many global warming proponents have asserted that the science is settled, that global warming is a reality.

And when an inquiring skeptic examines reliable scientific data and research conducted by independent scientists with no government connections, it’s clear the science is settled, but the scientific conclusion is that anthropogenic (man-made) global warming does not exist to any measurable degree, that the carbon dioxide portion of total Earth atmosphere is both trivial and benign, and that what little there is of it is absolutely essential for human existence.

Here are some universally understood and irrefutable meteorological facts:

The Earth’s atmosphere is a sea of gases that includes carbon dioxide — CO2, the villain “greenhouse gas,” plus nitrogen, oxygen, argon, and water vapor. To visualize the relative volume of CO2, let the atmosphere be represented by $100, or 10,000 pennies. Nitrogen is about $78, or 7,800 pennies; oxygen is a little less than $21, argon is $1, and carbon dioxide is $0.04 — four pennies, or four one-hundredths of one percent of the total. Water vapor, the more plentiful greenhouse gas, is between 1 and 100 pennies, depending on location. Methane, the other advertised “greenhouse gas,” is not even one penny.

Additionally, carbon dioxide, which is odorless and colorless, is also very beneficial. Plants love it, and without it, human existence would cease.

What about the extraordinary growth in atmospheric CO2 since the burgeoning use of hydrocarbon fuels since about 1950? Yes, the percentage of CO2 in the atmosphere has increased, from 0.03 percent in 1950 to near 0.04 percent in 2014. Yes, the increase of CO2 — 33 percent — is a large percentage increase. But a large percentage increase in almost-nothing adds almost-nothing to almost-nothing, leaving almost-nothing. More important is the fact that this relatively scarce CO2 is absolutely essential for the existence of both plant and animal life. Optimal public policy should logically encourage it rather than vilify it.

Also, recorded Earth temperatures since about 1850 have increased 1.6 degrees Fahrenheit, less than one one-hundredth of a degree per year. So the real trend is that global warming is no more an ongoing phenomenon than global cooling.

So why do the media, government agencies, university foundations and prominent politicians make such a big deal out of such a benign substance as CO2, especially when the sun, by itself, heats everything in the solar system? Several scientific studies have verified that the sun, and its sunspot variations, is a much more probable determinant of Earth temperatures than any puny man-made increases of CO2. Furthermore, just the degree of error in heat-measuring instruments (thermometers earlier and satellite devices later) over 100 years could explain the 1-degree “warming” that alarmists emphasize.

A scientific document on this issue, the “Petition Project,” circulated about 10 years ago. It provided a summary of long-time global temperature variations. It was published in the Wall Street Journal, and was endorsed by more than 31,000 bona fide scientists. The study concluded that CO2 is a benign and useful gas, that the major determinant of global warming is the sun, and that anthropogenic global warming is trivial.

Yet the drumbeat from the media, government agencies and their allied university grantees not only continues, but increases. This counter-scientific movement is very dangerous to both true science and civilized society, and it raises a big question: Why do these institutions propagandize such a non-problem?

Labels: climate change, global warming