Category: CCIQ

Answer: No, but poverty caused by energy starvation would be.

A consortium of medical organizations, among other advocacy groups, claims that climate change is the most urgent threat to public health. A 22-author “countdown” on health and climate change published Nov 6 in the British journal The Lancet concludes that the “planet still has time to heal,” but action to limit CO2 emissions is urgent, lest 50 years of public health gains be reversed. Continue reading “Climate Change IQ Question 10: Is climate change the most urgent global health threat?”

Answer: No, mild carbonation of the oceans is beneficial to marine life.

The “evil twin” of global warming is said to be ocean acidification, endangering coral reefs and harming lobsters, crabs, oysters, and other shell-making creatures. It is allegedly causing “osteoporosis of the sea,” a term coined by Jane Lubchenko, Administrator of the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) from 2009-2013. The oceans will be devastated “in a few decades,” predicts the 2009 Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) video Acid Test.

The ocean in fact is alkaline. Continue reading “Climate Change IQ Question 9: Are human CO2 emissions acidifying the oceans and endangering shell-making animals?”

Answer: No, and government agencies are actually guilty of corrupting the data.

The constant repetition of the mantra that were having “the hottest two decades in recorded history,” as by self-anointed authorities such as “Bill Nye, the Science Guy,” relies on data from government agencies, NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) and NOAA (National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration). These agencies, however, rewrite history by “adjusting” data, consistently making the past cooler and the present warmer. The “adjustments” correlate almost perfectly with the rise in atmospheric CO_2,, fitting the data to the theory. The graph below superimposes the surface temperatures, ostensibly based on the same data set, published by NASA in 1981, 2001, and 2017. [1] Continue reading “Climate Change IQ Question 8: Are government-sponsored climate scientists the only credible sources of information relating to climate-change policy?”

Answer: No, much more forest burned in the 1930s. The recent increase compared with the 1960s through the 1980s is probably caused by poor forest management.

Northern California is being devastated by wildfires, with dozens of people losing their lives and property damage topping $3 billion. Dry conditions and wind have hampered efforts to control them. Huge amounts of pollution—10,000 tons of soot, PM2.5s (small particulates), and VOCs (volatile organic compounds)—are being released into the atmosphere. Mother Nature has no smokestack scrubbers. Continue reading “Climate Change IQ Question 7: Is the increase in atmospheric CO2 making wildfires worse?”

Answer: Because they can’t all import one-third of their electricity. Somebody has to generate it.

California aspires to lead the world to a “clean, renewable” energy future by legislative fiat: 100% renewable by 2045.

That would be a gargantuan feat. As the table below [1] shows, 55% of the electricity California now uses comes from hydrocarbon (HC) sources: coal, petroleum and (mostly) natural gas. California generates only 68% of its own electricity, and half of that is from hydrocarbons. About one-third of its electricity comes from other states, and of that only 20% is from renewables. Continue reading “Climate Change IQ Question 6: Why can’t all States emulate California’s proposed “clean” energy standards?”

Answer: Mass starvation

Through photosynthesis, plants convert CO₂ and water into the food that supports all life on earth. The benefits to plants from increased atmospheric CO2 include: increased growth, more flowers and fruit, better water-use efficiency, and better resistance to environmental stressors such as plant pathogens, macro and micronutrient excesses or deficiencies, high soil salinity, high/low air temperature, and high/low air temperature. Continue reading “Climate Change IQ Question 5: What would happen if atmospheric CO2 concentration dropped by half, say to less than 200 ppm?”

Answer: No. For the past 150 years, sea level has been rising slowly at a rate unaffected by carbon dioxide level or the amount of fuel burned.

Some of the most memorable moments in Al Gore’s film An Inconvenient Truth show the effects of the sea level rising by 20 ft. This number was based on the assumption that half the ice on Greenland and Antarctica would melt. The ice in Greenland, in fact, made huge gains in the last year, and the gains in Antarctic ice exceed the losses. Continue reading “Climate Change IQ Question 4: Will Manhattan and Florida soon be under water if humans do not curtail use of “fossil fuels”?”

Answer: No. The percentage is less than 0.3%.

Science is not consensus. A single experiment can destroy the most beautiful “settled” theory, no matter how many scientists believe in it. Actual temperature observations do not agree with the accelerated global warming predicted by the climate models, as shown below. [1]

Truth is sought by observation and experiment. Continue reading “Climate Change IQ Question 3: Do 97% of climate scientists agree that catastrophic climate change will result if humans do not curtail use of “fossil fuels”?”

Answer: There is less ice now than in the 1970s or during the Little Ice Age, but more than in 2012 or the Medieval Warm Period. It has been increasing over the last few years.

While accusing the Trump Administration of “willful ignorance” and “insensitivity” to victims of Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, manifested by denying “obvious climate change,” an article in the Sep 11 Washington Post links Continue reading “Climate Change IQ Question 2: Is Arctic ice disappearing?”

Answer: No

The Galveston hurricane and floods of 1900, half a century before humanity could have influenced climate to any measurable extent, killed 8,000-12,000 people and remains to this day the worst natural disaster in the history of the United States. [1] Continue reading “Climate Change IQ Question 1: Would lowering atmospheric CO2 prevent or mitigate hurricanes?”