January 1998 Vol. XV, No. 1

The January 11, 1998, issue of the Arizona Daily Star carried two articles about climate on opposite sides of page 1: ``Family dies in effort to keep warm in Nogales'' and ``Fears of warming may bring surge of energy innovation.''

Unusually cold temperatures in the border town of Nogales, Sonora, killed more than a dozen people. Some were asphyxiated by gas heaters (they were conserving fuel by stuffing cracks in the house with rags), and some died of sicknesses aggravated by the cold. Meanwhile, pupils in the new Choptank Elementary School in Cambridge, MD, were being warmed by 52 to 58° water pumped through pipes buried 250 feet deep in bedrock (at an unspecified cost).

This winter also brought record-breaking ice storms to New England, causing disastrous power outages.

Fast forward to 2015. If the Kyoto Protocol is in effect, will human beings caught in a cold snap be allowed to exceed their carbon quotas as they struggle to keep warm? Will the price of doing so be a crushing tax for purchasing ``pollution credits'' from, say, Ukraine, or for paying for technology transfers to Bangladesh, or for protecting a forest in Belize, or for subsidizing a project to mine helium-3 on the moon (perhaps in the 22nd century)?

Will an entrepreneur be able to do unapproved research, say on energy sources, in his basement? Or will he be stymied by the inability to obtain permits, materials, or computers (not to mention capital or leisure time)? Note that the greenhouse gases covered by the Kyoto Protocol include hydrofluorocarbons or HFCs (used as agents to blow foams or insulation or as solvents or cleaning agents in semiconductor manufacture), perfluorocarbons or PFCs (used as a purging agent for semiconductor manufacture and produced during uranium enrichment processes), and sulfur hexafluoride or SF₆ (used as insulating material for high-voltage equipment and for water leak detection).

Understanding the threat posed by ``global warming''-which has nothing to do with the Earth's temperature─first requires understanding the semantics.

The term ``global'' refers primarily to governance. Decisions will be made by a global body (in which one political entity will have one vote, regardless of size, form of government, human rights record, etc.). The process will be based on global concerns. The cows, the trees, the tractors, the soil, and the automobiles in Iowa will be monitored for their infinitesimal contribution to the mix of global atmospheric gases. A judgment about this impact will carry much more weight than the needs of the citizens of Iowa. Molecules are mighty; ordinary individual human beings are not even ciphers─they are liabilities.

It won't be politics as usual. Persons who are not elected cannot be voted out. Nor will it be like a monarchy; kings are mortal and can be deposed. So what will the form of government be? Will decisions be made by a secret priesthood?

The agenda is also global in the sense of being very broad: The Union of Concerned Scientists' ``Sound Science Initiative'' targets a number of legislative issues in addition to its primary focus on the Kyoto Protocol. These include international family planning (population control) programs; the methodology for the 2000 census; the Man and the Biosphere Program; reauthorization of the Endangered Species Act; the Global Environment Facility (which has international projects on climate change, biological diversity, international waters, and stratospheric ozone); and funding for the creation of the National Institute for the Environment.

What the term ``global'' does not accurately describe is the temperatures purported to show a warming trend. The global temperatures are the ones measured by satellite. They show a slight cooling trend over the past 19 years. The temperatures pointed to by the advocates of the Kyoto Treaty are decidedly local: surface temperatures in a small area of Siberia or at selected stations biased toward those near population centers, which are contaminated by the urban heat island effect. They are also limited to a selected time period, leaving out the record that precedes the Industrial Revolution and includes the Medieval Climate Optimum.

Nor does the term ``global'' encompass all the measurements of greenhouse gases, such as the ones that contradict chosen scenarios. Globally averaged atmospheric methane concentrations between 1983 and 1995 show a slowing in the rate of increase, for unknown reasons. While the average rate of increase for 1995 was 5 ppbv/yr, one IPCC scenario assumes that it was 9.8 ppbv/yr between 1990-1995, nearly twice the measured level, and that it will be 12.2 ppbv/yr from 1995-2000. Similarly, the rate of growth for nitrous oxide is assumed to be 0.8 ppbv/yr and measured to be 0.5 ppbv/yr between 1990-1995. Assumed rates of increase in CO₂ also significantly exceed measured values (see data from the National Atmospheric and Oceanographic Administration, NOAA, presented in Heartland Institute Policy Study #84, 9/10/97).

A proclaimed ``global'' consensus of scientists does not include all scientists, nor do most included scientists agree with the apocalyptic scenario implied in the term ``global warming.'' Most hedge their statements very carefully: ``Our ability to quantify the human influence on global climate is limited because the expected signal is still emerging from the noise of natural variability, and because there are uncertainties in key factors'' (IPCC 1995). Or: ``For both N₂O and CH₄, 1990 emissions specified in the IS92 scenarios do not accord with emission estimates based on observed concentration data and current lifetime estimates....We therefore use these latter values to ensure a balanced contemporary budget, and assume that the scenario values are a valid representation of the changes from 1990, rather than correctly specifying absolute emissions (Climate Change 95, emphasis added).

Unfortunately, few scientists to date have been willing to speak out against exaggerations, much less to state boldly and unequivocally that actual measurements clearly disprove the ``global warming'' hypothesis. No government censor is needed when self-censorship is so powerful. Those who challenge the politically correct wisdom may be putting their jobs at risk. They can expect to be vilified as shills for ``big industry,'' as the media ignore the $2-plus billion pot of gold showered only on those who ``find'' causes for alarm related to global climate change.

Truth makes mankind free. And the inverse is also true: global lies will lead to global oppression and consequent widespread disaster.

All who have the ability to understand the issues have a responsibility to inform others about what is probably the most critical issue of our time.