Fox News' Hemmer hosted Wall Street Journal's "convincing" Du Pont, who continued to mislead on global warming
SUMMARY: On Fox News Live, anchor Bill Hemmer interviewed Wall Street Journal columnist and former Gov. Pete Du Pont (R-DE) about An Inconvenient Truth, a new documentary on former Vice President Al Gore's campaign to raise awareness of global warming. During the interview, Hemmer repeatedly characterized as "convincing" Du Pont's Journal column, which presented a series of assertions on global warming that misrepresent the underlying scientific research and relied on a misleading, industry-funded study on climate change to claim that the "truth about 'global warming' is much less dire than Al Gore wants you to think."
During the May 24 edition of Fox News Live, anchor Bill Hemmer interviewed Wall Street Journal columnist and former Gov. Pete Du Pont (R-DE) about An Inconvenient Truth, a new documentary on former Vice President Al Gore's campaign to raise awareness of global warming. During the interview, Hemmer repeatedly characterized as "convincing" Du Pont's May 23 Wall Street Journal column, which, as Media Matters for America noted, presented a series of assertions on global warming that misrepresent the underlying scientific research and relied on a misleading, industry-funded study on climate change to claim that the "truth about 'global warming' is much less dire than Al Gore wants you to think." Hemmer also let Du Pont repeat his misleading claim that global warming is primarily caused by solar radiation, not human activity.
Du Pont's May 23 column relied heavily on the conclusions of a 2006 report, "Climate Science: Climate Change and Its Impacts," by David R. Legates, associate professor of geography and director of the Center for Climatic Research at the University of Delaware. The report was published by Du Pont's employer, the National Center for Policy Analysis, a conservative think tank that has received substantial funding from energy interests such as ExxonMobil Corp. On Fox News Live, Du Pont repeated the claim from his column that "71 percent of the global warming is said to be because of solar radiation," an assertion that relied on Legates's argument that solar radiation has a significant effect on warming and should be incorporated into any climate models. Legates wrote:
Another variable that climate models do not take into account is the effect of changes in solar radiation on the Earth's climate. Over the past 350 years, scientists have discovered cyclical changes in the Earth's climate due to solar activity -- such as increases and decreases in solar flares and sun spots. Some researchers have argued that solar variability may be responsible for about 0.45 F of warming between 1900 and 1990 -- just under half of the recent warming -- and about a third of the total warming since 1500. This is notable since approximately half of the observed 20th century warming occurred before 1940 and cannot be attributed to human causes.
However Legates misrepresented the findings of solar radiation experts Judith Lean and David Rind, whose 1999 study Legates cited. While he noted their finding that "solar variability may be responsible for about 0.45 degree F of warming between 1900 and 1990," in order to emphasize the extent to which the sun is to blame for global warming, Legates ignored the conclusion Lean and Rind drew from this finding: that solar radiation has played only a small part in the warming observed in recent decades. Indeed, at a 1999 seminar hosted by the U.S Global Climate Change Research Program, Lean reportedly explained "that when the climate-warming energy represented by changes in the concentration of greenhouse gases is compared to that which is exerted by changes in the sun's radiation, the sun's effect is quite small."
From the May 24 edition of Fox News Live:
HEMMER: And former Delaware Governor Pete Du Pont is with me today. Governor, good morning to you.
DU PONT: Good morning, Bill.
HEMMER: You wrote a pretty convincing piece in The Wall Street Journal yesterday. Your take on global warming, as it relates to Al Gore's claim is what?
DU PONT: Well, I think it is more fiction than fact. And when you look at some of the statistics that go back to the first Earth Day in the spring of 1970, you see what's happening. The U.S. population is up 42 percent. The miles driven by Americans in cars is up 178 percent. And the gross domestic product in the country, up 195 percent. America is prospering, and yet the EPA [Environmental Protection Agency] reports that pollutants in the United States, the six major pollutants, have actually declined by 50 percent. We have more wetlands, we have more bald eagles -- we used to have 500 pairs, we now have 7,500 pairs. We have more forest. Things are getting better in the environment, and I think we're making progress.
HEMMER: You make a convincing argument in your story as it relates to the United States. But I don't know what's causing these glaciers to disappear. I don't know if it man's fault or not, but back on our screen right over here, we can show you the coral reefs again, this is not the reefs -- there we go. You see all the color here, governor? Today, they're saying after several decades of abuse, now the color has been lost. I don't know who is to blame in all this, but these pictures tell a story of something. The question is what story do they tell?
DU PONT: Well, there's no question that the world changes as time goes by. One of the things that's doing this, of course, is solar radiation. And there -- in a new study put out by the National Center for Policy Analysis, which I talk about in the column, and I'm associated with that organization, 71 percent of the global warming is said to be because of solar radiation. And you know, you think about it, and that makes some sense. The EPA reports, excuse me, NASA reports that the lower ice cap on the southern part of Mars has been shrinking for six years. There are no SUV's on Mars, there are no factories putting out smoke on Mars.
HEMMER: No H2's driving up and down the sand there.
DU PONT: No. That is because of solar radiation. And I think much of the warming is because of solar radiation here on Earth.
HEMMER: One more issue, 15 seconds left to go here. Could it be the responsibility of developing countries who maybe have not advanced their own technology and level of adherence to the changing environment over the past 35 years, going back to 1972, as you make the point. Maybe it's India, maybe it's China. Would you buy that debate and argument?
DU PONT: Well, there's no question that global warming started up, we're getting it under control, we're making progress, and all the nations of the world are going to have to help make that progress. But let's not pretend there's going to be a vast emergency. There simply isn't, and I think we're making a lot of progress on pollution and doing very well here in the United States.
HEMMER: Thank you, governor.
and drinking 6 glasses of beer is healthy for the heart and brain, smoking is good for the health.
Its so silly: the one is saying that global warming is not true, the other is saying that it is not that bad, and this guy is saying we are getting it under control! No explanation of these differences or any explanation how the US (ie the we) is getting it under control.
Even the Chinese government is acknowledging global warming and they will eventually be on the forefront of developing techniques to reduce pollution.
Its funny to see these old white guys yelling that no one needs to worry now ... these guys are not lookg further than their paycheck and profits on their stock. That is the bad thing about conservatives: everything should remain as it is without using creativity to explore how we can make things better as it is. I would almost think this guy likes to smell the smog in Houston and SF. If its not for the ozon-layer, perhaps we could change a few things that would benefit our lungs and other parts of the body.
Do you believe there was an "ice-age" on our planet at one time? If so, where did all the ice go? Of course there's global warming and it's been around for a lot longer than the "industrialized" nations have been. Who exactly are we trying to blame the global warming on, in your opinion?
Of course there were ice ages. Much of the ice melted, and sea levels rose. This is so easily documented in the geologic record.
As to when gw started - Yes, there are natural cycles of cooling and warming - leading to glacial and inter-glacial periods. This graph shows the temperature fluctuations over the last 150,000 years or so. Note that the temps only vary by about 5-7 degrees or so, and that's enough to trigger ice ages. Also on the graph are CO2 levels during that time. I'll let you decide if there's a relation. This graph shows CO2 levels for the last 1000 years. Notice anything happening around the time of the industrial revolution?? Both of these graphs were taken from Wikipedia. If you want to talk about the "scientific debate" regarding global warming, start with the science.
Yeah, that first one is a good graph. I'm not sure I can trust the second one. The first one showed a dramatic increase in temp beginning around 15,000 years ago. What manufacturing jobs were available then that would account for the increase? Then near the end of the graph (present time) the temp dropped and/or steadied out, what accounts for that happening?
Why does the graph end at 150,000? It would be helpful to know if these temp increases happen every 150k years, don't you think? After all the scientists say the world is millions of years old, we should have more info before making a broad statement that industry is "causing" the problem.
>>I'm not sure I can trust the second one.
Why?
Yes, virtually every scientist believes humans cause global warming. I tend to believe scientists, not superficial bloggers.
They are also not looking any further down the road than the 20 years or less they life span will allow. What do they care what condition Mother Nature is in when future generations take hold?
i mean wesley will be here in a minute to clear it all up.
he probably will be.
I think your assessment is RIGHT ON! Or is it Tommy? or is it Wesley?
tommy's farewell martyr tour.
"we have more bald eagles -- we used to have 500 pairs, we now have 7,500 pairs."
And how many *other* less charismatic species have gone extinct in the same time frame?
Nobody seemed to catch a huge logical flaw in DuPont's argument. He says that since the first Earth Day, there has been much improvement in pollution. True enough, if you're talking about sulphor and carbon monoxide and particulates and so on. But CO2 and the other gh gasses have only been considered "pollutants" more recently. Those are getting worse and have not been addressed in this country.
Also - why do we discount human activity as a potential source for global warming before 1940? I usually think of the Industrial Revolution as the time start looking for evidence of human-generated global warming...
Whenever the conservative misinformation/damage control wire churns out these bogus reports stemming from the National Center for Policy Analysis, why isn't it disclosed that the organization is funded by Big Oil? The WSJ and Faux News again do the general public a great harm.
So we just HAD to attack Iraq because American lives depended on it, better to err on the side of caution than see a smoking gun shaped like mushroom cloud, yet we can just IGNORE global warming, no need to err on the side of caution, who cares if it turns out to be true and New York city floods and the planet can no longer sustain human life.
"As planned," says the Earth.
Way I see it, the Earth is erring on the side of caution by eradicating such an ignominious, arrogant and destructive species as ours.
...conclusions are widely unrealistic,...assuming the maximums, pulling out all the stops for every loophole, possibility, and making some assumptions -- some unrealistic - William Frey, an mmfa source of credibility.
Frey was talking about illegal immigration but his statement is more appropriate when describing the position of the global warming alarmists.
Their dire predictions have failed to materialize...the computer models have not produced anything credible. Global warming has increased by only 0.5 degree in the last one hundred years...most of it before 1940.
Brrrrr
in recorded history, most storms, most hurricanes, earliest intense storm [july], most intense storms, lowest pressure recorded in a hurricane, florida struck by a record eight hurricanes in two years. a prediction of all those global warming crazies.
first storm to hit spain-portugal. and in the winter of 05 the first storm in the south atlantic, which hit brazil.
What about the record snowfall the midwest gets every 11 years or so? Is that related to global warming too? So, by your analysis, we'll have an even worse hurricane/tornado season this year, and a worse one next year and a worse one the year after that?
you're talking gibberish. and i'm talking hurricanes. whether there will be as many this year is unknown. in general the trend is up. are you denying that is one of the predictions?
You are not even posting coherent sentences. It sounds like you are so desperate that you are throwing anything that comes into your head.
>>Their dire predictions have failed to materialize...the computer models have not produced anything credible. Global warming has increased by only 0.5 degree in the last one hundred years...most of it before 1940.
The predictions can't come true because they are set in the future! The predictions are that the ice caps will melt and that the seas will rise in the next 20 to one hundred years. How can their predictions be wrong when that time hasn't come?
Their other predictions however are exactly right. They predicted that the interior of Iceland would get a bit colder, for example, and they are right.
Where is the proof that their computer models aren't right? Did you hear that on talk radio and are just reporting it? See realclimate.org for the science which refutes everything you claim.
Amost every single scientist in the field of climatalogy believes global warming is real, as do most of the nobel winning scientist.
- Could New Orleans be the first major U.S. city ravaged by human-caused climate change?
The correct answer--is that there is no way to prove that Katrina either was, or was not, affected by global warming. For a single event, regardless of how extreme, such attribution is fundamentally impossible. We only have one Earth, and it will follow only one of an infinite number of possible weather sequences.
It is impossible to know whether or not this event would have taken place if we had not increased the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere as much as we have.
Weather events will always result from a combination of deterministic factors (including greenhouse gas forcing or slow natural climate cycles) and stochastic factors (pure chance). - realclimate
Despite the dubious assumptions from the alarmists their is plenty of diagreement in the scientific community about global warming and its possible results.
there is no way to say one specific event was caused by global warming. however, one of the predictions of global warming consequences was that there would be more and intense storms. that's what's happening.
Hurricane data is pretty anecdotal at this point. We have only been able to track them with satellites for 35-40 years.
The comparative data only compares those hurricanes that struck or neared land. Many storms spawned and died at sea...and no one knew it.
in the 40s, so it's not exactly unknown. before that many storms were reported by ships at sea. and we do know the areas that have been struck as you say. those are way up. but you're out in left field anyway tommy. you keep insisting that there's major disagreement among scientists. there's not.
The trend of hurricanes can predictably be higher today with better tracking. Any half-hearted attempt to correlate hurricanes today with data more than 35-40 years old is limp alarmism.
Is global warming a factor? Might be. Proven? No Way.
we're talking intensity. we do know the storms that have struck the coasts. and the numbers are unprecented in record keeping going back to 1851. the weather service has been flying planes into hurricanes for fifty years. last year they measured the lowest recorded pressure ever. and it's hardly just the u.s., wilma all but destroyed cozumel last year.
Intensity or frequency...makes no difference. Without the complete data set...the alarmist assumptions are valid for only the last 35-40 years...hardly enough info to make a definitive judgement about the long term trends.
If Albert Pujols hits 2 homeruns on opening day...he's on a pace to hit 324 homers for the season. Twelve games later...after going homerless...he's on pace to hit 27 homers for the season.
That's how much sense the alarmist predictions make.
and the caribbean since those are basically land locked. a hurricane will hit something. and in florida they were recording wind speeds and pressures back in the 20's. so the record keeping goes back far further that 40 years. so the basis for your assumption is false. keep repeating it but it's false.
The fact is you have no idea of the frequency or intensity of hurricanes in total before satellite tracking. You have no idea of the number of hurricanes that were never discovered in the ocean.
How many hurricanes were identified in 2005? The answer is...all of them.
How many hurricanes were identified in 1920? The answer is...some of them.
and the numbers on average for all those early years are far below the last two years and far below the intensity of the last two years.
The question is quite simple. Can you quantify the frequency and intensity of all hurricane activity prior to satellite tracking? If you can...you have a leg to stand on.
If you can't...your assumptions collapse.
Force 5 hurricanes between 1850 and 1985, and we have had 8 since 1985. THREE last year alone. It is just incredible that at this point ANYONE is denying the reality of global warming. Energy corporations said they would win if they could inject uncertainty into the global warming debate. There really isnt any uncertainty in the scientific community if you take out the industry sponsered science. Its just ludicrous. The glaciers are melting, the hurricanes are getting worse, and you are blithering. There are none so blind as those that REFUSE to see.
You have nothing but anecdotal and incomplete records to make the alarmist assumption about global warming and hurricanes.
The only reliable data consists of the tracking since satellites...you cannot prove the frequency or intensity of hurricanes before that.
Let's sit around and wait till category 5 hurricanes are the norm THEN do something about it. This is so effing dumb I can’t even bring myself to mockingly say “brilliant!”
Funny how the "mushroom cloud" scare was enough for you and the rest of Right to back W's invade Iraq play, based on ANECDOTAL EVIDENCE of WMD, but now that it's global warming, the cost of which will ultimately shift to the "backs" of the tragic waif known as Big Bidness Corporate America, it's the tried and true "it needs more study" canard.
One thing that IS 100% predictable is Tommy/Wesley’s reliance on debunked, fallacious arguments.
Well ok, einstein...just what is it that you plan on doing...while I'm rocking on the porch and ignoring the alarmists.
Careful now...a plan...not wild blather.
Would be to take the message Al Gore is spreading with some actual interest and understanding, not calling him out as an ALARMIST. The first step in any situation is acknowledgement and acceptance of the situation itself. This would include the acceptance and acknowledgement that their IS a POSSIBLITY that we humans are causing a Green House effect, that can be hindered if we change some of our methods of transportation and living. A full scale, and agreeable plan can be formulated when and IF the world accepts the situation before them and works together in order to relieve the problem. CHINA has surpassed the US in the effort already. What more is needed other than global support for a plan of action to hinder the Green House effect? The United States has a great oppurtunity to show the rest of the world that we ARE concerned with issues not directly relating to the platinum lined pockets of its leaders.
- This would include the acceptance and acknowledgement that their IS a POSSIBLITY that we humans are causing a Green House effect - rstybeach
I would accept that.
- IF the world accepts the situation before them and works together in order to relieve the problem - rstybeach
But now you have made a giant leap and proclaimed that there IS a problem...not just the possiblity.
- CHINA has surpassed the US in the effort already - rstybeach
How bout a little more info on that statement.
If you present the situation honestly...if you accept that there is a possiblity that mankind is to blame for global warming...you must also accept the argument that there is the possiblity that we are not at fault.
" CHINA has surpassed the US in the effort already - rstybeach
How bout a little more info on that statement."
"Last week Tony Blair went out of his way to welcome China's readiness to take "a real lead" in combating global warming. In the first instance of its kind, the Chinese State Environment Protection Agency laid down that the projects - which cover 13 of the country's provinces and are worth a total of £7.5bn - should not proceed until their impact on the environment had been reviewed. Among the halted projects is an important power facility at the highly controversial Three Gorges dam on the Yangtse River."...
..."But even before the latest move, China had already done far more than the US to combat the danger of climate change. Although its emissions of carbon dioxide, the main cause of global warming, rose rapidly between 1978 and 1996, they then fell sharply as a result of clean-up measures. "
[link to www.energybulletin.net]
An interesting read...although I find it hard to fathom that China has done more than the U.S. in this area. I'll keep my eyes open on this subject...and all others dealing with China.
Like the editors, I'll remain a bit skeptical. In the editorial notes they stated, "The editors would welcome confirmation of this dramatic change of plan by Chinese authorites."
Thanks for the info.
typical tommy sit back and rock away and just ignore all those upsetting things. kind of like he blue-skied iraq until he had no credibility.
You're mind is made up, Tommy, and you know it. Any idea that weighs unfavorable to corporate America is, to you, a bad one. If I say "we need to rid of the internal combustion engine, the dirtiest and most inefficient device ever invented", BANG! you'll unleash the "undo hardships on GM and Ford and Chrysler-Dahmer" argument. Same goes for fuel efficiency standards. Hardships on the automotive industry. Well, so what? The buggy whip and surrey manufacturers of America had a good thing going till the big bad auto came and ruined it for them. Nothing is permanent but change itself. Time for some little ones, in scheme of things, to avoid a BIG one.
Originally published in Science Express on 16 March 2006
Science 7 April 2006: Vol. 312. no. 5770, pp. 94 - 97
Deconvolution of the Factors Contributing to the Increase in Global Hurricane Intensity
C. D. Hoyos,* P. A. Agudelo, P. J. Webster, J. A. Curry
To better understand the change in global hurricane intensity since 1970, we examined the joint distribution of hurricane intensity with variables identified in the literature as contributing to the intensification of hurricanes. We used a methodology based on information theory, isolating the trend from the shorter-term natural modes of variability. The results show that the trend of increasing numbers of category 4 and 5 hurricanes for the period 1970–2004 is directly linked to the trend in sea-surface temperature; other aspects of the tropical environment, although they influence shorter-term variations in hurricane intensity, do not contribute substantially to the observed global trend.
School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA 30332, USA.
* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: choyos@eas.gatech.edu
[link to www.sciencemag.org]
Hey, Wesley, How 'bout if you write to Dr. Hoyos and explain to him why you think he and his colleagues are wrong? And let us know what he says, OK?
Plato
Keep posting here. You abviously understand the fine details. I need to to really educate myself. I regularly look at realclimate.org. Much of the discussion is very technical. In order to understand technical details, one has to understand the underlying science and the jargon. One also needs to immerse onself in the argument. Usually once I do this the reports (the technical ones meant for the "lay person!") usally become clearer.
But keep posting. Global warming is too serious a problem to allow sceptics to cast false doubt on it when there is none. It is too serious a problem for many of us not to be able to answer the skeptics factually.
>>Despite the dubious assumptions from the alarmists their is plenty of diagreement in the scientific community about global warming and its possible results.
You are totally making this up.
You have completely missed the point of that thread - there is no way to blame hurricane Katrina, a single weather event, on global warming. But that has no bearing whatsoever on the scientific view of global warming (which is, it is real). Computer models of climate change deal with statistical probability - not with single events. Anyone with a minimal background in statistics would know this. And if you bother to read the rest of the threads posted at realclimate.org, you will see that mainstream climatologists believe that it is real and humans have contributed to this warming (the arguments put forth by global warming skeptics are analyzed and debated there). Here's another source of information from the journal Science (excerpt):
No Doubt About It, the World Is Warming Richard A. Kerr Science 12 May 2006 Vol 312, page 825
Global warming contrarians can cross out one of their last talking points. A report released last week* settles the debate over how the atmosphere has been warming the past 35 years. The report, the first of 21 the Bush Administration has commissioned to study lingering problems of global climate change, finds that satellite-borne instruments and thermometers at the surface now agree: The world is warming throughout the lower atmosphere, not just at the surface, about the way greenhouse climate models predict. "The evidence continues to support a substantial human impact on global temperature increases," added the report's chief editor Thomas Karl, director of the National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, North Carolina. The additional support for global warming will not change White House policy, however. Michele St. Martin, spokesperson for the White House Council on Environmental Quality, says President George W. Bush believes that greenhouse gas emissions can be brought down through better use of energy while the understanding of climate science continues to improve. Critics who blasted research under the White House's Climate Change Science Program (CCSP) (Science, 27 February 2004, p. 1269) as mere obfuscation might not have expected such a forthright conclusion from the report. Karl attributes the clarity to the CCSP approach. "For the first time, we had people [who initially disagreed] sitting down across the table. That's a tremendous advantage," he says. "The process is great for improving understanding. It led to not just synthesis but to advancing the science." The CCSP synthesis and assessment process prompted new, independent analyses that helped eliminate some long-standing differences, Karl says... *www.climatescience.gov/Library/sap/sap1-1/finalreport/default.htm Source: [link to www.sciencemag.org]
probability can not say for instance a single event was caused by a bias.
In order to determine a bias, a large enough sample would have to be taken.
To go to say a game of craps, roulette etc. Any game involving probablity, if a number of events are recorded down, then it is possible to determine the overall "curve" of possibilities.
Is 100 or 1000 years of data enough? It depends on how far into the future we are trying to predict. It would be silly to use that for lengths of time greater than 10% of the sample size.
media matters is wasting its time follwing the fox channel. it is not a real news channel, but one that masquerades as one by putting forth real news on non political and policy items, and on those topics, to which the station is dedicated, putting forht the views of the other side in a tepid, distorted, incomplete, or factually illogical way. the station is a joke as a news show, and it really is counterproductive to dignify it as such.
additionally attemtps to communciate something to it are a waste, because it has a specific and focused purpose. so it doesnt matter what media matters says, or what you way. the critical issue here is to make this larger story, about how "fox news" really isn't a news story, the ONLY story when it comes to the fox channel, and support it. but critiquing it as a news source along with these other news sources only undermines that message
[link to www.pressthenews.com]
But at the same time, this is why MMFA attracts attention to Faux news. Just as John Stewart and the Daily Show does, MMFA must point out the rediculous vile that is reported on Fox news in order to convince its loyal audience to take everything they say with a grain of salt. In order to have a nation that thinks clearly, and votes without ignorance or misinformation, media outlets such as Faux news must be pointed out as punditry and not factual news reporting. Just imagine what kind of country we would be living in if every media outlet had the same agenda as Faux, Hitler would have won the war!
is actually the one that got me. It's a PROVEN fact that the increase in CO2 has increased the acidity of our oceans measurably. I read this in either Discover or Scientific American a few months ago, and I can't remember which because I bought them both to read during a long flight. The level of carbonic acid is increasing, and it's killing the coral. This is directly related to the atmospheric CO2 concentration. The other thing is that the polar ice floes are breaking up - polar bears are drowning. And this stuff probably would normally happen in geological time - but NOT in a human generation. This is scary stuff, and these nut jobs just want to ignore it so they can keep lining their pockets. And, oh, what has ol' Billy Hemmer done? How far he's fallen from his days at CNN. He wasn't nearly the partisan hack at CNN that he's become at Faux.
Science 16 July 2004: Vol. 305. no. 5682, p. 305
Based on the amount of fossil fuel that has been burned in the industrial era, the increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration is only half of the expected value. The fate of the rest of the CO2--in the ocean and the terrestrial biosphere--is the focus of two Research Articles (see the Perspective by Takahashi). Feely et al. (p. 362; see the cover) use a new data set of total alkalinity and chlorofluorocarbon measurements to estimate CaCO3 dissolution rates and to examine the long-term impacts on the carbon speciation in the global ocean. They also discuss the effects of these changes on calcium-carbonate-secreting organisms, including corals, foraminifera, pteropods, and coccolithophorids. Sabine et al. (p. 367) use marine inorganic carbon measurements from two global ocean surveys conducted in the 1990s to estimate the size of the oceanic sink for the period from 1800 to 1994. They find that the oceans have absorbed 48% of the CO2 emissions from fossil fuel burning and cement manufacturing during that period. Because the atmospheric CO2 levels are equivalent to about two- thirds of the anthropogenic CO2 produced, the terrestrial biosphere must have been a net source during that interval. [link to www.sciencemag.org]
Science 16 July 2004: Vol. 305. no. 5682, pp. 362 - 366
Impact of Anthropogenic CO2 on the CaCO3 System in the Oceans
Richard A. Feely,1* Christopher L. Sabine,1 Kitack Lee,2 Will Berelson,3 Joanie Kleypas,4 Victoria J. Fabry,5 Frank J. Millero6 Rising atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations over the past two centuries have led to greater CO2 uptake by the oceans. This acidification process has changed the saturation state ofthe oceans with respect to calcium carbonate (CaCO3) particles. Here we estimate the in situ CaCO3 dissolution rates for the global oceans from total alkalinity and chlorofluorocarbon data, and we also discuss the future impacts of anthropogenic CO2 on CaCO3 shell–forming species. CaCO3 dissolution rates, ranging from 0.003 to 1.2 micromoles per kilogram per year, are observed beginning near the aragonite saturation horizon. The total water column CaCO3 dissolution rate for the global oceans is approximately 0.5 ± 0.2 petagrams of CaCO3-C per year, which is approximately 45 to 65% of the export production of CaCO3. [link to www.sciencemag.org]
Al Gore is flying around the world in a private jet saying "stop polluting the world, we're all going to die". I bet he drives around with a caravan of SUVs once his plane lands.
Gore is causing more pollution than the average citizen does in a year. I find this extremely, entertaining....combat this one guys...its almost as good as the proven fact that Michael Moore owned Halliburton stock...hahahahahahahah
You're probably right about Al and his travels. Although, the message he spreads is convincing enough that there will be a change of opinion in a large number of people's views such that people will change their actions in a way that will encourage their awareness of everyday methods to prevent/deter pollution. This number of people detering pollution because of Al Gore's message largely outweighs the amount of pollution Gore may be responsible for.
I can tell you Gore is very aware of the pollutants he is responsible for, but in this day and age and being a former vice president, there are certain modes of transportation that are considered a necessity.
Why is it so difficult to be aware of a possible situation anyways? I believe GW is true, and we are a major cause of it. But for the numerous amount of people who would rather choose ignorance and apathy over being informed and aware of an even POSSIBLE situation, I ask why be so lazy? Is it really that difficult to become aware of what we pump into our breathing air everyday, and that possibly a lot of the crap we do pump into the air may be harming us in the long run? Where is the harm in spreading a message to "WAKE UP" and see that we could be causing harm to the beautiful planet in which we inhabit. We as a nation were sold on a WAR based on non-factual, misinformation. Can we call the entire bush administration ALARMISTS on the Global War on Terror?
Do they mention in the movie the fact that less than 10% of the nations meterologists believe in global warming?
Can you provide some reliable authority to support your so-called fact? And, while you're at it, perhaps you could find some information about meteorologists in other countries?
Of course, none of this is particularly relevant, as meteorologists study the weather- not the earth's climate. What you really need is reliable information about what mainstream climatologists are reporting in peer-reviewed research journals (along with the oceanographers who study ocean warming). You can get a good sense of this from www.realclimate.org. [I found it amusing that earlier on this thread someone posted an excerpt from realclimate.org entry about hurricane Katrina and its possible relationship to global warming (cannot be determined) , and attempted to use this excerpt as evidence that climatologists are uncertain about the global warming phenomenon; a cassic case of taking a statement out of context]
Excellent (though I suppose obvious) response! I keep hearing this tripe about meterologists doubting global warming. Of course, what they think is not particularly relevant. But besides that, I doubt 90 percent don't believe in global warming.
From Science online (www.sciencemag.org):
New Forecast: Hot and Hotter By Noreen Parks ScienceNOW Daily News 26 May 2006
If Earth's past climate cycles are any indication, temperatures could be significantly hotter by the end of the century than current climate models predict. New research suggests that current atmospheric models underestimate future global warming. Scientists say the estimates don't account for soil decomposition and other natural processes that are expected to escalate in response to ongoing warming, thus amplifying greenhouse gas production. Currently, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change estimates that the global average temperature could increase as much as 5.8 degrees Celsius by the end of the 21st century. But these estimates don't factor in some feedback mechanisms that may be triggered by rising temperatures. For instance, accelerated decomposition in soils and changes in ocean chemistry may add considerably to greenhouse gases and further intensify warming. Two studies published 26 May in Geophysical Research Letters attempt to translate these potential impacts into hard numbers. In the first study, biogeochemists Margaret Torn of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California and John Harte of the University of California, Berkeley, used Antarctic ice cores to estimate the amount of greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere over the past 420,000 years, allowing them to predict the impact of future climate-CO2 feedbacks. Combining these estimates with standard assumptions from climate models, they calculated that a doubling of current CO2 levels would boost temperatures by 1.6 to 6 degrees Celsius, and by 2100 the gain could be as much as 7.7 degrees C. Torn notes that many feedback mechanisms remain poorly understood, and uncertainties abound in trying to predict their effects on climate. But she believes the findings indicate "that we will experience more severe, not less severe, climate change than is currently forecast." In the second study, climatologist Marten Scheffer of Wageningen University in the Netherlands and colleagues also examined data from polar ice cores and reconstructed temperatures during the ice age that lasted from about 1550 to 1850. Using somewhat different methods from Torn and Harte, they found that warming due to human activities could heighten temperatures by 1.7 to 8.0 degrees Celsius over the coming century. Caspar Ammann, a climate modeler with the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, however, says that climate models do incorporate various types of feedback--including advances in technology and public policy--to estimate future temperatures resulting from higher atmospheric CO2. [link to sciencenow.sciencemag.org]