No Climate Change Emergency

The July 25^th Seattle Times Editorial “No Time to Dither on Climate Emergency” opened with the following:

“Climate change is an imminent threat to humanity and the planet, and we are running out of time. This is as settled as science can be, yet Congress continues to hem and haw and fail to meet to take meaningful actions.”  

 

It concludes with the following:

 

The danger of climate change demands that whole government approach. Biden says he understands the urgency---that means hurry up and do something

 

The seminal “science” behind global warming is a 2007 Scientific American article “The Physical Science behind Climate Change”.  That computer models using the authors’ “Radiative Forcing” didn’t match with “observed climate change” unless they "assumed" the increase in carbon dioxide had ten times the effect on temperatures as increases in warming from the Sun. More recent studies have increased the effect of a CO2 increase to up to 30 times that of an increase from the Sun

 

Yet, a National Academy of Science, Nov 10^th 2015 paper entitled, "Shortwave and Longwave Radiative Contributions to Global Warming Under Increasing CO2" concluded 

 

Altogether, these results suggest that, although greenhouse gas forcing predominantly acts to reduce Outgoing Longwave Radiation (OLR), the resulting global warming is likely caused by enhanced Absorbed Solar Radiation (ASR)

 

That CO2 effects on global warming were also included in NASA, Dec 9^th 2019 paper “Solar Cycle 25 Prediction 2019 – Bing”.  It included charts concluding the following:

 

CO2 warming effect decreases with concentration. CO2 has less and less effect with increased concentration.   CO2 can go to 1,000 to 2000 or to 5,000 and it won’t warm the earth.  

 

Clearly the “science” behind claim CO2 driven “Climate change is an imminent threat” is hardly “settled”.  

 

That climate change demands a “whole government approach” ignores the fact the "whole country" only emits 15% of the planet’s CO2. China and India emit nearly 45% and have plans to continue adding coal fired power plants at least through 2030. Thus, it’s unlikely a whole US government approach would significantly change atmospheric CO2 levels.

 

As far as actual data, ice core studies have been used to compare CO2 levels and global temperatures during the last 800,000 years. That during the Eemian period, some 130,000 years ago, temperatures were 4 deg C higher than current levels with 290 ppm CO2 levels.  Thus, CO2 levels alone aren’t determinative. More important, the ice core data showed a lag between global temperature and CO2 during periods they’re both increasing and decreasing.

 

That indicates increasing global temperatures, driven by the Sun, increases CO2 out gassing from ocean, raising CO2 on the way up.  The lag is even greater when global temperatures go down, again, driven by the Sun, increases CO2 dissolution into the ocean, lowering atmospheric levels on the way down.  The ice core data indicate atmospheric CO2 level is the result of global warming not the cause.  Any additional CO2 emissions from fossil fueled power plants will increase atmospheric levels but not global temperatures or constitute a climate emergency.   

 

The bottom line is the “science” is far from “settled”.  That the whole country only emits 15% of the planet's CO2 emissions.  That ice core data indicate increasing atmospheric CO2 levels is the result of global warming not the cause.  Thus, there is no need to use solar and wind power to replace fossil fueled generators.  (In 2021, they only provided 12% of the electric energy consumed.) That until there are ways to store renewable energy, fossil fueled generators are the only way to avoid the blackouts that will inevitably arise when the Sun doesn’t shine, and the wind doesn’t blow.