CO2 Warming The Atmosphere Is False.

Joseph Romm, Ph.D. Physics

Written Testimony of Dr. Joseph Romm Senior Fellow, Center for American Progress Action Fund Before the Ways and Means Committee of the U.S. House of Representatives Hearing on Energy Tax Incentives Driving the Green Job Economy April 14, 2010:

"The Bush administration itself concluded in a major 2008 report, "It is well established through formal attribution studies that the global warming of the past 50 years is due primarily to human-induced increases in heat-trapping gases." That study noted we're already seeing more extreme weather events, especially intense precipitation. In the past million years, the climate was primarily driven by natural cycles initiated by changes in the earth's orbit, which led to emissions of greenhouse gases, an amplifying feedback that caused rapid warming after long ice ages. As pre-eminent climatologist Wallace Broecker wrote in 1995, "the paleoclimate record shout out to us that, far from being self-stabilizing, the Earth's climate system is an ornery beast which overreacts even to small nudges." Now we are punching the beast in the face by emitting billions of tons of global warming pollution a year. If we don't act quickly, then, by midcentury, CO2 concentrations in the air will reach levels not seen in 15 million years, when it was 5°F to 10°F warmer and seas were 75 to 120 feet higher, a 2009 study concluded. Indeed, many studies make clear we risk 9°F warming this century alone. And that isn’t the worst-case scenario; that’s what is projected to happen [if] we stay anywhere near our current emissions trajectory. The plausible worst-case scenario, as the Met Office warned last year, is 13-18°F over most of U.S. and 27°F warming in the Arctic—and it could happen in 50 years. But “we do have time to stop it if we cut greenhouse gas emissions soon.” The good news is that sea levels don't rise as fast as temperatures, but the bad news is that everywhere you look around the planet, ice is disappearing much faster than expected, including the dynamic disintegration of the great ice sheets on Greenland and Antarctica. Whereas the IPCC had ignored dynamic effects and predicted sea levels might rise perhaps only one to two feet this century if we took no action to reduce emissions, major studies since 2007 put the estimate at 3 to 7 feet, enough to generate 100 million environmental refugees or more.  Other studies warn that the U.S. Southwest could become [a] permanent dust bowl post-2040, with Kansas above 90°F some 120 days a year. l  We are literally poisoning our oceans. Unrestricted burning of fossil fuels threatens a new wave of die-offs. The title of a recent documentary on ocean acidification put it bluntly: “Imagine a World Without Fish.” The cost of unrestricted greenhouse gas emissions are nearly incalculable. A 2009 report by the International Institute for Environment and Development found the “net present value of climate change impacts” of $1.240 trillion on our current emissions path. Reducing emissions sharply offered a 6-to-1 savings over trying to adapt."

Comments on the testimony by Adrian Vance:

(1)  "If we don't act quickly, then, by midcentury, CO2 concentrations in the air will reach levels not seen in 15 million years, when it was 5°F to 10°F warmer and seas were 75 to 120 feet higher,"

Actual temperatures 15 million years ago are not known with any accuracy as they are determined by oxygen isotopes from Antarctic ice 6000 miles from the location under consideration and by extinct species of plants the range tolerances we can only speculate about based on similar species living now that may, or may not, relate.  The American Geophysical Union says if all the ice were to melt that could the seas would rise no more than 22 feet because the poles will never melt as long as we are tilted 23.5 degrees.

(2) "Indeed, many studies make clear we risk 9°F warming this century alone."  

These are all computer simulations that are rigged to show an increase when experimental work would show no increase and when a decline is seen by increasing atmospheric CO2 to 1%.

(3)  "The plausible worst-case scenario, as the Met Office warned last year, is 13-18°F over most of U.S. and 27°F warming in the Arctic—and it could happen in 50 years."  

This is clearly ridiculous as any simple atmospheric simulator shows.

(4) "Whereas the IPCC had ignored dynamic effects and predicted sea levels might rise perhaps only one to two feet this century if we took no action to reduce emissions, major studies since 2007 put the estimate at 3 to 7 feet, enough to generate 100 million environmental refugees or more."  

If all the ice that could melt in glaciers and on Greenland were to melt the seas would take hundreds of years to rise 17 inches according to the Amercian Geophysical Union experts and cause no refugees.

(5)  "Other studies warn that the U.S. Southwest could become a permanent dust bowl post-2040, with Kansas above 90°F some 120 days a year. 

These predictions are based on nothing, but avarice or computer models.  Our simple atmospheric simulation shows CO2 atmospheric warming is false.

Full testimony at:  https://cdn.americanprogress.org/wp-content/uploads/issues/2010/04/pdf/Romm_testimony.pdf

Adrian Vance