McLieberman Bill Unsupported By Science: Voted Down by Senate
Dr. S. Fred Singer

Letter to Wall Street Journal
SFS 10/31/2003

Senator John McCain's rosy economic appraisal (op-ed, 10/30) of his Climate Stewardship Act (S.139), co-sponsored with Joseph Lieberman, is not supported by the facts. Even if this energy-rationing scheme were to cost households only an improbable "$20 a year" (or about $2 billion a year, instead of many times as much - according to most other estimates), its benefits are essentially zilch. It would hardly influence atmospheric greenhouse gases and certainly not the climate. No dispute about that.

According to independent, non-partisan analyses, McLieberman, which would require mandatory reductions of carbon dioxide, would eliminate jobs, dramatically increase electricity prices, and impose significant burdens on the poor, the elderly, and minorities, all the while doing nothing for the environment.

Mr. McCain is also off-base when he claims a scientific consensus; I will therefore expand on my testimony delivered to his Senate committee. His authority, the Summary of the UN-IPCC science panel report (but not the report itself), bases its conclusion about existence of human-induced global warming on three major claims [1]. Although widely publicized, none of them pass muster; they have been or are being disproved by actual data.

· The IPCC claim, that the climate is currently warming, is based solely on surface thermometer data. It is contradicted not only by superior observations from weather satellites [2] but also by independent data from radiosondes carried on weather balloons. In addition, proxy (non-thermometer) data from tree rings, ice cores, etc. confirm that there is no current warming [3].

· The IPCC claim that the 20th century was the warmest in the past 1000 years is based entirely on a misuse of such proxy data. Two Canadian scientists have just published a detailed audit that exposes a shocking set of errors; it permits anyone to independently verify their counter-claim [4].

Note that even if these two IPCC claims were valid, they would not by themselves prove a human cause; the warming could well be a natural climate fluctuation of the kind frequently observed in the past.

· The third IPCC claim is that climate models which incorporate the observed increase in atmospheric greenhouse gases can accurately reproduce the temperature record of the past 100 years. That assertion is inaccurate. True, the models employ enough adjustable parameters to mimic the global average temperature. But once the record is deconstructed according to latitude and altitude, any agreement with model results disappears [5].

Thus, human-induced climate warming, although expected from greenhouse theory, appears to be difficult to demonstrate and is likely to remain insignificant in comparison to natural variations of the climate. In any case, even its sponsors agree that McLieberman would have an unmeasurable effect on atmospheric carbon-dioxide and climate. And its economic burden and impact on jobs are certainly much greater than its supporters maintain. All in all, it is a bad deal.

The Senate was on target in 1997, during the Clinton administration, when it passed the Byrd-Hagel Resolution against a similar proposal - by unanimous vote. Yesterday's vote of 55 to 43 against S.139 does not represent a shift in opinion so much as a "freebie" for senators willing to cater to environmental pressure groups. It is certainly ironic that the bill would have committed the U.S. to ration energy use unilaterally at a time when Russia has all but killed the Kyoto Protocol, the international agreement to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions.

**********************
S. Fred Singer is professor emeritus of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia and former director of the US Weather Satellite Service. He authored Hot Talk, Cold Science: Global Warming's Unfinished Debate (Independent Institute, Oakland, CA, 1999)

Scientific Literature References (listed only for verification)

1. IPCC 2001. Climate Change 2001: The Scientific Basis. (Houghton J.T. et al., ed.) Cambridge University Press, 892 pp.

2. National Research Council. "Reconciling Observations of Global Temperature Change." National Academy Press. Washington, DC. 2000

3. S.F. Singer. Science 301, 595 (2003)

4. S. McIntyre and R. McKitrick. Energy & Environment 14, 751-771 (2003)

5. D.H. Douglass, B.D. Pearson, and S.F. Singer (submitted for publication)