Hot Air—UN IPCC AR5

Michael S. Coffman, Ph.D. July 12, 2014

THE UNITED NATIONS INTERGOVERNMENTAL PANEL ON CLIMATE CHANGE (IPCC) in their Assessment Report #5 (AR5) released in late 2013 and early 2014 glosses over the enormous discrepancies between results of individual climate model and between model results and actual earth temperatures.

Instead, the IPCC states: “The scenarios should be considered plausible and illustrative, and do not have probabilities attached to them.” In other words, accuracy (more appropriately, inaccuracy) of the climate models is not even considered. Instead, their use is dependent on the models plausibility to predict future warming and whether they can convince the unwashed masses that man-caused warming is real. One look at the widely contrary graphic model results should shatter any illusion that the IPCC’s  claim that it is 95 percent certain that man is causing global warming. The dismal failure of the models  was…, well, it was ignored completely. To understand how this is possible, readers need to understand how AR5’s Summaries for Policy Makers (SPM) were written.

The IPCC’s AR5 was released in three documents in late 2013 and early 2014. The lead authors of each of the three documents met with bureaucrats representing 195 governments to write each SPM. They hashed out every word in every line over period of about a week. The process is totally corrupt. Dr.Robert Stavins, one of the lead authors of Working Group II wrote a highly critical letter about the SPM process asserting: “the resulting document should probably be called the Summary by policymakers, rather than the Summary for Policymakers.” (Emphasis original) Stavins explained: it became clear that the only way the assembled government representatives would approve text for SPM.5.2 was essentially to remove all “controversial” text (that is, text that was uncomfortable for any one individual government), which meant deleting almost 75% of the text, including nearly all explications and examples under the bolded headings. In more than one instance, specific examples or sentences were removed at the will of only one or two countries, because under IPCC rules, the dissent of one country is sufficient to grind the entire approval process to a halt unless and until that country can be appeased.

In reality, then, government bureaucrats wrote the SPMs to fit the narratives of their governments, including that of the Obama administration. The SPM is not a science report, but an alarmist political report at best, and outright propaganda at worst. The SPM has been a political document since the first one was written in 1990. Yet, it is reported as a science document, which would be laughable if trillions of dollars and the lives of billions Only about 5 percent of the 90 climate models used by the IPCC even come close to earth’s actual temperature since the mid-1990s. Yet, these models are the only “evidence” the IPCC has that man is causing global warming. Everything else is circumstantial evidence (i.e. glaciers melting, etc.). This circumstantial evidence may demonstrate warming but it does not prove why we are having warming. These models are used to predict the UN’s alleged catastrophic increase in earth’s temperature when it is obvious they can’t predict even a few years ahead. Source: Dr. Roy Spencer, http://www.drroyspencer.com/2014/02/95-of-climate-models-agree-the-observations-must-be-wrong/. HadCRUt4 temperatures are surface station measured temperatures managed by Britain’s CRU – the organization at the center of the 2009 email scandal showing that they manipulated the data. The UAH Lower Troposphere temperatures are highly accurate satellite temperature measurements of the lower troposphere. 2 of people weren’t at stake. To believe that the information the average person gets through the news media represents the true science is not only fool-hardy, it labels the believer as a dupe willing to believe raw propaganda of the worst kind.

The Summary for Policy Makers II was so disgusting that another well known and respected lead author, Dr. Richard Tol, asked to be removed from the working group he was leading because the report was too distorted by alarmism and group think. Dr. Tol had been involved with the IPCC since 1994 and had almost resigned when the IPCC’s 2007 AR4 reported environmental dogma from a green advocacy group as peer-reviewed science. IPCC’s AR5 Challenged To confront the misleading and false information in AR5, a group of over 35 leading international climate scientists wrote or reviewed a 1000 plus page analysis of the peer-reviewed science entitled Climate Change Reconsidered II. Not surprisingly, their conclusions radically refuted those of the IPCC. For instance, rather than depending on climate models to support conclusions of doom and gloom, as does the IPCC, Reconsidered II rightly concluded that “global climate models are unable to make accurate projections of climate even 10 years ahead, let alone the 100-year period that has been adopted by policy planners. They in no way should be used to guide public policy formulation.”

While the IPCC remains adamant that the sun plays no significant role in warming (or cooling), NIPCC cites thousands of research papers showing just the opposite. It’s no wonder the IPCC did not cite them. Up to 66 percent of twentieth century warming may have been caused by solar effects, or solar/cosmic radiation interactions (See “It’s the Sun After All,” Range, Fall 2013). Also contrary to the claims of the IPCC, Reconsidered II reported that “neither the rate nor the magnitude of the reported late twentieth century surface warming (1979–2000) lay outside the range of normal natural variability, nor were they in any way unusual compared to earlier episodes in Earth’s climatic history.” Finally, the Reconsidered II scientists found that “no unambiguous evidence exists of dangerous interference in the global climate caused by human-related CO2 emissions.” Reconsidered II systematically refuted with hard science every fear mongering claim made by the IPCC in AR5 and the Obama administration in the National Climate Assessment.

While the IPCC and Obama administration treats CO2 as a worlddestroying  pollutant, Reconsidered II shows how CO2 is absolutely required for life on earth. Hundreds of research studies demonstrate “numerous growth-enhancing, water-conserving, and stress-alleviating effects of elevated atmospheric CO2 on plants growing in both terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems.” At the same time, CO2 “does not seriously affect human health until the CO2 content of the air reaches approximately 15,000 ppm;” about 37 times higher than current atmospheric levels.

The earth is literally greening because of the rise of CO2—in spite of the real and imagined assaults on earth’s vegetation by fires, disease, pest outbreaks, deforestation, and climate change. Annual net carbon uptake globally has doubled since 1960 (2.4 billion tons to 5 billion tons in 2010). Satellite-based analyses determined that net primary terrestrial biomass has increased 6 to 13 percent since the 1980s. That includes food production. Poor farmers in Third World Nations are benefiting as much as Developed Nations. Along with increased crop production, a higher CO2 concentration makes crops more resistant to drought, disease and insects;which could make the difference between life and death in many countries whose citizens live in abject poverty. There is nothing to fear and everything to gain with earth’s warming temperatures and increasing CO2. About the Author Dr. Coffman is President of Environmental Perspectives incorporated (epi-us.com) and CEO of Sovereignty International (sovereignty.net) in Bangor Maine. He has had over 30 years of university teaching, research and consulting experience in forestry and environmental sciences. He produced the acclaimed DVD Global Warming, Emerging Science (emergingscience.com). His newest books, Plundered, How Progressive Ideology is Destroying America and Radical Islam at the Door In the House (AmericaPlundered.com) are receiving wide acclaim. He can be reached at 207-945-9878 or mcoffman@epi-us.com.

Climate Change Reconsidered was published just as AR5-III was made public. Thirty-five international climate scientists systematically refuted the science and results of the UN’s IPCC AR5 report using peer-reviewed science.