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Global Warming – Is it Really a Threat?
Address by Des Moore at Marcus Oldham College, 5 November 2008

Full Presentation transcript available here as a PDF. (613Kb)

"Those who have knowledge, don’t predict. Those who predict, don’t have knowledge”
– Lao Tzu, 6th Century BC Chinese Poet

These are the main summary points of the presentation.

• Starting an emission reduction policy (ERP) regardless of whether other major emitting countries do seems unbelievably naive as Australian leadership will not itself cause them to start their own ERP: nor will it save the Gt Barrier Reef;
• Treasury’s economic modelling assumes some form of effective global agreement will be reached and carbon capture/storage will become “commercial”. The first seems unrealistic and the second ill-defines commercial. If no global agreement occurs the cost of an ERP could be large;
• Worryingly, no independent public examination has been made of the IPCC science: that is simply accepted as gospel despite widespread critiques; 
• Claims of scientific consensus are contradicted by extensive, qualified dissenters (attached). Some “science”, accepted initially by IPCC, has been dropped; 
• Claims that 2,500 scientists support the IPCC view compare unfavourably with the 31,000 plus who don't. Anyhow, the IPCC Secretariat has denied that the 2,500 do endorse its reports and has refused journalistic access to their names;  
• Assessments of the precautionary principle by the Productivity Commission and the UK House of Commons Science and Technology Committee make it unsuitable to apply to analyses predicting “damaging” temperature increases;      
• The case for an urgent ERP is undermined by uncertainty about the science, Garnaut’s acknowledgement of only a miniscule “loss” of GDP in 2100 if no action is taken, and the cessation of temperature increases since 1998;
• There is a long history of wrong doom and gloom predictions by scientists and the global warming scare may simply reflect a new age of Apocalypticism;
• The science of climatology is a new one dealing with very complicated relationships about which definitive conclusions are premature;
• The increase of 0.74 degrees in temperatures over the last 100 years ago includes a lengthy period of falling temperatures when CO2 emissions increased rapidly and data for recent years that an authoritative independent analyst claims has a large warming bias;
• Despite increasing CO2 emissions, temperatures have not risen since 1998 and have fallen since 2001. The IPCC chair acknowledges a need for re-assessment;
• The IPCC claim that global temperatures in the last 50 years are "likely" the highest in 1300 years, and the Government’s Green paper claim that Australia has experienced 12 of the hottest years "in history" in the last 13 years, are almost certainly wrong. Historical evidence shows at least two lengthy past periods had higher temperatures with virtually no CO2 emissions from fossil fuel use and with advances in civilisation. IPCC scientists seem unaware of history;  
•  Measurements of upper air temperatures show they produce results inconsistent with models based on greenhouse theory and contradict IPCC claims of consistency between such temperatures and surface temperatures;
• Historical analysis of ice cores suggest that increases in CO2 emissions have occurred after temperature increases: they also suggest no fossil fuel effect;
• The IPCC’s fourth assessment report estimated an increase in average sea levels of 7 centimetres (about 3 inches) during a mostly warm period between 1961 and 2003. This caused few problems. Possible future changes in sea levels are widely disputed: the projected increase of 18-59 cm to 2100 in the IPCC report was dropped in the associated “synthesis” report but recent data, which shows a fall, provides no basis for reaching more than the low estimate;
• Recent melting in the Arctic, now reversed, occurred during a period of fallingglobal temperatures. Such meltings have virtually no effect on sea levels;
• The Government’s Green paper claims "concerns" exist about the "stability" of Greenland and West Antarctic ice sheets. But the sea ice area in the Southern Hemisphere is now one million square kms higher than the average for 1979-2000; India's climate change policy says there is no accepted rationale for meltings of some glaciers in the Himalayan chain;
• There is no correlation between global temperatures and rainfall in Australia: the Green paper’s acknowledgement that the N East of Australia became wetter since the 1950s suggests no global temperature increase effect: similar droughts to the current one occurred in the past when emissions were much lower;
• Polar bear numbers have increased in recent years;
• Malaria occurs in cold as well as warm areas and warmer temperatures would not themselves cause a higher incidence;
• If temperatures warm, the incidence of storms and hurricanes may decrease;
• All IPCC reports acknowledge that the warming effects from increased concentrations of CO2 diminish progressively as concentration levels grow. But this established fact is not taken into account in IPCC conclusions that urgent action is needed to reduce CO2 emissions. This suggests its conclusions are politically not scientifically motivated;
• IPCC models used to project temperature increases have a major fault in failing to take adequate account of cooling from evaporation. This causes models to produce much larger increases in surface temperatures than could actually occur;
• Considerable scientific analysis suggests variations in the sun's activity are correlated to variations in temperatures: recent declines in activity suggest a cooling period ahead;
• Humans are able to adapt to differences in temperatures and already live good lives in places with widely different average temperatures;
• Australia's highly respected Productivity Commission has concluded that uncertainty pervades the science, geopolitics and economics of global warming and that action to substantially reduce CO2 emissions could be "very costly".

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