The key to the "climate change" debate is atmospheric sensitivity to CO2
February 27, 2012
Notes from an excellent presentation made last week by Richard Lindzen to the House of Commons. Summary:
Stated briefly, I will simply try to clarify what the debate over climate change is really about. It most certainly is not about whether climate is changing: it always is. It is not about whether CO2is increasing: it clearly is. It is not about whether the increase in CO2, by itself, will lead to some warming: it should. The debate is simply over the matter of how much warming the increase in CO2 can lead to, and the connection of such warming to the innumerable claimed catastrophes. The evidence is that the increase in CO2 will lead to very little warming, and that the connection of this minimal warming (or even significant warming) to the purported catastrophes is also minimal. The arguments on which the catastrophic claims are made are extremely weak – and commonly acknowledged as such. They are sometimes overtly dishonest.
Also interesting, from a less authoritative source--someone trained as an economist!--"Omitted variable fraud: vast evidence for solar climate driver rates one oblique sentence in AR5".
And one more to annoy the extreme Greens: "The End of the Peak Oil Theory".
It's neither surprising nor especially disappointing that when the stakes are high, people sometimes lie. But if history is any guide, while it can take a while, truth usually wins.
UPDATE: Another review of the evidence, consistent with Lindzen's: "The Skeptics Case".