During December 1-12, 10,000 delegates from around the world met
in Poznan, Poland, for the latest fiesta of the United Nations
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It was to come
up with a successor to the ill-fated Kyoto treaty. Alas, the
conference heard thousands of words, read dozens of papers and
spewed untold tons of carbon emissions into the atmosphere from
the conferees’ flights, but there was no thunderous announcement
of the birth of Kyoto II.
For the inside word, we called Ms. Henny-Penny, founder and
recording secretary of The Holy Order of The Sky is Falling. She
had just returned to the barnyard from Poland.
“Brrr, it’s cold here,” she said. “While you were away,” I noted,
“an ice storm left thousands of New Englanders without
electricity; New Orleans had eight inches of snow. It even snowed
in the hills above Malibu in southern California. What do you
think of that?”
“It’s just as our Pontiff, Al Gore, has said all climate change
is caused by our profligate ways, burning fossil fuels and
consuming far too much of everything.”
“Funny,” I replied. “Not too long ago you and your IPCC friends
were preaching that temperatures would continue to climb, all the
ice would melt and the coasts and low islands would be flooded.
Now, the National Climatic Data Center says 2008 will turn out to
be our coldest year since 1997. And astrophysicist Dr. Sallie
Baliunas, of Harvard and the Smithsonian Institution, says that
solar variability (“sun spots”) more than CO2 affects global
temperatures.”
“She must be another of those deniers,” Ms. H-P retorted. The
Pontiff says they are to be ignored. The evidence is right there
in our computers.”
“The IPCC’s scary warnings are based on 22 computer-generated
models and the IPPC admits they can’t be validated. So how can we
believe the dire claims about global warming? Why Piers Corbyn,
an astrophysicist with the Imperial College, London, a long-range
forecaster, wrote to the British Parliament recently that ‘Global
warming is over and Global Warming Theory has failed. There is no
evidence that CO2 drives world temperatures or any consequent
climate change’ Sounds pretty authoritative to me..
“You remind me of Chicken Little,” she huffed. “When I declared
the sky was falling, she said she could see no evidence of it.
Another denier. How can 10,000 UN scientists be wrong and that
one man right?”
“Well,” I said, “many of those UN friends of yours work for
governments whose policy is to swallow the global warming
argument in the hope that it reduces economic output of the most
productive countries. And others are living off government grants
that support global warming.
“Besides, Mr. Corbyn is not alone. Just a year ago, more than 400
scientists — including some who had participated in the IPCC —
challenged the so-called ‘consensus’ about global warming.
“So, what happened in Poznan? Did you and your friends get the
new treaty to replace Kyoto?”
“Well, not exactly. It needs some more work. I’m sure we’ll work
it out at the next meeting in the spring. By then there will be a
friendlier administration in Washington. Carol Browner, the new
czarina of environmental policy in the White House, will surely
understand the need for cutting CO2 emissions. Governor
Schwarzenegger of California understands it. His new policy, if
and when it takes effect, will stop that state’s economy in its
tracks. And, of course, our Pontiff has declared that we must go
to renewable energy sources completely within 10 years. All of us
at THOOTSIF agree with him.”
“Solar and wind energy provide, at most, three percent of our
energy,” I said. “How are you going to get us to 100 percent in
10 years?”
“The Pontiff will ask President Obama and the leaders in Congress
to pass a bill requiring it. That will do the trick here. Now, if
only we could do something about the surplus population in Africa
and Asia. Perhaps that cholera epidemic in Zimbabwe will spread…”
I could hear her wings flapping as she said, “I’ve got to run;
I’m about to lay an egg.”
Mr. Hannaford writes from Northern California, which
is experiencing colder than normal temperatures for this time of
year.
