Responding to Skeptics: Proof of Human Induced Global Warming

February 13, 2005 – Vol.9 No.47

RESPONDING TO SKEPTICS: PROOF OF HUMAN INDUCED GLOBAL WARMING.

The Kyoto Protocol went into force this week for 141 nations, but not the U.S. Those who believe that actions by man are causing the Earth to warm see the international agreement as a good first step in mitigating the problem.

But skeptics see the treaty as a pointless mistake.

On every occasion where skeptics have challenged the science of human-induced global warming scientists have studied their assertions - and proved the skeptics wrong.

Skeptics have been saying for years that global warming is caused by natural variabilities in our planet - natural causes. According to a new study, natural causes such as increased solar radiation or volcanic activity are highly unlikely to cause a warming of the planet. Instead, as scientists have said all along, it is us.

A study of ocean temperature data from the last 40 years concluded, with a statistical confidence of 95 percent, that human activities - not nature - were causing a warming of the oceans.

The study utilizing computer modeling, along with an earlier study from the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, has been able plot the history of the warming in the oceans as well as predict future warming trends.

One of the predictions is that warming of the planet will shift fresh water supplies. For instance altered snow pack in the western U.S. could cause a water crisis there in the next 20 years. Other regions, which rely on spring melting of glaciers for water supply, will be at risk of water shortages as glaciers shrink.

Tim Barnett, a research marine physicist in the Climate Research Division at Scripps, was the lead author of the study and had help with colleagues at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's Program for Climate Model Diagnosis and Intercomparison (PCMDI).

The Scripps Institution study was presented at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS).

Another study presented at the AAAS meeting showed that more than 7700 square miles (20,000 square kilometers) of freshwater ice melted in the Arctic between 1965 and 1995.

According to lead author Ruth Curry from the Wood Hole Oceanographic Institute in Massachusetts, further melting of this magnitude could be sufficient to turn off the Gulf Stream, which keeps Europe and much of northeastern U.S. and Canada relatively warm. The Gulf Stream warms the U.K., for instance, up to 10 degrees F (6 degrees C ) above what it would be without it flowing in the Atlantic.

Scripps is one of the oldest, largest, and most respected centers for global science research in the world. Woods Hole has similar accolades. For a copy of the Scripps study visit at http://sio.ucsd.edu/ .Visit the AAAS at http://www.aaas.org/ , the Wood Hole Oceanographic Institute at http://www.whoi.edu/