Climate reconsidered, at last

You will not have heard about this in most of the mainstream media. According to the U.K. Met Office, the global temperature in January dropped to where it was in 1998. Since last year’s El Niño climate cycle is now being followed by La Niña, as it always is, temperatures fell. That has extended to 20 years a pause in the increase of global temperatures.

The hiatus raises questions about the relationship of CO2 emissions and global warming, yet news that detracts from the established narrative is systematically ignored. Since the Trump administration is skeptical of the settled orthodoxy, we may soon be exposed to different views of the issue. That could lead to an open discussion about whether climate change is really the threat we’ve been led to believe. It’s long overdue.

In that context, let me raise some unconventional facts. Contrary to the oftrepeated assertion, carbon dioxide is not a pollutant; it is a greenhouse gas, essential to human life. William Happer, a physicist and professor emeritus at Princeton University, points out that an increase in carbon dioxide would be “strongly beneficial for humanity,” enhancing agricultural output and increasing drought-resistance in crops. In his view, that is an important argument against the need for an “insurance policy” against potential climate disaster.

Many scientists agree that humans are major contributors to global warming. However, there is very little we can do about it. In the extremely unlikely event that every country fulfills its voluntary commitment to the Paris climate agreement, the impact on global temperatures All of the Arctic ice was supposed to have disappeared by last year, but it hasn’t, Joe Oliver writes. the Paris climate talks. Congress is investigating the allegation. More generally, intimidation has been used to silence divergent scientific opinion, while research grants are unavailable to anyone deviating from the official global-warming perspective.

Climate change is an extraordinarily significant public policy issue. If prevailing opinion is correct, the world faces an avoidable yet looming catastrophe, with tragic consequences for entire nations and billions of people, as well as animals and plant life. We would then have a compelling moral obligation to do as much as we can to protect the planet’s future.

On the other hand, if the skeptics are right, we will be wasting many trillions of dollars. That would undermine global economic growth and employment and drastically reduce available funding for social programs and international aid, disproportionately hurting the poor. In Prof. Happer’s words, “the cure is worse than the disease, especially since there is no disease at all.”

Given the highly polarized views of this critical issue, we urgently need transparent, independent and objective research and a free and informed debate, without any threat of retaliation to careers and reputations. It won’t start in Canada.

The Trump administration, on the other hand, seems intent on it. Alarmists are appalled at that prospect but unless they are worried that science won’t support their opinions, they should welcome the opportunity to settle the issue. Regardless, there is too much at stake to allow intimidation and group pressure to stifle open inquiry.