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Global Warming: Bush Administration Now Disagrees with ... Bush? Huh?
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| occrider |
U.S. Study Links Human Activity to Global Warming
Thu Aug 26, 2004 11:17 PM ET
By Tom Doggett
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Warmer temperatures in North America since 1950 were probably caused in part by human activity, the Bush administration said in a report that appeared to contradict the White House position there was no clear scientific proof on the causes of global warming.
In a report sent to Congress this week, the administration noted a recent government-sponsored study supported the view of many scientists that human action from driving automobiles to running power plants helped cause global warming.
"North American temperature changes from 1950 to 1999 were unlikely to be due only to natural climate variations," the report said.
Warmer temperatures that occurred from 1900 to 1949 were "likely due" to natural causes, the report added.
The brief passage in the report was surprising because President Bush and other senior administration officials have long insisted there was no clear scientific proof to link human activities to global warming.
In an interview with the New York Times, published on its Web site, Bush was asked why his administration had changed its position. "Ah, did we?" Bush replied. "I don't think so."
White House spokesman Trent Duffy said the study did not change the administration's position and more research was needed. "The president's policy is the same ... we need to fill in the knowledge and the scientific gaps," he said.
Bush withdrew the United States from participating in the Kyoto treaty that sought to reduce global warming emissions produced mostly by industrialized nations. He said the accord's tough requirements would be too costly to the U.S. economy.
The White House has promoted a voluntary program for U.S. power plant and oil refinery owners and other industries to cut their so-called greenhouse gas emissions.
The specific study on temperature changes from 1950 to 1999 was included in a list of research projects on climate change sponsored by various government agencies that were recently completed or are under way.
In its report to Congress on the research, the administration said the studies did not "make any findings of fact that could serve as predicates for regulatory action."
One environmental group said, however, the report put pressure on Bush to address the global warming issue when the president lays out his plans for a second term at the Republican convention next week in New York.
"It will be interesting to see whether he plans to do something about global warming or just continue ignoring it for political reasons," said Philip Clapp, president of the National Environmental Trust.
Other recent government-sponsored studies listed in the administration's report found:
* 13.8 million acres of U.S. farmland set aside from production across a 13-state region soak up 5.1 million metric tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere each year.
* Emissions from the oil and natural gas industries in the Southwestern United States raised quantities of ethane, propane and butane in the near-surface atmosphere of Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas in autumn and spring that were comparable to urban smog.
* The portion of the Arctic Ocean covered by perennial sea ice has declined by about 9 percent per decade since 1978.
© Reuters 2004. All Rights Reserved.
http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle....77&pageNumber=1 |
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| LiquidX |
| HeH. No surprise to me, Sadly though.. |
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| cammie |
check out Richard Hoagland's website [url]http://www.enterprisemission.com/
he has a completely different view of "global warming" only he theorizes that the entire solar system is warming, not just Earth.
excerpt (because this is long):
The entire solar system - not just our one small planet -- is currently undergoing profound, never-before-seen physical changes. This paper will address and scientifically document a wide variety of significant examples, drawing from a host of published mainstream sources.
We will also outline a new scientific model that, for the first time, coherently explains these simultaneous interplanetary changes via a fundamental “new Physics” - a Physics that predicts “even greater anomalies to come”…
Here are some highlights:
Sun: More activity since 1940 than in previous 1150 years, combined
Mercury: Unexpected polar ice discovered, along with a surprisingly strong intrinsic magnetic field … for a supposedly “dead” planet
Venus: 2500% increase in auroral brightness, and substantive global atmospheric changes in less than 30 years
Earth: Substantial and obvious world-wide weather and geophysical changes
Mars: “Global Warming,” huge storms, disappearance of polar icecaps
Jupiter: Over 200% increase in brightness of surrounding plasma clouds
Saturn: Major decrease in equatorial jet stream velocities in only ~20 years, accompanied by surprising surge of X-rays from equator
Uranus: “Really big, big changes” in brightness, increased global cloud activity
Neptune: 40% increase in atmospheric brightness
Pluto: 300% increase in atmospheric pressure, even as Pluto recedes farther from the Sun
thats scary if its true. i'm not a physics major so a lot of what he says is really too difficult for me to follow but maybe some TAs can understand.
edit: sorry about the link.... the article on the "Day After Tomorrow" .....the guy is defintely NOT mainstream science but I had fun reading his theories (and he does say that they are theories) |
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| Q5echo |
| cool^stuff right there |
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| Q5echo |
| quote: | Originally posted by rizen
flip flop :o |
theres no flip flop there. you fell for the political nature under which the article was written...again. |
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| rizen |
| quote: | Originally posted by Q5echo
theres no flip flop there. you fell for the political nature under which the article was written...again. |
Oh right, miss post. Happens when you have so many tabs open in FireFox. |
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| DrUg_Tit0 |
| quote: | Originally posted by cammie
check out Richard Hoagland's website http://www.enterprisemission.com/_a...planetary_1.htm
he has a completely different view of "global warming" only he theorizes that the entire solar system is warming, not just Earth.
excerpt (because this is long):
The entire solar system - not just our one small planet -- is currently undergoing profound, never-before-seen physical changes. This paper will address and scientifically document a wide variety of significant examples, drawing from a host of published mainstream sources.
We will also outline a new scientific model that, for the first time, coherently explains these simultaneous interplanetary changes via a fundamental “new Physics” - a Physics that predicts “even greater anomalies to come”…
Here are some highlights: |
Would you mind checking the link, since it doesn't work?
| quote: | | Sun: More activity since 1940 than in previous 1150 years, combined |
This is totally rediculous. While there was a drop in solar activity from about 1600-1750, such a drastic change would cause the Earth to become a fried piece of charcoal. The solar constant changed less than 3% during last 1 million years, and has infact dropped a bit since the 1980's. It is, however, true that it seems there was more magnetic activity in the last 50 years than there was in the last 900, but certainly not combined.
http://dmiweb.dmi.dk/fsweb/solarter...e/welcome.shtml
http://www.physics.gmu.edu/classinf...larActivity.htm
| quote: | | Mercury: Unexpected polar ice discovered, along with a surprisingly strong intrinsic magnetic field … for a supposedly “dead” planet |
I really fail to see what is unexpected about those discoveries, and even moreso how it is related to a sudden increase in solar activity. Mercury is a planet with huge temperature variations made mostly of solid iron, so it's not that surprising that ice and magnetic field are found there. But a huge solar activity increase is kinda contradictory to the existance of ice. Or is the author saying that Mercury was a huge ball of ice 50 years ago?
| quote: | | Venus: 2500% increase in auroral brightness, and substantive global atmospheric changes in less than 30 years |
So Venus is now 25 times brighter than it was 30 years ago? Hmm, how come noone noticed it?
| quote: | | Earth: Substantial and obvious world-wide weather and geophysical changes |
And those changes would be? Potential switching of the magnetic poles? Happened in the past and had nothing to do with solar activity. Volcanoes, tectonic plates, and earthquakes? Nothing to do with the sun either. Global warming? Perhaps partially due to the solar activity, but more likely due to greenhouse gasses. Anyone notice how the ozone hole over Antarctica began to diminish after a decrease in use of CFC?
| quote: | | Mars: “Global Warming,” huge storms, disappearance of polar icecaps |
Hmm, is it just me or do I see an icecap on the picture???
| quote: | | Jupiter: Over 200% increase in brightness of surrounding plasma clouds |
Oh, so Jupiter is twice as bright too, just happened that noone noticed it?
| quote: | | Saturn: Major decrease in equatorial jet stream velocities in only ~20 years, accompanied by surprising surge of X-rays from equator |
Recent discoveries did show that Saturn's rotation rate was miscalculated a bit (<1%, though), but I can't see how that had anything to do with solar activity either.
| quote: | | Uranus: “Really big, big changes” in brightness, increased global cloud activity |
What big change in brightness? It looks exactly the same! And its clouds are the same as they were when Voyager saw them.
| quote: | | Neptune: 40% increase in atmospheric brightness |
Where, oh where does the author of this masterpiece find such unsubstantiated claims? There isn't a single respectable scientific institution that has claimed any of these idiocities to be true. The only thing that happened with Neptune is that the great dark spot (a huge storm) has disappeared. It was really small compared to the size of the planet, so it couldn't have changed the overall brightness by more than a few percent.
| quote: | | Pluto: 300% increase in atmospheric pressure, even as Pluto recedes farther from the Sun |
And how exactly did we manage to measure Pluto's atmospheric pressure if this is the most detailed image of Pluto we can come up with?
| quote: | | thats scary if its true. i'm not a physics major so a lot of what he says is really too difficult for me to follow but maybe some TAs can understand. |
It is most certainly not true, and I must say it's really amuzing. The site seems to be working, but the second part of your link is messed up. Anyway, this stuff is hilarious, and as the authors themselves admit it, not recognized by mainstream science. |
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