    [Senate Hearing 109-1077]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]

                                                           S. Hrg. 109-1077

                     EXAMINING CLIMATE CHANGE AND THE MEDIA

    =======================================================================

                                    HEARING

                                   BEFORE THE

                                  COMMITTEE ON
                          ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS
                              UNITED STATES SENATE

                           ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS

                                 SECOND SESSION

                                   __________

                                DECEMBER 6, 2006

                                   __________

      Printed for the use of the Committee on Environment and Public Works

          Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/
                                congress.senate

                                   __________

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                   COMMITTEE ON ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS

                           ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS
                                 SECOND SESSION

                      JAMES M. INHOFE, Oklahoma, Chairman
    JOHN W. WARNER, Virginia             JAMES M. JEFFORDS, Vermont
    CHRISTOPHER S. BOND, Missouri        MAX BAUCUS, Montana
    GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, Ohio            JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN, Connecticut
    LINCOLN CHAFEE, Rhode Island         BARBARA BOXER, California
    LISA MURKOWSKI, Alaska               THOMAS R. CARPER, Delaware
    JOHN THUNE, South Dakota             HILLARY RODHAM CLINTON, New York
    JIM DeMINT, South Carolina           FRANK R. LAUTENBERG, New Jersey
    JOHNNY ISAKSON, Georgia              BARACK OBAMA, Illinois
    DAVID VITTER, Louisiana
                    Andrew Wheeler, Majority Staff Director
                     Ken Connolly, Minority Staff Director

                                      (ii)

                                C O N T E N T S

                                  ----------
                                                                       Page

                                DECEMBER 6, 2006
                               OPENING STATEMENTS

    Bond, Hon. Christopher S., U.S. Senator from the State of
      Missouri.......................................................    15
    Boxer, Hon. Barbara, U.S. Senator from the State of California...    10
    Inhofe, Hon. James M., U.S. Senator from the State of Oklahoma...     1
    Jeffords, Hon. James M., U.S. Senator from the State of Vermont..     5
    Lautenberg, Hon. Frank R., U.S. Senator from the State of New
      Jersey.........................................................    13
    Voinovich, Hon. George V., U.S. Senator from the State of Ohio...    11

                                   WITNESSES

    Carter, R.M., Ph.D., Marine Geophysical Laboratory, James Cook
      University, Australia..........................................    20
        Prepared statement...........................................    74
    Deming, David, Ph.D., University of Oklahoma, College of Earth
      and Energy.....................................................    17
        Prepared statement...........................................    54
    Gainor, Dan, The Boone Pickens Free Market Fellow, director,
      Business & Media Institute.....................................    24
        Prepared statement...........................................    85
    Oreskes, Naomi, professor, Department of History and Program in
      Science Studies, University of California, San Diego...........    22
        Prepared statement...........................................    83
    Schrag, Daniel, Ph.D., Laboratory for Geochemical Oceanography,
      Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Harvard University.    18
        Prepared statement...........................................    66

                              ADDITIONAL MATERIAL

    Articles:
        Ancient Lessons for Our Future Climate, Daniel P. Schrag and
          Richard B. Alley...........................................    72
        A New York Times-line, Business & Media Institute............    87
        Climate Warming in North America: Analysis of Borehold
          Temperatures, David Deming, Science, Vol. 268, June 16,
          1995.......................................................    55
    Charts:
        Carbon Dioxide Concentrations from an Antarctic Ice Core.....    68
        Northern Hemisphere Ice Coverage.............................    70
    Map, Southeastern U.S. Coastlines and Coastlines if Half of the
      Greeland Ice Sheet Melted......................................    71
        Photographs of the Quelccaya Ice Cap Between 1977 and 2002...    69
    Report, Fire and Ice, Business & Media Institute.................    88

                     EXAMINING CLIMATE CHANGE AND THE MEDIA

                                  ----------

                          WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 6, 2006

                                           U.S. Senate,
                     Committee on Environment and Public Works,
                                                        Washington, DC.
        The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 9:30 a.m. in room
    406, Senate Dirksen Building, the Hon. James M. Inhofe
    (chairman of the committee) presiding.
        Present: Senators Inhofe, Isakson, Bond, Voinovich, Boxer,
    Thune, Jeffords, Lautenberg.

     OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES M. INHOFE, U.S. SENATOR FROM
                         THE STATE OF OKLAHOMA

        Senator Inhofe. The hearing today is the fourth global
    warming hearing that I have held as Committee Chairman. This
    time, we are going to examine the media's role in presenting
    the science of climate change.
        I have to say, Senator Boxer, that we had decided to have
    this fourth hearing before the Republicans lost the majority on
    that fateful Tuesday. So we are going to go ahead and have
    this, and I am sure that we will have an opportunity to explore
    this much more under your chairmanship.
        Poorly conceived policy decisions may result from the
    media's over-hyped reporting. Much of the mainstream media has
    subverted its role as an objective source of information on
    climate change into a role of an advocate. We have seen
    examples of this overwhelmingly one-sided reporting by 60
    Minutes reporter Scott Pelley, ABC's Bill Blakemore, CNN's
    Miles O'Brien, who I believe is here with us today or will be,
    Time Magazine, the Associated Press, Reuters, just to name a
    few.
        There are three types of climate research: first, the hard
    science of global warming by climate scientists; second, the
    computer modelers; and finally, the researchers who study the
    impacts.
        Rather than focus on the hard science of global warming,
    the media has instead becomes advocates of hyping
    scientifically unfounded climate alarmism. I am not the only
    one who believes that. Here are just a few examples of
    believers. Now these are people who believe, well, first of all
    let us clarify what the issue is.
        I think all of us know that we are going through cycles,
    and we have throughout recorded history where it gets warmer
    and gets cooler. We are going through a warmer cycle now, and I
    have contended, as many scientists have, that this is due to
    natural causes. But if you don't believe that and believe that
    it is due to anthropogenic gases or manmade gases or methane or
    CO2, then you are in that camp. So, some of the
    people who believe that still believe the media is wrong in the
    way they have been reporting it.
        Mike Hulme, the director of the U.K.-based Tyndall Centre
    for Climate Change Research, a group that believes humans are
    the driving force behind global warming, chastised the media
    and environmentalists last month for choosing to use ``the
    language of fear and terror to scare people.''
        Hulme noted that he has found himself ``increasingly
    chastised by global warming activists because his public
    statements have not satisfied the activists' thirst for
    environmental drama and exaggerated rhetoric.''
        Second, a report in August 2006 from the U.K.'s Labor-
    Leaning Institute for Public Policy Research also slammed the
    media presentation of climate science as--this is what they
    said; these are people who are believers in the other side of
    this about manmade global warming--``a quasi-religious register
    of doom, death, judgment, heaven and hell, using words such as
    catastrophe, chaos, and havoc.''
        The report also compared the media's coverage of global
    warming to ``the unreality of Hollywood films.'' Now these are
    the believers we are talking about.
        In addition, NBC newsman, Tom Brokaw's one-sided 2006
    Discovery Channel, his 1-hour program, a global warming
    documentary, was criticized by a Bloomberg News TV review that
    noted, ``You will find more dissent,'' referring to the
    presentation that was made by Tom Brokaw, ``You will find more
    dissent at a North Korean political rally than in this
    program.''
        The media often fails to distinguish between predictions
    and what is actually being observed on the Earth today. We know
    from an April 23, 2006 article, in the New York Times by Andrew
    Revkin that ``Few scientists agree with the idea that the
    recent spate of potential Hurricanes, European heat waves,
    African droughts, and other weather extremes are, in essence,
    our fault, a result of manmade emission. There is more than
    enough natural variability in nature to match the difference.''
    Again, we are talking about someone who generally would be on
    the other side.
        The New York Times is essentially saying no recent weather
    events including Hurricane Katrina is because of manmade global
    warming, yet most of the media fails to understand this
    fundamental point and instead focuses on global warming
    computer model projections of futures as if they were proven
    fact. This is perhaps the easiest scientific area for the media
    to exaggerate and serve as advocates for alarmism. Climate
    modelers project all kinds of scary scenarios. This allows the
    media to pick and choose which one they want to show and
    demonstrate and characterize as being true. Hysteria sells, and
    people are out there doing it.
        Clearly, we cannot today somehow disprove catastrophic
    predictions of our climate in the year 2100, but if the
    observations of what is happening today are not consistent with
    what global warming models predict should occur, then what we
    do know is that our understanding of the globe is incomplete.
    The fact is the biosphere is extremely complex, and startling
    discoveries happen every year.
        This point was driven home earlier this year when the
    journal, Nature, reported that trees emit methane. Now this is
    something that was brand new. They had not used the fact that
    trees emit methane. Methane is a type of anthropogenic gas,
    similar to CO2. If this does affect climate, it
    would affect climate. Yet, the models didn't even have this.
    This is a great discovery. Trees are everywhere, and we didn't
    use this as a basic fact about our planet.
        Some portions of this committee are focused on alarmism
    rather than a responsible path forward on this issue. If your
    goal is to limit emissions, whether for traditional pollution
    or CO2, the only effective way to go about it is the
    use of cleaner, more efficient technologies that will meet the
    energy demands of this century and behind.
        In the Bush administration, their Asia-Pacific Partnership
    is on target for this type of an approach. It stresses the
    sharing of new technology among member nations including three
    of the world's top 10 emitters who are exempt from Kyoto. We
    are talking about China, India, and South Korea. China, by the
    end of 2009, will become the world's largest CO2
    emitter.
        What is disappointing is that the President's program gets
    more positive press in other countries than it does here in the
    United States.
        So the alarmism is not just coming in the media, it is
    advancing. They are becoming more desperate because former
    supporters of their views are now changing their position.
    Former advocates such as David Bellamy, Britain's famed
    environmental campaigner, was one of the most vocal back in the
    late 1990s on CO2 and manmade gases contributing to
    climate change.
        David Bellamy and also Claude Allegre, a French
    geophysicist and a former Socialist Party leader in France. I
    don't know anyone else who has this in their credentials. He is
    a member of both the French and the United States Academies of
    Science. Allegre now says the cause of warming remains unknown,
    and alarmism ``has become a very lucrative business for some
    people. In short, their motivation is money.''
        I agree with Allegre, probably the only thing that I agree
    with him on, that it is money.
        [The prepared statement of Senator Inhofe follows:]
           Statement of Hon. James M. Inhofe, U.S. Senator from the
                               State of Oklahoma
        Today's hearing is the fourth global warming hearing I have held as
    committee chairman. We will examine the media's role in presenting the
    science of climate change. Poorly conceived policy decisions may result
    from the media's over-hyped reporting. Much of the mainstream media has
    subverted its role as an objective source of information on climate
    change into the role of an advocate. We have seen examples of this
    overwhelmingly one sided reporting by ``60 Minutes'' reporter Scott
    Pelley, ABC News's Bill Blakemore, CNN's Miles O'Brien, Time Magazine,
    the Associated Press and Reuters, to name just a very few outlets.
        There are three types of climate research: first, the hard science
    of global warming by climate scientists, second, the computer modelers,
    and finally the researchers who study the impacts. Rather than focus on
    the hard science of global warming, the media has instead become
    advocates for hyping scientifically unfounded climate alarmism--and I'm
    not the only one who believes this. Here are just two examples of
    believers in man-made global warming who have been critical of the
    media.
        First, Mike Hulme, the Director of the U.K. based Tyndall Centre
    for Climate Change Research--a group that believes humans are the
    driving force of global warming--chastised the media and
    environmentalists last month for choosing to use the ``language of fear
    and terror'' to scare the public. Hulme noted that he has found himself
    ``increasingly chastised'' by global warming activists because his
    pubic statements ``have not satisfied [the activist] thirst for
    environmental drama and exaggerated rhetoric.''
        Second, a report in August 2006 from the UK's Labour-leaning
    Institute for Public Policy Research also slammed the media
    presentation of climate science as--and I am quoting again here--``a
    quasi-religious register of doom, death, judgment, heaven and hell,
    using words such as `catastrophe', `chaos' and `havoc.' '' The report
    also compared the media's coverage of global warming to ``the unreality
    of Hollywood films.''
        In addition, former NBC Newsman Tom Brokaw's one sided 2006
    Discovery Channel global warming documentary was criticized by a
    Bloomberg News TV review that noted ``You'll find more dissent at a
    North Korean political rally than in this program'' because of its lack
    of scientific objectivity.
        The media often fails to distinguish between predictions and what
    is actually being observed on the Earth today. We know from an April
    23, 2006 article in the New York Times by Andrew Revkin, that ``few
    scientists agree with the idea that the recent spate of potent
    Hurricanes, European heat waves, African drought and other weather
    extremes are, in essence, our fault (a result of manmade emissions.)
    There is more than enough natural variability in nature to mask a
    direct connection, [scientists] say.''
        The New York Times is essentially saying, no recent weather
    events--including Hurricane Katrina--is because of manmade global
    warming. Yet most of the media fails to understand this fundamental
    point and instead focus on global warming computer model projections of
    the future as if they were proven fact. This is perhaps the easiest
    scientific area for the media to exaggerate and serve as advocates for
    alarmism. Climate modelers project all kinds of scary scenarios of the
    future and the media then erroneously presents these scenarios as a
    scientifically based. But these computer models are not hard science.
        Clearly, we cannot today somehow disprove catastrophic predictions
    of our climate in the year 2100. But if the observations of what is
    happening today are not consistent with what global warming models
    predict should occur, than what we do know is that our understanding of
    the globe is incomplete. The fact is, the biosphere is extremely
    complex and startling discoveries happen every year. This point was
    driven home earlier this year when the Journal Nature reported that
    trees emit methane, a potent greenhouse gas. Trees are everywhere, yet
    we didn't even know this most basic fact about our planet.
        It is unfortunate that so many are focused on alarmism rather than
    a responsible path forward on this issue. If your goal is to limit
    emissions, whether of traditional pollution or CO2, the only
    effective way to go about it is the use of cleaner, more efficient
    technologies that will meet the energy demands of this century and
    beyond.
        The Bush administration's Asia-Pacific Partnership is the right
    type of approach--it stresses the sharing of new technology among
    member nations including three of the world's top 10 emitters who are
    exempt from Kyoto--India, South Korea, and China, which in 2009 will
    become the world's largest CO2 emitter. What is
    disappointing is that the President's program gets more positive press
    in other countries than it does here.
        So the alarmism not just continuing in the media, it's advancing.
    They are becoming more desperate because former supporters of their
    views are now changing their position. Former advocates such as David
    Bellamy, Britain's famed environmental campaigner, and Claude Allegre,
    a French geophysicist and former Socialist Party Leader who is a member
    of both the French and U.S. Academies of Science. Allegre now says the
    cause of warming remains unknown and the alarmism ``has become a very
    lucrative business for some people.'' In short, their motivation is
    money. And he's right . . . its about money.

        Senator Inhofe. Senator Jeffords, what we did was recess
    the business meeting, at which time as soon as we have 10
    people here, we will go back in it for our three nominations.
    In the meantime, we have started this. We now have one, two,
    three, four, five, six, seven. We have seven members.
        If you would like to be recognized now for your opening
    statement, feel free to do so.
        Senator Jeffords. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Senator Inhofe. Let me say this before you do. I liked you
    equally when you were Republican as when you caucused with the
    Democrats. In the years we served together in the House and in
    the Senate and your chairmanship of this committee when I was
    the Ranking Member, then my chairmanship when you are the
    Ranking Member, equally enjoyable, and while we differ in our
    philosophies and our views, you have always been fair. You have
    been a good personal friend. I just appreciate so much the
    service that you have rendered to your State and to the country
    in both the House and the Senate.
        Senator Jeffords. Well, thank you for those very kind
    words, Mr. Chairman.

    OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. JAMES M. JEFFORDS, U.S. SENATOR FROM
                          THE STATE OF VERMONT

        I am going home. As my friend, Robert Frost, once said,
    ``Home is the place where, when you have to go there, they have
    to take you in.''
        [Laughter.]
        Senator Jeffords. My farm is on the west side of Killington
    Peak in the small village of Shrewsbury, VT. The snow comes
    early there. I filled the woodshed for the winter already. My
    snowshoes are hanging on the hook in the shed. Hopefully, I
    will get to see the birches covered in snow next week. I miss
    my farm.
        Before we part ways, I would like to recognize a few
    people. Mr. Chairman, I thoroughly enjoyed working with you.
    Incredibly, when we disagree, it has always been in good spirit
    and our bond of friendship has carried us through these 5
    years. You have been so kind to me in so many ways. Thank you.
    You have a wonderful staff.
        I have many friends on both sides of the dais. I wish you
    all well. This is one of the best committees in Congress. I
    hope the years ahead are as productive as I think they have
    been.
        I am happy now to know that Vermont will continue to be
    represented on this wonderful committee. Senator Sanders will
    easily fill the shoes of former Chairman Bob Stafford and me.
    All of Vermont is proud to have him in the Senate.
        I have been blessed to have an excellent staff serving me
    through the years here on the committee. I can't list them all,
    but there are a few here today. When I mention your names, will
    you please stand up and wave your hand?
        We already miss a few staff that have moved on including
    Alison Taylor, Geoff Brown, and Malcolm Woolf.
        Caroline Ahearn, David Sandretti, Nicole Parisi-Smith,
    Amanda Fox, Rachel Winnik, and Eric Thu have served me
    exceptionally well.
        Carolyn Dupree, who came with me from the HELP Committee,
    has been so committed to EPW and to me. She is one of the great
    ones.
        Jo-Ellen Darcy, Catharine Ransom, Margaret Wetherald, Chris
    Miller, Michael Goo, Mary Frances Repko, and J.C. Sandberg have
    all had legendary careers to date in the Senate, and I hope
    they continue.
        Cara Cookson from Cabot, VT, has served her home State with
    great honor.
        Diane Derby, another great Vermonter, has been an
    outstanding spokesperson and advisor to me for many years. She
    handled committee communications and my own press and was able
    to make this plain-spoken Senator sound august and intelligent.
    My hat is off to you, Diane.
        Bill Kurtz, my Chief of Staff, my friend, my golf
    companion, is simply one of the greatest people that has ever
    served me and the State of Vermont.
        Finally, I would like to thank my old pal, Ken Connolly.
        [Applause.]
        Senator Jeffords. Since 1993, he has been with me, and we
    have had some amazing times together. When Ken started with me
    those many years ago, he was single. He didn't have three
    children, and he didn't have any gray hair. I think we can only
    blame the Senate for the gray hair, not me. Ken helped me put
    together the greatest EPW staff of all time, and I thank him
    for that.
        As for the topic at hand, global warming, I can only say
    that I am sorry I was not able to do more to change the minds
    of the skeptics that remain in our Nation. The climate is
    warming. It is due to human activity, and only a change in
    human behavior will ensure that my grandson, Patton Henry
    Jeffords, will not suffer the consequences.
        As I rise from this chair, I do so knowing that its future
    occupant is a strong and courageous leader.
        I salute you, Senator Boxer, for your tireless effort to
    improve the lot of mankind. I will be watching from my quiet
    mountain retreat and praying that under your leadership, the
    committee will continue to be as great tomorrow as it has been
    in the past.
        In parting, I would like to cite one of Robert Frost's
    refrains, my favorite man:

        ``Whose woods these are I think I know. His house is in the
    village, though. He will not see me stopping here to watch his
    woods fill up with snow.
        ``The woods are lovely, dark and deep. But I have promises
    to keep. And miles to go before I sleep. And miles to go before
    I sleep.''

        Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        [Applause.]
        [The prepared statement of Senator Jeffords follows:]

          Statement of Hon. James M. Jeffords, U.S. Senator from the
                                State of Vermont

        Mr. Chairman, I'm going home. As my friend Robert Frost
    once said, ``Home is the place where, when you have to go
    there, they have to take you in.''
        My home is on the west side of Killington Peak in the small
    village of Shrewsbury, Vermont. The snow comes early there.
    I've filled the woodshed for the winter. My snowshoes hang on
    the hook in the shed. Hopefully I'll get out to see the birches
    covered in snow next week. I miss my home.
        Before we part ways, I'd like to recognize a few people.
        Mr. Chairman, I've thoroughly enjoyed working with you.
    When we disagree, it's always been in good spirit, and our bond
    of friendship has carried us through these 5 years. You've been
    so kind to me in so many ways. Thank you. You have wonderful
    staff.
        I have many friends on both sides of this dais. I wish you
    all well. This is one of the best committees in Congress. I
    hope the years ahead are productive.
        I am happy to know that Vermont will continue to be
    represented on this wonderful committee. Senator-elect Sanders
    will easily fill the shoes of former Chairman Bob Stafford and
    me. All of Vermont is proud to have him in the Senate.
        I've been blessed to have an excellent staff serving me
    through the years here on the committee. I can't list them all,
    but there are a few here today, and as I mention your name
    please stand up or wave your hand.
        We already miss a few staff members who have moved on,
    including Alison Taylor, Geoff Brown, Erik Smulson and Malcolm
    Woolf.
        We have Caroline Ahearn, David Sandretti, Nicole Parisi-
    Smith, Amanda Fox, Rachel Winnik and Eric Thu, who have served
    me exceptionally well. Carolyn Dupree, who came with me from
    the HELP Committee, has been so committed to EPW and to me,
    she's one of the great ones. Jo-Ellen Darcy, Catharine Ransom,
    Margaret Wetherald, Chris Miller, Michael Goo, Mary Francis
    Repko, J.C. Sandberg have all had legendary careers to date in
    the Senate, and I hope they continue. Cara Cookson, from Cabot,
    Vermont, has served her home State with great honor. And Diane
    Derby, another great Vermonter, has been an outstanding
    spokesperson and advisor to me for many years. She handled
    committee communications and my own press and was able to make
    this plain-spoken Senator sound august and intelligent. My
    hat's off to you, Diane.
        Bill Kurtz, my Chief of Staff, my friend, my golf
    companion, is simply one of the greatest people ever to serve
    me and the State of Vermont.
        Finally, I'd like to thank my old pal, Ken Connolly. Since
    1993, he's been with me, and we've had some amazing times
    together. When Ken started with me those many years ago he was
    single, he didn't have three children and he didn't have gray
    hair. I think we can only blame the Senate for the graying
    hair. Ken helped me put together the greatest EPW staff of all
    time, and I thank him for that.
        As for the topic at hand, global warming, I can only say
    that I am sorry that I was not able to do more to change the
    minds of the few skeptics that remain in our Nation. The
    climate is warming, it is due to human activity, and only a
    change in human behavior will ensure that my grandson, Patton
    Henry Jeffords, will not suffer the consequences.
        As I rise from this chair, I do so knowing that its future
    occupant is a strong and courageous leader. I salute you,
    Senator Boxer, for your tireless efforts to improve the lot of
    humankind. I will be watching from my quiet mountain retreat,
    and praying that under your leadership this committee will
    continue to be as great tomorrow as it has been in the past.
        In parting, I would like to cite one last Robert Frost
    refrain:
        ``Whose woods these are I think I know.
        His house is in the village though;
        He will not see me stopping here
        To watch his woods fill up with snow.
        The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
        But I have promises to keep
        And miles to go before I sleep.
        And miles to go before I sleep.''
        Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

        Senator Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Jeffords. That was
    beautiful.
        When you were introducing your staff, it occurred to me
    that so many people and probably the vast majority of the
    people in this room don't realize how close we have been with
    our staffs and how often we are in agreement. We went through
    the Transportation Reauthorization Bill, a really long and
    arduous thing, and the Water Bill which we unfortunately are
    losing now. It is not due to this committee. We worked
    together. Senator Boxer and Senator Jeffords and all of us on
    this side worked tirelessly and tried to get it done, and our
    staffs worked closely together.
        I just hope people realize that while we do have some
    subjects where we disagree, we have many more where we were in
    total agreement during the years that we served together.
        Senator Boxer. Mr. Chairman?
        Senator Inhofe. Yes, Senator Boxer.
        Senator Boxer. Can I have a point of personal privilege
    just for a moment to respond to our friend's comments?
        Senator Inhofe. Of course.
        Senator Boxer. First of all, how touched we are with what
    you said. I totally appreciate the fact that you mentioned how
    wonderful our Chairman has been to you. He is a good man. I
    think we have proven the fact that we don't have to agree on
    everything in order to get along and to respect each other and
    to work together. I think our Chairman pointed out actually
    there are some issues in which we can work really closely, and
    we will do that.
        I just want to say you have set the tone for me. I really
    have two goals for this committee, and I know you share them so
    I am going to say what they are. One is to protect the health
    of our families, our children, and the planet. The other is to
    bring bipartisanship back to this committee in a way that we
    really, truly reach out to each other because I know we can
    find common ground. I know that I have found that common ground
    with the Chairman. I have found that common ground with Senator
    Thune on certain issues. No one expected we could team up, and
    we did, and we will find it with others.
        I know the members on our side, many new members who are
    coming, are very excited about the traditions of this committee
    and to really get things done for the people. We are so lucky
    with the portfolio that we have. In many ways, yes, some
    contentious things, but there are a lot of things that we need
    to do to keep on growing in this country, and the public works
    side of it certainly enables us to make a contribution.
        But Senator Jeffords, you are loved; you are beloved. Your
    staff has served you magnificently, and it has been my
    privilege to work with them and with you. I will never forget
    our friendship and your courage and your dedication.
        Thank you.
        Senator Inhofe. Just a moment, Senator Isakson, did you
    have any comments to make along this line before we go to
    Senator Lautenberg?
        Senator Isakson. With regard to our distinguished colleague
    from Vermont, I do have a comment. I think John and I are the
    two, I won't say youngest but we are certainly the two newest
    members of the Senate on this committee. I had the privilege of
    being elected with John in 2004, and I had the privilege of
    meeting and getting to know Senator Jeffords.
        I just want to take this occasion to thank him for the many
    kindnesses he extended to me as a new member of the Senate,
    thank him for that which I have learned from him, and remind
    him that Frost wrote a lot of great poems. One of my favorite
    lines from Frost's work is ``Two roads diverged in a yellow
    wood, and I took the one less traveled by, and that has made
    all the difference.''
        If there is anybody on this committee who is emblematic of
    taking a different road and making a difference, it certainly
    is you, and I commend you on your contribution to the
    committee, your contribution to the Senate, and I wish you a
    lot of luck in those snowshoes and fireplaces in Vermont.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Isakson.
        Senator Lautenberg.
        Senator Lautenberg. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        I have a special feeling for Vermont and Vermonters since I
    have owned a little place up there since 1968. My kids and I
    love the mountains, the Green Mountains, and the people who
    inhabit them. They are a particular breed, and they are not
    unlike the actual character of Vermont: hardy, tough,
    beautiful, attractive.
        Jim Jeffords comes with a line of distinguished Senators
    who have served here from Vermont on this committee. Bob
    Stafford and I were good friends. The fact that we are going to
    be having Senator Sanders with us, that gives me some
    encouragement that the Vermont influence will not diminish
    here, and I look at Pat Leahy. The Vermonters have a way of
    being direct without being offensive.
        Fairness has always been a cornerstone of Senator Jeffords'
    being. We are good pals. We are going to miss the heck out of
    you. But Jim, if I come up to Vermont, it is not snowshoes; I
    still like skiing. I hope that we will be able to cross paths
    along the way. God bless and thank you for the wonderful
    service you have given to this committee and this country.
        Senator Jeffords. Thank you.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Lautenberg.
        Senator Voinovich.
        Senator Voinovich. I echo the comments of your other
    colleagues, Jim. You and I have been working together for 8
    years. This is my 8th year on the committee. I must say that
    even though we have had some major differences of opinion, our
    relationship has been on the highest level, and I want you to
    know that I respect you for your integrity and for your
    advocacy on those things that you really believe in and feel
    are important to your State and to our country.
        I think that one of the things that impresses me with this
    body is that we have people like you who speak from the heart
    and really care about making a difference. I want you to know
    that we are going to miss your presence on this committee. I
    hope you enjoy your retirement and as you look in on this
    committee's work this year, that you not become too frustrated.
        Thank you so much for everything you have done for your
    State and for our country and for your friendship with me.
        Senator Jeffords. Thank you.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Voinovich.
        Senator Thune.
        Senator Thune. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        I too want to express my appreciation to Senator Jeffords
    for his service.
        You wouldn't remember this, but I do. In 1988, I and
    somebody I was working for, we went to Vermont and campaigned
    for your election to the Senate back then. I am not a collector
    of such things, but I was going through some stuff the other
    day, and I actually have a Jeffords pin or button I think from
    that 1988 campaign. In any event, that was a long time ago, and
    I have only been here a couple of years.
        Like Johnny, I appreciate very much your kindness. I think
    that is something that there just isn't enough of around here.
    I appreciate the fact that you have always been a gentleman and
    also that you are a principled individual. That is something
    too that is important to me. I think people in public life want
    to accomplish certain things, and I think you can do it in a
    way, a principled way but do it with an element of kindness
    too. I think those are two qualities that you have really
    embodied in your service here.
        So thank you, and I congratulate you. As you retire and go
    off and do hopefully more fun and pleasant things than battling
    some of the issues we battle around here, I wish you well.
    Thank you.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Thune.
        As I had said earlier, we have recessed our business
    meeting. We will go back to it as soon as we get 10 people in
    here to make a quorum.
        The nominees are not going to be here, but we have
    announced who they are. But on the witnesses that are here
    today, we are going to welcome them and enjoy their opening
    statements.
        Prior to that, I would ask if there are other members who
    want to make a statement in conjunction with the subject of the
    hearing today.
        Senator Boxer.

    OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. BARBARA BOXER, U.S. SENATOR FROM THE
                          STATE OF CALIFORNIA

        Senator Boxer. Mr. Chairman, I am glad we are holding a
    hearing on global warming today. As you alluded to, next year
    this committee will continue to examine how to contain global
    warming. We have a big job since out of the 56 biggest emitters
    of carbon dioxide, American is now No. 1. We are 53d out of the
    56 nations in our efforts to contain global warming. So we have
    a lot of work to do.
        I would like to raise a concern that I have about the focus
    on the media this morning. The free expression of the media is
    a deeply held valued in this country, and the one thing I would
    hope we don't want to do is to chill the free expression of the
    media. I have a concern about focusing a full Senate Committee
    hearing on whether we agree with the vast spectrum of media
    outlets when it comes to the presentation of global warming
    issues. In a free society in what is the greatest democracy in
    the world, I don't believe it is proper to put pressure on the
    media to please a particular Senate Committee view, one way or
    the other.
        It is clear that the dissenting views on global warming get
    plenty of attention in the media, and we have a witness today
    who will speak to that issue. At the same time, there is a
    consensus view of scientists, and that view is that global
    warming is happening and human activities are making a
    significant contribution. The Bush administration itself says
    that.
        Now there is a serious risk to the world. It is not just
    the consensus view among leading scientists including 11
    National Academies of Science throughout the world including
    our own; it is a wide consensus view. For example, let us look
    at the business community.
        Lord Brown, CEO of British Petroleum, has said of global
    warming, ``Companies composed of highly skilled and trained
    people can't live in denial of mounting evidence gathered by
    hundreds of the most reputable scientists in the world.''
        Let us look at the CEO of Wal-Mart, Lee Scott, who just
    said this year, ``Global warming is real now, and it must be
    addressed.''
        JPMorgan Chase, the fourth largest banking company in the
    world, has a policy that states, ``JPMorgan Chase advocates the
    reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.''
        There is even a Pentagon report that says climate change
    should ``be elevated beyond a scientific debate to a national
    security concern.'' That is our Pentagon.
        And so, I think if you look at both what is being said in
    the media as well as the broad spectrum of voices on this
    issue, it seems more than clear that global warming is a
    serious concern. A consensus has developed that we need to act.
        My other sadness with this hearing is again we are arguing
    over who believes what rather than moving toward solving the
    problem. What we need to do next is focus our attention on how
    we can fight this serious threat. I believe that fighting
    global warming will have many benefits to our society beyond
    addressing the media issue. We discussed this a little bit at
    one of our other hearings, Mr. Chairman.
        The new technologies we are developing will produce jobs.
    The alternative fuels we are developing burn cleaner and will
    aid us with the critical goal of energy independence. Avoiding
    the dislocation that could be caused by global warming induced
    floods and other disasters will lead us to a more stable world.
        I have great faith in this country, and though we have been
    slow to address the threat, I am convinced, convinced that we
    can do what it takes to change course and protect the future
    for our children and our grandchildren.
        Mr. Chairman, this certainly is not going to be the last
    word, what we do today, but I am glad we are having this
    hearing because I think it gives us a chance to tell our
    constituents where we each stand on this question. Through a
    series of hearings, we are going to call forward people from
    both sides of the issue. We are going to call on other
    Senators, Senators in this committee. We are going to call on
    business leaders. We are going to call on faith-based
    organizations, many of whom have contacted us and want to work
    with us, faith-based organizations who believe we have to
    protect God's planet.
        So I think this issue is going to take on, in many ways, a
    life of its own, and I only hope and I do pray that enough of
    us on this committee will be able to work together to reach
    some consensus on beginning to contain global warming.
        Thank you.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Boxer, for that
    excellent statement.
        On this side, any opening statements, Senator Isakson?
        Senator Voinovich?

      OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. GEORGE V. VOINOVICH, U.S. SENATOR
                         FROM THE STATE OF OHIO

        Senator Voinovich. Mr. Chairman, I have been a member of
    this committee, as I mentioned in my remarks with regard to
    Senator Jeffords, for 8 years, and I have had a chance to
    participate in numerous climate change hearings in this
    committee as well as the Governmental Affairs Committee. When
    Senator Lieberman was Chairman of that committee, he took that
    committee and had hearings on global warming and climate
    change. I have heard vigorous debate on both sides of the
    issue.
        Unfortunately, the media and those involved politically in
    this issue have raised the rhetoric to such a point that it is
    difficult for consensus. Far too often, we talk past each other
    because it doesn't promote or defend a certain agenda and any
    other point of view that is not orthodox is moot or, worse,
    unworthy to be heard.
        I remember, Mr. Chairman, when we had Michael Crichton here
    testifying, who wrote the book, State of Fear, and Mr. Crichton
    discussed the issue of the media's impact on this whole climate
    change issue. I asked him the question. You remember we had
    lunch with him afterward, and I said: Are they going to make a
    movie? Some of his books have been made movies.
        He said: You have got be kidding me. There is no way they
    will make a movie on State of Fear because the perspective that
    I outline in this book about the media's influence doesn't fit
    in with what most people in Hollywood think the issue is about.
        That is a good example, I think, of how the media does
    impact upon this.
        Then I remember when I first came here, Bjorn Lomborg who
    is from Denmark, who is a great environmentalist, and who
    studied Kyoto and came back and said that with the costs
    involved and the result that we would get from it, really if
    you look at the money spent on that, you could do far more with
    the money in terms of bringing potable water to African nations
    and health and education.
        There is no question that the media has had some impact on
    what we are doing. The reality is that not all climate change
    skeptics are denialists or ideologues, and those in the
    environmental movement are not all alarmists. We can learn a
    lot and achieve more if we listen a little more to each other,
    and I suspect that is what Americans believe and what they
    expect us to work together on in terms of this issue.
        I think one of the things, Senator Boxer, that has bothered
    me a bit about this committee is that so often we get together
    and we discuss some of these issues and because of special
    interest groups on both sides, because of media interest, we
    don't listen to each other. I happen to believe that there is a
    problem, that we have to deal with climate change, OK. The
    issue is how do we go about dealing with the issue.
        I think we also have to become well aware of the fact that
    what we do also is going to be impacted dramatically by the
    developing countries. For example, we know that China is
    building a new coal-fired plant every week, every single week,
    and many of them lack modern pollution control devices. We are
    talking about energy for cities like the size of Dallas.
    Researchers say, for example, that our Great Lakes that I am
    very interested in, 20 percent of the mercury now is coming
    from China.
        So this is a worldwide problem. I think any time we deal
    with it, we have to realize that we have a role to play, but we
    also must recognize that others have a role to play and the
    more we can engage them in this debate, the better off we are
    going to be and the better off the world is going to be.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Voinovich.
        Senator Lautenberg did you have any comments?

      OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. FRANK R. LAUTENBERG, U.S. SENATOR
                      FROM THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY

        Senator Lautenberg. Disappointingly, I may have some
    comments. Mr. Chairman, I want to start off by putting away the
    gloves. I am not going to lock the cabinet, but the fact of the
    matter is we just had one of those moments in the U.S. Senate
    when our hearts take a lead in our views. I am talking about
    someone as noble as Jim Jeffords is and how wonderful it is as
    he leaves this place that we all detail our feelings about how
    nice it is to work with someone who has such balance.
        I don't think the people who are new to come here were
    elected to cross the bipartisan divide but rather they are here
    to accomplish something, and we have to get on with that. We
    have to be frank with one another.
        Mr. Chairman, I want to thank you for providing us an
    opportunity today to prove to the American people or at least
    inform the American people that we don't think that global
    warming is really a hoax, that it is real, that is out there in
    front of us. To ignore it and to dismiss it as a bad joke
    doesn't, in my view, do the public any good and certainly does
    not speak well in my view of the Senate or those who are
    advocating push it away and maybe we will be lucky and it won't
    come back.
        I think everybody knows that I look at the world through my
    grandchildren's eyes and think about what I would like to see
    for the future.
        But for the last 6 years, the way the Administration has
    behaved toward the environment I think has negatively affected
    our world. We just heard from our distinguished friend from
    Ohio that this is a worldwide problem and that we are concerned
    now about China building all these plants and disregarding good
    environmental control. America is purportedly the leader in the
    world, so it is not for us to point our fingers at other
    countries and say they are going to do terrible things to the
    environment unless we lead the way, unless we convey a message
    that we really are concerned about the environment and it means
    something to us.
        Joined by Exxon, American Petroleum Institute, and others,
    there has been a misleading of the American people about the
    threats that global warming poses to our communities and our
    countries and the continents. The reason people are making
    movies and writing books focusing on the environment is because
    major changes in our environment like global warming are
    happening, and the evidence is so clear in front of us. Think
    about it.
        We have all seen pictures of the polar bears. The mighty
    polar bears are now reduced to ragged herds, searching,
    foraging for food. Their environment is being less hospitable
    to them, and they are out there searching for ways to stay
    alive. I don't know whether anybody has not ever seen a picture
    of a polar bear, but I have seen them up there, alive and
    powerful. Now to see them looking like almost enlarged alley
    cats is pathetic. Global warming is melting our glaciers,
    leading to record temperatures, changing our weather, changing
    the conditions of our oceans. For heavens sake, what does it
    take to say there is something amiss out there?
        The oil companies and the other polluters have borrowed a
    page from the tobacco industry's playbook: create fake science
    in order to undermine real science.
        But it is time to focus on, if I may borrow the words, an
    inconvenient truth. Global warming is real. It is caused by
    man; entirely, perhaps not but significantly, of course.
        The Bush administration has spent 6 years avoiding any real
    action. The Administration has declined to put mandatory caps
    on carbon emission and opposed the significant improvement of
    cap and trade standards. They refuse to let California set
    tailpipe emissions on carbon dioxide for their cars. In the
    past year alone, politicians, not scientists, have kept NOAA
    and NASA experts from discussing and releasing their work on
    global warming. Now when scientists can't tell the public what
    they have learned, then we will have to rely on the media to
    uncover the truth.
        I plead with those in the media: Speak up for heavens sake.
    Call it; say it like it is. That is the power of your
    profession.
        The power of science is that it is beholden to no one. It
    is not Democrat, Republican, or Independent. I am hopeful with
    a change here and the chairs are going to shift. I have great
    respect for our Chairman, and I have also, as some might have
    noticed, some great differences, occasional differences. But
    the fact of the matter is there is mutual respect because I
    know that Senator Inhofe ultimately has the same issues in mind
    as I have, and that is to make our Nation a healthier place,
    but we see it through different colored glasses. What I want to
    do and hope that we can is really reduce the threat that global
    warming brings to my grandchildren, to your grandchildren, and
    to your grandchildren, so the future generations can look at
    what we have done to contribute to their well-being and not to
    destroy reality.
        [The prepared statement of Senator Lautenberg follows:]
         Statement of Hon. Frank R. Lautenberg, U.S. Senator from the
                              State of New Jersey
        Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        I want to first thank Senator Jeffords for his service to Vermont
    and to our nation. He has worked for safer, smarter transportation,
    better health care options, and to protect our environment. He has
    served with distinction. He will be missed in this Committee and the
    Senate.
        Mr. Chairman, now I want to thank you for providing us an
    opportunity today to prove to you that global warming is not a hoax--it
    is real. I saw a movie recently called Hoot. It's a story about a boy
    and his friends who save a group of owls from losing their habitat. I
    liked Hoot because it tells the truth: the way we behave affects the
    world. For the last six years, the way the Bush administration has
    behaved towards the environment has negatively affected our world.
    Joined by Exxon, the American Petroleum Institute, and others, the
    administration has misled Americans about the threats global warming
    poses to our communities, our country, and the continents.
        The reason people are making movies and writing books focusing on
    the environment is because major changes in our environment--like
    global warming--are happening, and people want to know the truth. The
    truth is that global warming is no hoax. There is no conspiracy. What
    you hear, what you read, what you see, is reality. Global warming is
    melting our glaciers, leading to record temperatures, changing our
    weather, and changing the conditions of our oceans. The oil companies
    and other polluters have borrowed a page from the tobacco industry's
    playbook: creating fake science in order to undermine real science.
        But it's time to focus on an inconvenient truth: global warming is
    real, caused by man, and the Bush administration has spent six years
    avoiding real action. The administration has declined to put mandatory
    caps on carbon emissions, opposed a significant improvement of CAFE
    standards, and refused to let California set tailpipe emissions
    standards on carbon dioxide for their cards. In the past year alone,
    politicians--not scientists--have kept NOAA's and NASA's experts from
    discussing and releasing their work on global warming. And when
    scientists can't tell the public what they've learned, then we will
    have to rely on the media to uncover the truth.
        The power of science is that it's beholden to no one: it is not
    Democratic or Republican. I am hopeful that, in the aftermath of
    November's elections, and with a new Congress, America's scientists
    will be able to tell their own story--and we can use their expert
    advice and help to reduce global warming.
        Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

        Senator Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Lautenberg. I would now
    ask that the statements of Senators Thune and Bond be included
    in the record.
        [The prepared statement of Senator Thune was not available
    at time of print.]
        [The prepared statement of Senator Bond follows:]
        Statement of Senator Christopher S. Bond, U.S. Senator from the
                               State of Missouri
        Thank you Mr. Chairman for holding this hearing on climate change
    and the media. Certainly, we have heard, and will hear more today,
    examples of the media's focus on climate change advocates.
        What I want to focus on is what the media is not covering, what the
    media needs to cover and what this committee needs to focus upon if it
    is serious about considering climate change strategies. That is the
    human toll current climate change fighting strategies will impose on
    people, on families, and on workers.
        We cannot, I cannot, and I will fight, fighting climate change on
    the backs of the poor. The weak, the infirm, the vulnerable, are all in
    the crosshairs of proposals put forward by climate change advocates.
        Proposals that cap, ration or tax carbon energy and its waste will
    raise the cost of our most basic needs--heating, cooling, lighting--
    that no family, rich or poor, can do without. However, it will be the
    poor that will suffer most when heating bills go up in the winter.
    Fixed income seniors will suffer most when air conditioning bills go up
    in the summer. Families, especially blue-collar, middle class families
    will suffer most when their bread-winner loses their job.
        These are the untold stories, the unreported stories that I
    challenge the media, and now the committee, to tell. Maybe we should
    not be surprised that the press is not talking about how current
    climate change proposals will hurt everyday people, because advocates
    surely are not talking about it.
        ``An Inconvenient Truth'' runs about 95 minutes. In it you will
    find about an hour and 20 minutes on global warming and its
    environmental impacts, 10 minutes of what to do about global warming
    and about 5 minutes on how much those proposals might cost. Nothing on
    forcing low-income families to choose between heat and eat.
        Read the book ``Field Notes from a Catastrophe: Man, Nature and
    Climate Change'' and you'll get chapters on the Golden Toad and the
    Mountain Ringlet Butterfly. It bills itself as ``the most important
    book about life on Earth in over forty years.'' But it provides no
    advice to fixed-income seniors forced to chose between prescription
    drug medicine and air conditioning their homes in the Summer.
        The book ``The Weather Makers: How Man is Changing the Climate and
    What it Means for Life on Earth'' does devote 30 of its 300 pages to
    solutions. But advice on walking, biking and hybrids will hardly meet
    the needs of blue-collar Midwestern manufacturing workers put out of
    work by higher energy costs.
        It is no surprise that advocates do not want to talk about the
    severe human toll of their current proposals.
        The ``Economist'' estimates the costs of adequate emissions
    controls at 1 to 5 percent of global GDP. That works out to between
    $440 billion and $2.2 trillion. Assuming America's fair at 25 percent
    would cost us $100 to $500 billion per year.
        And who will pay that $100 to $500 billion? You and me and everyone
    less fortunate than us because every electric utility, every car maker,
    every maker of a product we can't do without will pass that cost right
    on to us. We might as well be raising the cost of milk, diapers and
    prescription drugs.
        Do not tell me the costs are bearable because the average cost per
    family is low. Some groups will say that current proposals are
    affordable at only $100 per family per year. Of course, they do not say
    that no one will pay $100--that some will pay less and some will pay a
    whole lot more.
        They cannot tell us whether these nationwide cost figures will
    impose unbearable disproportionate regional harm--how they may spare
    the natural gas burning Northeast and West Coast but hit hard the coal
    burning Midwest.
        They cannot tell us whether their plans will impose
    disproportionate harm on certain blue-collar workers--how they may
    spare California high-tech and New York finance but will hit hard
    middle-class workers dependent on power from coal and natural gas,
    manufacturing, chemical, fertilizer and automotive jobs.
        If this committee wants to get past the rhetoric and seriously
    consider climate change fighting proposals, it must come up with these
    answers--we must debate these issues.
        We need to know what regions of the country, what States, what
    cities will be affected by proposals. What sectors of the economy, what
    types of jobs, their locations, who holds them and who will lose them?
    What types of workers, blue collar, union, are most at risk? What types
    of people, families, young, old, struggling, will face burdens too
    high?
        General legislation that leaves the details and dirty work to
    others, like those recently passed at the State level, that abdicate
    these questions, abdicate our responsibility to pass judgment on these
    issues, are unacceptable. We have a responsibility to those we may hurt
    to know more, consider more, and do more.
        Some have said that they want to make this committee an environment
    committee, not an anti-environment committee. We must be an environment
    committee, but we cannot be an anti-poor committee, an anti-blue collar
    committee, an anti-family committee. Then we will be able to see if we
    can work together.
        Thank you.

        Senator Inhofe. We will ask the witnesses to please come to
    the table. We have Dr. David Deming from the University of
    Oklahoma, College of Earth and Energy; Dr. Daniel Schrag,
    Laboratory of Geochemical Oceanography, Department of Earth and
    Planetary Sciences, Harvard University; Dr. R.M. Carter, Marine
    Geophysical Laboratory, James Cook University, Australia; Dr.
    Naomi Oreskes, director of Science Studies Program, University
    of California at San Diego and professor, Department of History
    and Program in Science Studies; and Dan Gainor, The Boone
    Pickens Free Market Fellow and director, Business & Media
    Institute.
        It is not the purpose of this meeting and while I
    appreciate very much the comments that are being made, I do
    have documentation that I would be glad to share with anyone
    after the meeting on the plight of the polar bears--they are
    doing quite well--also a long list of scientists who certainly
    agree on the point that we are going through a warming cycle,
    but it is not related to manmade emissions.
        What I would like to ask you to do, the five panelist
    members, since we took a little longer on opening is to each
    one try to confine your remarks to 5 minutes. Your entire
    statement will be made a part of the record.
        I think particularly we might give a little bit longer to
    Dr. Carter. He came all the way from Australia for this
    meeting. So we appreciate that very, very much, Dr. Carter.
        At any time that we happen to have 10 members here, we will
    go back to our meeting.
        Senator Boxer, I don't think that is going to happen,
    judging from who isn't here right now. So let me just announce
    that after the first vote today, we will go to the President's
    room and have our business meeting at that time if we don't
    have 10 here, if that is all right.
        We will start with you, Dr. Deming, and thank you for being
    here from the great University of Oklahoma.

       STATEMENT OF DAVID DEMING, Ph.D., UNIVERSITY OF OKLAHOMA,
                      COLLEGE OF EARTH AND ENERGY

        Mr. Deming. Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, and
    distinguished guests, thank you for inviting me to testify
    today.
        I am a geologist and geophysicist. I have a Bachelor's
    Degree in geology from Indiana University and a Ph.D. in
    geophysics from the University of Utah. My field of
    specialization in geophysics is temperature and heat flow. In
    recent years, I have turned my studies to the history and
    philosophy of science.
        In 1995, I published a short paper in the academic journal,
    Science. In that study, I reviewed how borehole temperature
    data recorded a warming of about 1 C in North America over the
    last 100 to 150 years. The week the article appeared, I was
    contacted by a reporter for National Public Radio. He offered
    to interview me but only if I would state that warming was due
    to human activity. When I refused to do so, he hung up on me.
        I had another interesting experience around the time my
    paper in Science was published. I received an astonishing e-
    mail from a major researcher in the area of climate change. He
    said, ``We have to get rid of the Medieval Warm Period.''
        The Medieval Warm Period was a time of unusually warm
    weather that began around 1000 A.D. and persisted until a cold
    period known as the Little Ice Age took hold in the 14th
    Century. Warmer climate brought a remarkable flowering of
    prosperity, knowledge, and art to Europe during the high Middle
    Ages. The existence of the Medieval Warm Period had been
    recognized in the scientific literature for decades, but now it
    was a major embarrassment to those maintaining that the 20th
    Century warming was truly anomalist. It had to ``be gotten rid
    of.''
        In 1769, Joseph Priestley warned that scientists overly
    attached to a favored hypothesis would not hesitate to ``warp
    the whole course of nature.'' In 1999, Michael Mann and his
    colleagues published a reconstruction of past temperature in
    which the Medieval Warm Period simply vanished. This unique
    estimate became known as the hockey stick because of the shape
    of the temperature graph.
        Normally in science when you have a novel result that
    appears to overturn previous work, you have to demonstrate why
    the earlier work was wrong, but the work of Mann and his
    colleagues was initially accepted uncritically even though it
    contradicted the results of more than 100 previous studies.
    Other researchers have since reaffirmed that the Medieval Warm
    Period was both warm and global in its extent.
        There is an overwhelming bias today in the media regarding
    the issue of global warming. In the past 2 years, this bias has
    bloomed into an irrational hysteria. Every natural disaster
    that occurs is now linked with global warming no matter how
    tenuous or impossible the connection. As a result, the public
    has become vastly misinformed on this and other environmental
    issues.
        Earth's climate system is complex and poorly understood,
    but we do know that throughout human history, warmer
    temperatures have been associated with more stable climates and
    increased human health and prosperity. Colder temperatures have
    been correlated with climatic instability, famine, and
    increased human mortality.
        The amount of climatic warming that has taken place in the
    past 150 years is poorly constrained and its cause, human or
    natural, is unknown. There is no sound scientific basis for
    predicting future climate change with any degree of certainty.
    If the climate does warm, it is likely to be beneficial to
    humanity rather than harmful. In my opinion, it would be
    foolish to establish national energy policy on the basis of
    misinformation and irrational hysteria.
        Thank you.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you very much. Thank you, Dr. Deming.
        Dr. Schrag.

     STATEMENT OF DANIEL SCHRAG, Ph.D., LABORATORY FOR GEOCHEMICAL
       OCEANOGRAPHY, DEPARTMENT OF EARTH AND PLANETARY SCIENCES,
                           HARVARD UNIVERSITY

        Mr. Schrag. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to all
    the Senators for hearing us today. I am going to depart from my
    written comments and just speak from them more generally.
        First of all, let me say that I think one of the problems
    with media coverage of climate change is that it is being
    covered in a very political era where the issue has become
    quite divided across partisan lines. I think that is very
    unfortunate. This is really a bipartisan issue. Moreover, I
    think science reporters are often very concerned about making
    sure that both sides are discussed as opposed to framing the
    issue.
        I see the issue quite differently. I am an earth scientist
    who studies the history of the climate on all time scales and
    also modern climate dynamics. Let me just start a little bit
    with the way I think this issue should be discussed. I attached
    some figures that I am going to refer to in these comments.
        Let me start with some observations about the climate
    system, about the atmosphere that are absolutely
    incontrovertible. There is no serious objection to them at all
    even by the serious scientific skeptics. Carbon dioxide levels
    today are the highest they have been for at least the last
    650,000 years and that is by direct observation from measuring
    gas bubbles in ice cores. We can't go further back than that
    because that is the oldest ice core we have. But indirectly by
    measuring chemistry of the ocean which tells us something about
    the ph and therefore the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, we
    can say that levels that we are seeing today and levels that we
    will see this century are higher than they have been for tens
    of millions of years.
        If you look at the Figure 1 that I have attached, you will
    see this represented where today and relative to the last
    650,000 years, the carbon dioxide concentration is far above
    anything we have ever seen. That is everybody in this room
    today is seeing an atmosphere unlike any human being ever in
    the history of the world.
        Now the question in front of us is: What is that going to
    do? We know that this carbon dioxide rises due to burning of
    fossil fuel primarily with some contribution from deforestation
    as well. The good news is that the Earth is actually cushioning
    us a little bit. Only about 60 percent of the CO2 we
    emit from burning fossil fuel ends up in the atmosphere. Some
    of it is taken up by the ocean. Some of it is taken up by
    terrestrial plants.
        Unfortunately, the natural world can't absorb it fast
    enough. We are burning fossil fuels too quickly, and the
    CO2 is rising faster and faster.
        As Senator Voinovich said, the developing countries, in
    particular China today, are burning more and more coal.
    Currently about 46 percent of the world's coal is being used in
    China, and that is contributing more and more. They will soon
    pass us as the largest emitter of carbon dioxide.
        Now the important thing here is then what is this going to
    do for the climate. We know that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse
    gas. It absorbs infrared radiation. In fact, in the laboratory,
    the way we measure carbon dioxide is by its infrared absorption
    properties. It absorbs heat coming from the surface, acting
    like a thermal blanket. That is not a controversy. We can look
    at our neighboring Venus and look at its atmosphere which is
    almost 100 times thicker and composed almost entirely of carbon
    dioxide. It is 460 C at the surface mostly because of carbon
    dioxide.
        The question is: What is a smaller increase in carbon
    dioxide going to do on the Earth? We have a variety of
    information about this. We have models, and I think the
    Chairman has referred to some of the uncertainty in these
    models. I actually share those concerns about these climate
    models. Climate models are the best physics, the best
    observations we have from the last 100 years of observations.
    We take those models and the best physics we can, incorporate
    them into a physical model, a computer model that we then try
    to use to predict the future.
        But try to understand it this way, that the carbon dioxide
    levels today are higher than they have ever been in human
    history, higher than they have been probably for 30 or 40
    million years of Earth history. What that means is it is
    unreasonable to expect scientists like me to predict exactly
    what is going to happen when we are taking the Earth into a
    state that we haven't seen for 30 million years. The
    expectation that we will be able to predict exactly what is
    going to happen is unreasonable.
        I will say this though; I look at Earth history and try to
    use climate variations in the past to estimate how sensitive
    the Earth is to changes in carbon dioxide, and the general rule
    that I see is that the Earth is always more sensitive than the
    models whether you are talking about the difference between the
    last Ice Age and today, and that is Figure 3 here.
        If you look at Figure 3, the Northern Hemisphere, when most
    of North America was covered with ice, where I live in Boston,
    it was covered with a mile of ice, a very different world. The
    average temperature difference was 5 C for the whole world. We
    are talking about 3 to 5 C warming this century potentially.
    That is what some of the models say if we double or triple
    atmospheric CO2 this century.
        Exactly how this will affect our climate? Very difficult to
    say, but there is no question that it will be dramatic and
    significant.
        To me, we can look warm climates 40 or 50 million years ago
    when crocodiles lived up in Greenland, when there were palm
    trees in Wyoming, sea level was 300 feet higher because there
    was no ice anywhere on the planet, a very warm world. We think
    CO2 levels were something like two to four times
    higher than today, a very different world. We are not going to
    get back to that world in a hundred years--it takes longer for
    that for the ice to melt--but we are heading that direction. We
    are returning the atmosphere to a state it hasn't been in since
    that time.
        It is an experiment on the planet. That is the way I think
    is the right framing of this problem. We are doing an
    experiment on the planet. It is uncontrolled. We don't know
    exactly what is going to happen. The question is, it is an
    insurance question, how much are we going to risk? What is it
    worth to us? What is the cost of fixing this problem relative
    to the possibility that we will really do something bad?
        Senator Inhofe. Dr. Schrag, will you please wind up now in
    fairness to the other witnesses?
        Mr. Schrag. Yes, I will wind up right now, absolutely.
        I think the framing of this as an insurance problem is
    important. Ultimately, we don't buy insurance because we know
    our house is going to burn down. We do it because we can't
    afford it if it did burn down.
        What it comes down to then is: What is the cost of the
    premium? What does it cost to fix the problem? I think we heard
    Senator Bond earlier talk about 1 percent or 4 percent of GDP.
    I think recently there have been estimates that are much lower
    than that, 0.4 to 1 percent. The point is that it is actually
    relatively affordable. As Senator Boxer said, there are
    actually issues. There are many ways this will actually help
    our economy and help our national security.
        Senator Bond was exactly correct in asking how is this
    going to affect poor people. How is this going to affect
    different States? There are solutions, for example, for Ohio
    which depends heavily on coal.
        Senator Inhofe. OK, Dr. Schrag, thank you very much.
        Mr. Schrag. Thank you.
        Senator Inhofe. Dr. Carter coming all the way from the
    other side of the world, thank you very much.

    STATEMENT OF R.M. CARTER, Ph.D., MARINE GEOPHYSICAL LABORATORY,
                    JAMES COOK UNIVERSITY, AUSTRALIA

        Mr. Carter. Mr. Chairman, Senators, ladies and gentlemen, I
    thank you for the invitation to speak to you. I am aware,
    coming from a long way away, of the privilege that it
    represents.
        I am particularly pleased to meet Senator Boxer for the
    first time because, unbeknownst to her, we have something in
    common, and that is a brother-in-law of mine who lives in her
    electorate. So I just stopped there briefly on the way to
    Washington, and I wonder why you spend time in Washington
    rather than that lovely part of California?
        Climate change is a complex thing, and human-caused climate
    change is even more complex. It is important at the outset to
    appreciate there is no theory of climate in the sense that
    there is a sense of gravity, a Newtonian theory of gravity, for
    example.
        I like to look at it this way; there are three realities of
    climate change. The first reality is the reality that Dr.
    Schrag has just been speaking about, the science reality, and
    it is based upon facts and experiment and empirical testing.
        The second reality is virtual reality, and you have a very
    distinguished practitioner of it in the States, Dr. Jim Hansen,
    and many colleagues who spend their time devising computer
    models that are so mind-bogglingly complex that ordinary
    scientists like me can't begin to penetrate them. But the
    important thing to understand is that they do not produce
    predictions of future climate. They are virtual realities. They
    produce imaginary worlds. We learn a huge amount from them, but
    we do not gain predictions from them.
        The third reality is the cause of this hearing, mostly
    behind me but some gentlemen in front of me, the press. It is
    the public opinion, the general common view of climate change.
        Now those three realities are very different things and two
    of them are in complete conflict. The two are the science
    reality where there is vigorous debate as indeed there should
    be in any mature science or young science, I should say. There
    is vigorous debate on virtually every aspect of climate change.
    Yet, in the public arena now, it has become a political issue
    which is a done deal. Everybody knows the planet is
    overheating, and we have got to save it.
        How did that come about? How is it possible for there to be
    such a disjunct between the public understanding and the
    scientific situation? The answer to that has to be the press
    because the press carry the privilege of informing the public
    and informing them on climate change. The three players that
    they should be paying attention to are the Intergovernmental
    Panel on Climate Change, the IPCC; the non-governmental
    organizations with an environmental bent like Greenpeace and
    the World Wildlife Fund; and individual scientists like Dr.
    Schrag and others. They are the three big sets of voices.
        So the press' job then, is to translate what it hears from
    those people out to the public. The press is failing, and let
    me tell you why. They are failing to translate the uncertainty
    of the science. There is huge uncertainty in every aspect of
    climate science.
        The second thing they are failing to do is they are not
    transmitting many essential facts and especially facts that are
    relevant to the human influence. Let me give you two because I
    only have time for two.
        The first is that if you look at the ice core evidence, you
    will discover that yes, changes in carbon dioxide are
    accompanied by changes in temperature, but you will also
    discover that the change in temperature precedes the change in
    carbon dioxide by several hundred years to a thousand or so
    years. Reflect on that and reflect when you last heard somebody
    say that they thought lung cancer caused smoking, because that
    is what you are arguing if you argue on the glacial time scale
    that changes in carbon dioxide cause temperature changes. It is
    the other way around.
        The second example is--it will come as a surprise to some
    people in this room--using the official statistics of the
    Climate Research Unit of the University of East Anglia, which
    are the statistics that the IPCC use, there has been no
    increase in global temperature for the last 7 years. Since
    1998, global average temperature has remained unchanged, yet
    over those 7 years, carbon dioxide has been continuing its
    spiral upwards.
        Other things that the press do, briefly, and they are
    detailed more in my paper to the committee, are they make a
    great deal of alarmist stories about climate change. We all
    understand why; it sells newspapers. They play the man and the
    women, not the ball. It is not the science that gets discussed.
    It is the motivation or who is paying for the science.
        They use what I call couldism, mightism, and perhapsism.
    Droughts could go up; we might get more storms; and perhaps sea
    level is going to rise.
        They substitute he says/she says type of coverage for
    assessing complex scientific issues where there are not just
    two sides to the argument. There are multiple sides to the
    argument. But a reporter is trained from being knee-high, as
    far as I can tell, that the way you produce balanced coverage
    is to get a spokesman on the one hand and a spokesman on the
    other hand. Climate science is hugely more complicated than
    that. It requires the reporter to be able to make some
    judgments of his or her own.
        Finally, why am I concerned that this public hysteria--I
    agree with my colleague, Dr. Deming, on this--on climate change
    is such a problem? The reason it is a problem is it is
    diverting our attention from what is a real climate problem,
    and that is natural climate change, not human-caused climate
    change. Every experienced person who studies climate over the
    long haul understands rapid climate changes and especially
    coolings, can happen in a matter of a few years to a few
    decades. We do not understand what causes them. We do
    understand that a rapid cooling is going to be economically far
    more damaging than a gradual warming.
        Therefore, any policy should be based on adaptation to
    climate change, not on trying to prevent it. Trying to mitigate
    natural climate change is an exercise in utter futility. You
    might as well try to stop the clouds scudding across the sky.
        Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you, Dr. Carter. Thank you very much.
        Dr. Oreskes.

     STATEMENT OF NAOMI ORESKES, PROFESSOR, DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY
     AND PROGRAM IN SCIENCE STUDIES, UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN
                                 DIEGO

        Ms. Oreskes. Thank you very much. It is an honor to have
    the opportunity to speak to you today about the history of
    climate history.
        I am a professor of history at the University of
    California, San Diego where I teach and do research on the
    history of modern science. I hold a Bachelor's of Science in
    mining geology from the Royal School of Mines, part of the
    University of London, and a Ph.D., from Stanford University
    where I completed a graduate special program in geological
    research and the history of science.
        In recent months, the suggestion has been made that concern
    over anthropogenic global warming is just a fad or a fashion.
    The history of science clearly shows otherwise. Scientific
    attention to global warming has lasted over a century, has
    involved thousands of scientists, and extended across six
    continents. It has spanned the disciplines of physics,
    chemistry, meteorology, and oceanography, and included some of
    the most illustrious and trusted scientists of the 20th
    Century, and it has included scientific advisors to numerous
    U.S. Presidents, both Democratic and Republican.
        Let me explain. Scientists have been studying carbon
    dioxide and climate for a long time. John Tyndall first
    established in 1859 that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas.
    From this, the great Swedish geochemist Svante Arhenius deduced
    in the 1890s that carbon dioxide released to the atmosphere
    from burning fossil fuels could alter Earth's climate.
        By the 1930s, British engineer Guy Callendar had compiled
    empirical evidence that this effect was already discernible.
        Callendar's concern was pursued in the United States in the
    1950s by the great American physicist Gilbert Plass, a pioneer
    in upper atmosphere spectroscopy; by geochemist Hans Suess, a
    pioneer of radiocarbon dating who worked closely with the U.S.
    Atomic Energy Commission; and by the great oceanographer Roger
    Revelle, a one-time commander in the U.S. Navy Hydrographic
    Office.
        By the 1960s, Charles David Keeling's systematic
    measurements demonstrated conclusively that atmospheric
    CO2 was indeed rising, work for which he was awarded
    the National Medal of Science by the Bush administration in
    2002.
        These basic facts of history are well documented, but what
    is less well known is that by the mid-1960s, a number of
    scientific advisory panels had expressed concern about global
    warming, and this concern was communicated by some of America's
    most illustrious scientists to Presidents Lyndon Johnson,
    Richard Nixon, and Jimmy Carter.
        One early warning came in 1965 from the Environmental
    Pollution Board of the President's Science Advisory Committee,
    which warned that by the year 2000, ``There will be about 25
    percent more CO2 in our atmosphere than at present
    and this will modify the heat balance of the atmosphere to such
    an extent that marked changes in climate could occur.''
        Accordingly, President Lyndon Johnson stated in a special
    message to Congress: ``This generation has altered the
    composition of the atmosphere on a global scale through a
    steady increase in carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil
    fuels.''
        A second warning came in 1966 from the U.S. National
    Academy of Sciences Panel on Climate and Weather Modification
    head by geophysicist Gordon MacDonald, who later served on
    Richard Nixon's Council on Environmental Quality.
        In the wake of the Arab oil embargo, Alvin Weinberg, the
    director of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, realized that
    climatological impacts might limit oil production before
    geology did.
        In 1979, the subject was addressed by the JASON Committee,
    the reclusive group of highly cleared scientists who gather
    annually to evaluate scientific and technical problems for the
    U.S. Government and whose members have included some of the
    most brilliant scientists of our era, including physics Nobel
    Laureates Hans Bethe and Murray Gell-Mann.
        The JASON scientists predicted that atmospheric carbon
    dioxide might double by the year 2035, resulting in mean global
    temperature increases of 2 to 3 C and polar warming of as much
    as 10 to 12 C. This report also reached the White House where
    Frank Press, Science Advisor to President Carter, asked the
    National Academy of Sciences for a second opinion. An Academy
    Committee headed by MIT meteorologist Jule Charney affirmed the
    JASON conclusion: ``If carbon dioxide continues to increase, we
    find no reason to doubt that climate changes will result and no
    reason to believe that these changes will be negligible.''
        It was precisely these concerns that led in 1992 to the
    U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change which called for
    immediate action to reverse the trend of mounting greenhouse
    gas emissions. One early signatory was U.S. President George
    H.W. Bush who called on world leaders to translate the written
    document into ``concrete action to protect the planet.''
        Three months later, the Convention was unanimously ratified
    by the U.S. Senate. Since then, scientists around the world
    have worked assiduously to flesh out the details of this
    broadly affirmed picture.
        The purpose of my 2004 study of the scientific literature,
    published in the peer-reviewed journal, Science, was to assess
    how much disagreement remained in the scientific community
    about the basic reality of global warming and its human causes.
    The answer surprised me. Not one scientific paper in the sample
    disagreed with the consensus position. Scientists, my study
    showed, are still arguing about the details, but the overall
    picture is clear. There is a consensus among both the leaders
    of climate science and the rank and file of active climate
    researchers.
        Now I should acknowledge that one skeptic has challenged my
    study and others have repeated his claim. This man is a social
    anthropologist in Liverpool who, to my knowledge, has never
    published his arguments regarding my study in a peer-reviewed
    journal. This past October, he admitted that he had made
    significant mistakes in his criticisms, and he now agrees with
    my general conclusion about the state of climate science.
        In an interview with the Australian Broadcasting
    Commission, he acknowledged, ``I do not think that anyone is
    questioning that we are in a period of global warming. Neither
    do I doubt that the overwhelming majority of climatologists is
    agreed that the current warming period is mostly due to human
    impact.''
        The scientific evidence is clear: The predictions made
    decades ago by Arrhenius, Callendar, Plass, Suess, Revelle,
    Charney, MacDonald, Weinberg, White, the JASON Committee, and
    many others have come true.
        I thank you very, very much for your time.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you, Dr. Oreskes.
        Mr. Gainor.

      DAN GAINOR, THE BOONE PICKENS FREE MARKET FELLOW, DIRECTOR,
                       BUSINESS & MEDIA INSTITUTE

        Mr. Gainor. Thank you, Chairman Inhofe, Senators, and
    ladies and gentlemen.
        We are here to discuss the media coverage of the climate
    change debate, but there is only one problem; there is almost
    none of that debate actually in the media. Journalists who
    pledged to be neutral long ago gave up their watchdog roles to
    become lapdogs for one position. The media became alarmist,
    claiming the planet is at a tipping point as if at any moment
    everything would go over the edge.
        An April 2006 issue of Time Magazine pushed readers over
    that edge with 24 pages of advocacy, claiming, ``The debate is
    over. Global warming is upon us with a vengeance.''
        CBS's Scott Pelley, who covers the environment, actually
    compared climate change skeptics with Holocaust deniers and
    claimed, ``There becomes a point in journalism where striving
    for balance becomes irresponsible.''
        In an effort to provide balance to that irresponsible
    comment, let us recall the media's record on climate change.
    Reporters told us roughly 30 years ago that a similar fate
    awaited mankind. Then, journalists were convinced we would all
    freeze to death.
        In an April 1975 article entitled The Cooling World,
    Newsweek advised us that ``the Earth's climate seems to be
    cooling down.''
        A May 1975 New York Times piece cautioned, ``Scientists
    Ponder Why World's Climate Is Changing: A Major Cooling Widely
    Considered to be Inevitable.''
        The Washington Post, U.S. News and World Report, and
    Science News all chimed in that cool was suddenly very hot. One
    award-winning piece in Fortune said if the trend continued, it
    could ``affect the whole human occupation of the Earth.''
        The irony of this scare is that just years before, we had
    been warned the Earth was warming. In March 1929, the Los
    Angeles Times told readers, ``Most geologists think the world
    is growing warmer and that it will continue to get warmer.''
        The New York Times took a similar approach with a headline
    that said, ``America in Longest Warm Spell Since 1776.''
        And less than 10 years before that, the Times detailed the
    exploits of Captain Donald MacMillan's Arctic expedition and
    how ``MacMillan Reports Signs of New Ice Age.''
        In more than 100 years, the major media have warned us of
    at least four separate climate cataclysms: an ice age, warming,
    another ice age, and another bout of warming. If you count the
    current catch-all term of climate change, that would be five
    separate media predictions. Even by their count, they are 0 for
    3.
        The hubris that convinces supposedly unbiased journalists
    they are providing the truth on climate change has led them to
    criticize America for its stance on the issue including the
    Kyoto Treaty, but they typically leave out the 95 to nothing
    vote against Kyoto by this very Senate or the many billions of
    dollars such an agreement would cost America. This attitude has
    resulted in a media obsession with Al Gore's film, An
    Inconvenient Truth. At least 75 TV shows covered Gore or the
    film in just 3 months this summer, more than three and a half
    times the length of the movie.
        The Today Show's Matt Lauer even lent his status to a SciFi
    Network program that listed global warming among other
    potential threats to our species, including asteroids, aliens,
    and evil robots.
        Scientists who dare question the almost religious belief in
    climate change--and yes, they do exist--are ignored or
    undermined in news reports as are policymakers and pundits who
    take similar views. The few journalists who sometimes give
    another side, like the New York Times' Andrew Revkin, emphasize
    funding sources for that side of the debate and rarely bother
    to question the billions of dollars that go into promoting
    global warming.
        This goes against the basic tenets of journalism to be
    skeptical of all sides of an issue. It also violates the
    ethical code of the Society of Professional Journalists which
    urges the media to ``support open exchange of views, even views
    they find repugnant.'' That code calls for reporters to
    ``distinguish between advocacy and news reporting.''
        But that wasn't the media response when Chairman Inhofe
    read some of our report, Fire and Ice, on the Senate floor in
    September. Newsweek responded with a roughly 1,000 word
    clarification of its 1975 global cooling report but added it
    made this mistake as recently as 1992. Newsweek still claimed
    ``the story wasn't `wrong' in the journalistic sense of
    `inaccurate.' '' But at least it owned up to the error after 31
    years.
        In the New York Times editorial that responded to Senator
    Inhofe's comments, the Times summarized, ``Cooling, warming, we
    never get right.'' That is the inconvenient truth.
        Thank you.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you very much for the excellent
    statement.
        Without objection, I am going to enter into the record, Dr.
    Carter, a paper that you wrote called Human-Caused Global
    Warming because I find it to be very interesting as a
    supplement to your testimony.
        In order to accommodate Senator Boxer, we are going to
    expand the time for questioning. We will have a first round of
    7 minutes and then we will have a round after that of 5
    minutes. We are going to try our best, though, to conclude it
    in 1 hour from now because we have other uses for the room.
        Let me start off with the University of Oklahoma which
    shouldn't surprise too many people.
        I would like to have you, Dr. Deming, just repeat and just
    take a second to do it what you said about your call from the
    NPR to make sure everybody understands it.
        Mr. Deming. It was the week that my paper in the journal
    Science, had been published. I came into my office. There was a
    voice mail there from a reporter from National Public Radio. He
    said he wanted to talk to me about the paper, and I called him
    back, very excited. I thought I am going to be on the radio,
    and it is going to be wonderful, and it will help my career,
    and I will get all sorts of favorable publicity, and blah,
    blah, blah.
        I called him back, and to my surprise, he focused on the
    very last sentence in my paper where I said, I made the
    statement I thought was remarkably uncontroversial. I said the
    amount of warming that we have observed is within the range of
    natural variability for the last 10,000 years, and it is
    impossible to say at this point in time if it is due to human
    activity or a natural variation.
        And he said, did you really mean to say that?
        I said, well, of course, I did because I say what I mean.
        He said, well. He said, then I guess we have no story. He
    said, because if you had said it was due to human activity,
    that is what everyone is interested in.
        Then he hung up on me.
        Senator Inhofe. That is one of the problems that we have
    that is very serious.
        You also mentioned and as I said in my opening statement, 4
    years ago when I became Chairman of this committee, I assumed
    that it was anthropogenic gases that were causing this because
    that was all I had seen in the media since IPCC came out and,
    of course, Michael Mann was the one you heard from more than
    anything else.
        When we started looking at the science, you commented on
    the hockey stick. Isn't it true that if he had been honest in
    his portrayal, using a hockey stick for the blades charted at
    the 20th Century and included Medieval Warming Period, that it
    would have two blades of approximately the same size?
        Mr. Deming. As I understand the hockey stick, that period
    of time, the medieval time period is included, but the result
    they get is different from virtually almost what everyone else
    has found, and it has subsequently been criticized for having
    the result as an artifact of the methodology.
        As I understand the hockey stick, it is based primarily on
    tree ring thicknesses which are probably one of the most
    problematical indicators we have of past temperatures. The area
    in which I am most familiar, borehole temperatures clearly
    indicate that there has been a Medieval Warm Period and also
    that----
        Senator Inhofe. And a Little Ice Age, and I think also
    history, which Dr. Oreskes may want to address.
        Mr. Deming [continuing]. Polar sea maximum when
    temperatures were even warmer than the Medieval Warm Period
    about 5,000 years ago. Since that time, which used to be
    called, by the way, the Climatic Optimum. Before the warming
    scare, it used to be commonly acknowledged that warm
    temperatures are beneficial and cold temperatures are
    detrimental. Since that time, temperature, of course, has been
    undergoing variation, but it has been more or less
    systematically declining.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you very much.
        Dr. Schrag, I think the only criticism I would have of your
    presentation is you said it is unfortunate that it has become
    very political and yet you have made appearance after
    appearance with Al Gore. I mean Al Gore clearly believes that
    global warming is his ticket to the White House. You appeared
    at the premiere of The Day After Tomorrow with not just Al Gore
    but also have made appearance with MoveOn.org and many of these
    highly political groups.
        If it is unfortunate that it has become political, why are
    you participating in those politics? Cut it short now.
        Mr. Schrag. Yes, in the discussion of the movie, The Day
    After Tomorrow, I felt the movie was so distorted in terms of
    its climate science, that I welcomed any opportunity to try to
    explain to the public what was fact and what was fiction. I
    think if you actually see my comments on that film, you will
    agree with that.
        I welcome the opportunity to appear in any Republican or
    Democratic forum on this, and I do that regularly at Harvard,
    briefing.
        Senator Inhofe. I appreciate that very much. I would like
    to have you, for the record, give me some of these comments on
    the science. My staff should have done this, and I should have
    been aware of it, but I would like to see some of the comments
    that you made concerned the flawed science of that movie.
        Mr. Schrag. Yes, well, the movie was really preposterous,
    essentially. The movie suggested that warming would lead to a
    shutdown of the thermohaline circulation which is actually
    possible. That part of it was correct. However, it happened in
    3 days, and it resulted in a global ice age.
        In fact, a shutdown of the thermohaline circulation would
    have a minor effect on temperatures, probably only in the
    coastal regions of Northern Europe, and it might only mitigate
    future warming. It might reduce the impact of future warming.
    It certainly wouldn't cause a cooling. I would actually suggest
    that this is one example where certain climate scientists have
    probably, in my view, this is an unlikely thing to occur.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you very much, very much.
        Dr. Carter, I have been a vocal critic of the IPCC for some
    time, and I actually dedicated one whole 1-hour speech on the
    floor of the Senate that I am sure no one listened to about the
    IPCC. Can you tell me your views about the IPCC's credibility
    and how it can be improved or lack of credibility?
        Mr. Carter. Well, of course, the IPCC started off with
    great hopes and intentions like most offshore bodies. The
    problem is today that after it has been going I guess for 15
    years or so, it is basically unaccountable to anybody. The
    sovereign governments that receive its assessment reports use
    those assessment reports for their own climate policy.
        You could reflect on the thought of a sovereign government
    using an international body to set its next budget. I don't
    know why it is the governments have decided in this area of the
    environment that they defer to international advice where in
    every other part of their national management, of course, they
    use their own judgment.
        There is a lot of very good science in the IPCC volumes,
    but that is in the volumes. The problem is, as you, I am sure,
    heard many people say, it is the summary for policymakers.
        Senator Inhofe. It is the summary, the political summary.
        Mr. Carter. That is a political document, but that is all
    that most governments use in setting policy.
        Lord Lawson, the former Chancellor of the Exchequer in the
    United Kingdom, his view on this is that you should just shut
    the IPCC down. I would like to agree with him, but politically
    that is clearly not feasible.
        So I think you have to do something to make them
    accountable. I think AP-6, the Asia-Pacific Climate Accord, is
    the way to go. It is going to have to receive scientific and
    technical advice. It won't want to set up its own bodies
    because it is cumbersome and expensive and so on to provide
    that advice, but it will need an audit body of some sort. I
    think the IPCC could well contribute to AP-6 advice on climate
    change, but that then needs to be thoroughly audited by a group
    of independent scientists and engineers.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you very much.
        Senator Boxer, this first round is going to be an 8-minute
    round, not a 7-minute round.
        Professor Oreskes, you have spoken about consensus about
    climate change, so I want to make sure that I understand what
    you mean. Is the definition of consensus that No. 1, the globe
    is warming and No. 2, that man's activities have contributed to
    that?
        Ms. Oreskes. Correct.
        Senator Inhofe. All right, I would like to be invited to be
    part of your consensus because I have said this and I have
    acknowledged that we are in a period where there has been
    warming now, as it was pointed out by Dr. Carter, not really
    since 1998 but generally a warming period.
        I have said many times that there are human contributions
    to this such as the expanded cities, the land use policies, the
    agriculture, the heat island effect. These things do have an
    effect. I understand that. My only concern has been
    CO2 specifically.
        Now I am going to stop right here and wait for the next
    round of questions in deference to my future Chairman. I want
    to make sure we get everything covered.
        Senator Boxer, 8 minutes.
        Senator Boxer. Eight minutes, thank you very much.
        A couple of comments, Senator Voinovich, I was very moved
    by what you said about working together and recognizing China
    is a threat, and I think I agree with Senator Lautenberg's
    remarks that the best way to engage other nations is to become
    a role model and at the same time pulling them along. I hope in
    the Foreign Relations Committee, maybe we can team up and do
    some work in reaching out to China because clearly China is
    going to surpass us in 2009 as the largest emitter of carbon
    dioxide. I think that is key, and I thank you for bringing it
    up.
        I also think attacking the press doesn't make the truth go
    away. So you can attack and flail away, but it doesn't work. A
    lot of politicians and their death rattles turn against the
    press. It doesn't work at the end of the day. It can be
    certainly frustrating, but at the end of the day, it is a free
    press that keeps us strong.
        I also think attacking individuals for speaking out at
    forums is anti-democratic, and I just feel that way, regardless
    of what forum. That is what differentiates us from others. We
    don't say to people you can't have an opinion, regardless of
    what your profession is. I encourage all my people at home, Dr.
    Carter, and maybe you do too, and I encourage your brother,
    however he feels on this subject, to speak out, to go to forums
    to be educated and lead.
        Since you, Dan Gainor, you put up the Times, let me put up
    a series of mainstream press. I want to show you this. I am
    going to ask Dr. Schrag, because I asked you before if you
    would read these articles, to comment on whether you think
    there is anything in these articles that is hysterical, as my
    Chairman says, hysterical.
        The first one is the Tulsa World. We go to Oklahoma, Mr.
    Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I think you would be interested. Tulsa
    World, September 26, 2006: Global Warming Reaching Record:
    Earth's Temperature Highest in Millennia. Researchers say
    Earth's temperature has climbed to levels not seen in thousands
    of years; and warming has begun to affect plants, animals,
    researchers report in Tuesday's issue of proceedings of the
    National Academies of Sciences.
        So that is one. Let us go quickly with these because we
    have 8 minutes and eight charts. OK, here we go.
        Business Week, not your liberal bastion of a magazine:
    Global Warming Consensus Growing Among Scientists, Governments,
    Business. We must act fast to combat climate change. This has
    already sparked efforts to limit CO2 emissions. Many
    companies are now preparing for a carbon-constrained world.
        They cite a Pentagon report that tells of a plausible
    scenario in which the conveyor shuts off. They also quote
    Senator McCain as saying: The facts are there. We have to
    educate our fellow citizens about climate change.
        Let us go to the next one. This is the L.A. Times:
    Academies Warn of Warming. Science organizations from 11
    countries including the United States call for global action
    against the changing climate.
        It goes on to explain that.
        Let us go to the next one. Washington Post: Growing
    Activity of Oceans. This is important because Dr. Deming made a
    very important point that the oceans are our friend and they
    sequester the carbon dioxide. But look what is happening to the
    oceans: Growing acidity of oceans may kill corals.
        That is quoted also from a report from the National Center
    for Atmospheric Research in the National Oceanic and
    Atmospheric Administration, and that is the Bush
    administration.
        Let us go to the next one. This is the Financial Times: No
    Need to Become a Sitting Duck; Hurricane Zones: Businesses Can
    and Should Plan for Events Outside Their Control.
        Even the U.S. Pentagon says climate change should be
    elevated beyond a scientific debate to a national security
    concern. That is the Pentagon. That is the Bush administration,
    the current Administration.
        This is the New York Times: Yelling Fire on a Hot Planet.
    Between the poles of real time catastrophe and non-event lies
    the prevailing scientific view.
        Let me repeat that. The New York Times: Between the poles
    of real time catastrophe and non-event lies the prevailing
    scientific view. Without big changes in emission rates, global
    warming from the buildup of greenhouse gases is likely to lead
    to substantial and largely irreversible transformation of
    climate, ecosystems, and coastlines.
        So talk about the middle position, Dr. Deming, there you
    go.
        The next one, United Press International, CDC, this is
    important. This is the Bush administration's CDC. This is this
    month, Mr. Chairman.
        Climate Change a Health Threat, December 5: The rising
    scientific certainty of climate change should mobilize
    environmental health professionals to take aggressive action, a
    Center for Disease Control and Prevention director said at a
    meeting here Monday.
        Climate change is perhaps the largest looming public health
    challenge we face, certainly in the environmental health field,
    Dr. Howard Frumkin, director of CDC's National Center for
    Environmental Health.
        Given credible indications there is a danger there, we need
    to act to protect people from that danger. It is standard
    public health practice, said Frumkin, Bush administration's
    CDC.
        So, Dr. Schrag, in this example, I tried to pull together
    from all over the country business magazines, the mainstream
    press, an article from Tulsa. Is there anything in here?
        You have read them all because I have asked you because I
    consider you to be one of this country's leading experts on
    this. Is there anything in here that you think is hysterical,
    that is in any way out of the mainstream of scientific thought
    on this subject?
        Mr. Schrag. No, Senator Boxer; I actually think that, in
    general, those articles do a very excellent job describing the
    general scientific evidence for those various issues.
        I would just add that I think the business articles,
    Business Week and an article you didn't cite, one from the
    Economist recently that was a cover article--both of these are
    not typically political journals--they did an excellent job
    reporting on this partly because they weren't science
    reporters. They were business reporters, and business reporters
    have good experience making decisions under uncertainty, and
    that is what we are dealing with here. Again, it is the risks
    that we care about.
        Senator Boxer. Dr. Deming, I think it was interesting on
    the NPR story because as a former reporter myself, you tried to
    get what you consider a balanced view, but I thought what you
    said was really interesting and worthy of reporting because
    that last sentence was pretty balanced. You said we are not
    sure why this is happening, and I think that is important
    because I thought your position is we absolutely know it has
    nothing to do with human activity and actually that is not what
    you said at the end. So I was encouraged by that.
        I want to ask you, Dr. Deming, the National Academies of
    Science of 11 nations including the U.S. National Academies
    have said climate change is real. It is likely most of the
    warming in recent decades could be attributed to human
    activity. Am I right that you do not agree with this
    conclusion?
        Mr. Deming. What you said, I think, has two parts. You said
    that, first of all, climate change is real and second that it
    is due primarily to human activity. I think the first----
        Senator Boxer. I didn't say this. The National Academies of
    11 nations said this.
        Mr. Deming. Right, I understand.
        Senator Boxer. Do you agree with this or not?
        Mr. Deming. Well, I agree with the first part. I don't know
    of anyone who disagrees with it because climate changes on all
    time scales.
        Senator Boxer. How about the second part?
        We all agree climate change is occurring; you are right.
        Mr. Deming. It changes; you are right. Here in Washington,
    DC, every summer, it gets hotter; in the winter, it gets
    colder.
        Senator Boxer. We are not talking about that. We are
    talking about, as you know, over time. We understand that.
        But I am asking you: Do you agree with the statement, it is
    likely that most of the warming in recent decades can be
    attributed to human activity? Do you agree or disagree?
        Mr. Deming. I think it is highly problematical.
        Senator Boxer. You don't agree or you do agree?
        Mr. Deming. Well, I don't think my answer would fit into
    either of those categories because----
        Senator Boxer. So you don't disagree with this. You don't
    disagree with this then. You don't flat-out disagree with this
    statement of the 11 nations National Academies of Sciences that
    it is likely that most of the warming in recent decades can be
    attributed to human activity. You don't flat-out disagree.
        Mr. Deming. Well, let me see if I can phrase my answer in a
    way that links up.
        Senator Boxer. Dr. Deming, please try to help me out here.
    Do you agree or disagree?
        Mr. Deming. Well, I am trying, but you keep interrupting
    me.
        Senator Inhofe. Senator Boxer, you over your time. We are
    going to come back to you, and I will give you time to give
    your answer under my time if that is all right.
        Senator Boxer. Yes.
        Senator Inhofe. I know that Senator Isakson has to go.
    Senator Isakson, why don't you go ahead and take what time that
    you need?
        Senator Isakson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        I want to thank Senator Voinovich for giving me this
    opportunity to jump in. I have to be on a very important call
    in 4 minutes, but I have one very important question. I
    appreciate everything everybody said, but I heard something
    fascinating and I want to make sure I heard it right.
        Dr. Carter, did you say that the ice cores demonstrated
    that warming preceded the increases in CO2?
        Mr. Carter. Yes, and that is not controversial. There is no
    climate scientist that will disagree with that. There are a
    number of papers in Nature, Science, and other such journals.
        Senator Isakson. Before you go any further, excuse me for
    interrupting. I apologize for being rude.
        Does anybody disagree with that statement?
        Mr. Schrag. Well, I would like to say that it is a little
    bit more complicated than that, unfortunately.
        Senator Isakson. Most everything is.
        Mr. Schrag. It is. Unfortunately, I wish it weren't in this
    case. The bubbles in the ice that trap the CO2 have
    actually a different age than the ice that surrounds it, and
    that is just the nature of the way they form. As a result,
    there is a big uncertainty on the exact age of those bubbles.
    It is that the error is a few thousand years. Therefore, it is
    very difficult to say exactly which. To the best of errors,
    within the error, they are essentially synchronous.
        Now, the important point that I think is misleading about
    this is that on thousand-year time scales, on many thousand-
    year time scales, CO2 is very much connected with,
    linked to ocean temperature. They go up together, and they go
    down together. Therefore, talking about one driving the other
    is silly. They are connected. The ocean warms. It releases
    carbon dioxide which causes more warming which warms the ocean.
    It is a cycle. They are connected.
        On shorter time scales, this isn't the case, and we are
    dealing with a shorter time scale.
        Senator Isakson. Dr. Carter, I cut you off to get that
    response. Go ahead. I am sorry.
        Mr. Carter. Well, on short time scales, it is the case. Of
    course, the statements I was making are similar to those that
    Dr. Schrag was making. They are within scientific error. So the
    best estimates by the best scientists are that the change in
    temperature precedes the change in carbon dioxide in the ice
    cores.
        Getting to the short time scale, now that is true in the
    ice cores. It is also true on the annual temperature cycle.
    David Deming referred to that, that it gets colder here in the
    Washington winter as I have noticed, having just come from the
    Great Barrier Reef, and warmer in summer.
        You all know the famous Keeling Curve from Hawaii of
    CO2 which goes up like this, and that jiggle-jaggle
    in it is the annual cycle of CO2. Now when you
    compare that, you find again that temperature changes 5 months
    before carbon dioxide changes. So both on the short time scale
    and on the large time scale, that is the reality.
        But I do not disagree with what Dr. Schrag just said. This
    is a complex system. It is interacting both ways. But for what
    it is worth, temperature changes first; carbon dioxide changes
    second.
        Senator Isakson. The reason I asked the question is--and I
    am going to have to go, Mr. Chairman of all the things
    everybody said, I think your statement, Dr. Carter, and then
    your response demonstrates that this is a very complex issue of
    which far too many people have conclusive opinions as to who
    the villains are, who the contributors are, and what the
    solution is when, in fact, we need more dialog like we are
    having today to start identifying those things we can do and
    recognizing the impracticality, if that is the right word, of
    some of the things that we really can't do.
        I am a businessman. I spent 33 years in the private sector.
    I have never seen corporate America move as much as it has,
    particularly over the last 5 to 10 years, in its greening and
    its conscious effort to make constructive efforts to recognize
    there are things we can do to better improve our environment.
    But there continues to be this element of some who have all
    these absolute beliefs of the absolute solutions to this
    absolute problem when, in fact, people of your intellect.
        I am a politician. I am not a scientist. I was a barely
    good businessman. But I really think, Mr. Chairman, this has
    been very helpful today in getting out the information that we
    all agree with. There are some things that are happening, and
    there are some things that we can do, but some of the absolute
    conclusions that become facts because they get repeated over
    and over again are incontrovertibly not correct. Is that fair,
    Dr. Carter?
        Mr. Carter. I agree with that sentiment.
        Senator Isakson. I apologize for making a speech and then
    leaving, but I have got to be on a conference call in 2
    minutes.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you. I am sorry it took so long to
    get to you, Senator Isakson. Thank you for your contribution.
        Senator Lautenberg?
        Senator Lautenberg. Thanks very much, Mr. Chairman.
        I thank each of you for expressing yourself, in some
    instances way beyond the things that we would expect from the
    observations that man makes without instruments, without the
    calculations that may confirm that something terrible is
    happening in front of our eyes. That is what concerns me.
        One of them is, and I ask this to Dr. Schrag. Are you aware
    of any reports of government scientists who have had their work
    on global warming altered or suppressed or been prevented from
    speaking to the press, or you, Dr. Oreskes? Any evidence that
    there has been an attempt?
        Mr. Schrag. I am certainly aware of what was published
    widely in the press, and I have talked with Dr. James Hansen
    about his experience at NASA. I think ultimately, he was a
    prominent enough figure that he was able to overcome that.
        Senator Lautenberg. To break through.
        Mr. Schrag. I know other scientists at NOAA of a much
    smaller reputation who have been prohibited from talking about
    or mentioning the words, global warming, when they discuss
    their data on climate science.
        Senator Lautenberg. Dr. Oreskes?
        Ms. Oreskes. Yes, the example that I know about is the
    example of the Environmental Protection Agency reports that
    were altered, which was reported on the front page of the New
    York Times by Andrew Revkin and Kathryn Seelye. I would
    encourage you to invite people from the Environmental
    Protection Agency to discuss what was done to their reports.
        Senator Lautenberg. We don't have any here with us today,
    but I do hope that in the future, we will hear from Government
    witnesses.
        There is a science writer in the major New Jersey paper.
    The paper is the Star Ledger, very widely circulated, with the
    Sunday and the daily in the many hundreds of thousands of
    readers. She was writing a story on NOAA's GFDL laboratory in
    Princeton that she, the reporter, was denied permission to
    interview an important climate scientist named Richard
    Wetherald.
        Should NOAA or any other Government Agency be preventing
    their scientists from speaking to the press and the public
    about global warming? Can any of you think of any logical
    reason to block off that contact with the press?
        Ms. Oreskes. If I might respond to that, obviously, no. But
    if I could add a historical point on that, Professor Wetherald
    is one of the most important people in the history of climate
    science because he was one of the pioneers of the development
    of global climate models. So if you want to understand what
    climate models can and can't tell us, Professor Wetherald would
    be one of the best possible people you could talk to about that
    question.
        Senator Lautenberg. Do any of you know Dr. Wetherald at
    all? Do you know his reputation?
        Dr. Schrag, do you know who he is?
        Mr. Schrag. I taught at Princeton for a few years. I lived
    in Princeton, NJ, for 3\1/2\ years and worked closely with
    people at GFDL. It is a fantastic outfit. I believe they should
    all be encouraged to speak to the press.
        Senator Lautenberg. Dr. Carter, in Australia, do they stop?
        Mr. Carter. In the supporting papers, Senator, you will
    find I have given two examples of that. Of course, they are in
    Australian science so they are not primarily of concern to the
    committee except as an example.
        I would respond to your question. Why would an Agency head
    want to restrict? Did you ask that question.
        Senator Lautenberg. Yes.
        Mr. Carter. Because that Agency head has a primary
    responsibility for garnering next year's budget.
        Senator Lautenberg. That is a very interesting comment. So
    to withhold truth is an acceptable instrumentality to restrict.
        Mr. Carter. No, I didn't say that was acceptable. What I
    said is I can understand why that is a pressure on an Agency
    chief.
        Senator Lautenberg. Someone of your esteem, sir, when you
    say you can understand, it means that it is not so bad.
        Mr. Carter. Oh, well, that is not my intention at all. Let
    me say I think it is very bad, but I can understand why a
    manager in that situation ends up trying to restrict his staff
    talking to the press, and that happens the whole time in major
    Government organizations, scientific organizations, certainly
    overseas.
        Senator Lautenberg. Dr. Oreskes or Mr. Gainor?
        Mr. Gainor. I am a huge believer in the First Amendment,
    and I am a career journalist. So I certainly think that the
    people in the Agencies, I would love for them to talk to the
    media.
        But I would also at the same time like to challenge the
    point about Dr. Hansen who ended up on more TV and print media
    than I think pretty much any of the climate scientists that
    have been mentioned here today.
        Senator Lautenberg. He was forced. He was forced into the
    public eye. He wanted to tell the truth, and they didn't want
    him to. We have seen redactions around here, EPA reports, Dr.
    Oreskes, that say don't tell it like it is; tell it like we
    want you to tell it which is quite different especially coming
    from a distinguished group of scientists as you are. I would
    think that at any cost, dear God, tell the truth. Tell it as
    you see it.
        Ms. Oreskes. If I could just say one more thing, if I could
    respond to something that was in Dr. Carter's written
    testimony, which was that he raised the question of ad hominem
    attacks and libel restraints. I would like to make the point
    that this is issue not only for Government scientists but for
    academics and others as well.
        Since my paper was published in Science magazine in 2004, I
    have received hate e-mail. I have received threatening phone
    calls. I have been threatened with lawsuits by people who deny
    the scientific evidence of climate change. So there has been
    enormous pressure on academics not to speak up on this issue,
    and it is not just a matter of Government science. It goes
    across the board.
        Senator Lautenberg. Dr. Carter, I had the privilege of
    visiting Australia on my way to New Zealand, on my way to
    Antarctica, on my way to the South Pole. My principle mission
    was to meet with our National Science Foundation people and see
    what they saw, what they believed was happening.
        I don't know at what point, Mr. Chairman, there is a
    conclusion drawn from things that you feel, humans feel, see,
    changes in populations of particular species, the diminution of
    the penguin population and, as I mentioned before, the polar
    bear population.
        It was suggested that former Vice President Al Gore did
    this film on his way to another chance at the White House. See
    it before you make that kind of comment and debate it honestly.
    Go to the public and just say: This is wrong. That is wrong.
    The fact is that these ice flows are in your imagination, bad
    dreams for kids and just say seeing what you see is not really
    so as opposed to a discussion that gets us into relatively
    minute details which are important in the science world.
        But on the other hand, do you deny that there is a fire in
    the house and discussion the origination of the fire and how
    high the temperature is going to be before you tell everybody
    to get out of there? I don't think so.
        So, Mr. Chairman, we have to continue to search through
    these problems, and I appreciate your time.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Lautenberg.
        Senator Voinovich.
        Senator Voinovich. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
        As I have mentioned, I have sat through lots of these
    hearings. Senator Boxer, I understand we have two subcommittees
    now. One is going to be talking about private contributions to
    climate change and public contributions to climate change.
        The real question for me is: What do we do about it that is
    practical, that makes a difference?
        I would like to read and then have the panel comment on a
    couple of things. One of the things we have debated here is cap
    and trade. The European Union introduced a carbon cap and trade
    system in October 2001 which granted carbon permits to 12,000
    powerplants, factories, oil rigs, and refineries. Each permit
    represented the right to produce a ton of carbon dioxide and
    could be traded like any other commodity.
        The system was supposed to motivate companies to reduce
    carbon dioxide and sell their extra permits for profit, but
    according to an article published by Bloomberg England, the
    carbon trading system has led to huge utility price increases
    in Europe's two largest economies--Germany, prices up 61
    percent; England, up 66 percent. These price jumps were higher
    than the increase of crude oil traded in the London Stock
    Exchange, up 46 percent.
        The question is: Why hasn't this generated more attention
    with the mainstream media or is it that it contradicts some of
    the things that are being proposed in this country in terms of
    a cap and trade proposal to deal with reducing greenhouse
    gases?
        Again, I want everyone to understand. I believe that we see
    warming. I am not really sure how much is due to natural causes
    or to manmade causes, but I believe that manmade causes do
    impact on it. The issue is what do we do from a responsible
    policy perspective to deal with the problem?
        So that is one thing, and I want to read one other. I would
    like to one day, Senator Boxer, have an opportunity to let the
    Administration come in here and talk about what they have done
    about climate change.
        Senator Boxer. They will be on the very first group that we
    have before us.
        Senator Voinovich. They joined with China, India,
    Australia, and South Korea to form the Asia-Pacific
    Partnership, and I think personally engaging these nations
    which have the fastest growing economies and sharing our
    technology is one of the best way to address the problem of
    climate change.
        During the debate of the 2005 Energy Act, I worked on with
    Senator Hagle to add a climate change amendment which
    authorized $2 billion in direct loans, loan guarantees, and
    other incentives over 5 years for the adoption of technologies
    that reduce greenhouse gas intensity while directing a Federal
    effort to implement a national climate change strategy. These
    funds would be used to develop new technology to limit
    greenhouse gas intensity and would then be exported to
    developing nations that are burning fossil fuel at increasing
    prices or increasing rates.
        What role do you see technology transfer and development
    playing as the United States and the world move forward?
        Why does this get so little coverage when we know that if
    we are ever going to reduce global carbon emissions, that
    technology development must be the focal point of that
    strategy?
        What it is getting to is the real issue of if you have a
    problem, how do you go--maybe I was a mayor too long or a
    Governor. How do you practically deal with these things and
    invest money and get a return on your investment?
        We just talk about the problem and it is getting worse and
    so on and so forth. But the real issue is: How do we do
    something about the problem?
        Why can't we get more information out about some of these
    things that people are doing, what works and doesn't work, and
    come back with some practical recommendations on what it is
    that we can do here in Congress and what the world can do to
    impact responsibly on this problem?
        Dr. Schrag?
        Mr. Schrag. Senator Voinovich, I think that is a very good
    question. I think the question of what to do about climate
    change, it is about time that we got to that question. While I
    think that a cap and trade is a good way to start perhaps and
    it may be politically inevitable in the Congress, what cap and
    trade does is just let the market decide where the cheapest way
    to reduce carbon emissions. Markets are wonderful in many
    cases, but they don't consider certain things like how certain
    areas will be impacted preferentially to other areas, things
    that are real decisions that you are going to be faced with.
        I think technology is an essential part of the answer. We
    have to become more energy efficient, that is, do the same
    things we are doing now but using less energy. We have to
    develop essentially decarbonizing our fuel sources, and we are
    not going to be as able to get away from fossil fuels. As you
    know, coal is an essential part of what drives this country,
    and it will continue to be for the century. Our Department of
    Energy is working on ways of reducing carbon emission from coal
    plants by carbon capture and then storage in geologic
    repositories. Unfortunately, the funding for that is so low, we
    need to see test projects done now, so that 10 years from now
    we can roll it out on a bigger scale.
        So the sorts of things that you suggested, I think, are
    very much in line with what is needed in leadership from this
    Government.
        Ms. Oreskes. May I join in? Thank you.
        At the University of California, I teach the history of
    20th Century science including the history of the Manhattan
    Project, and I think there is a useful analogy there. In 1942,
    the U.S. Government realized it had a big problem, and that
    problem was the threat that the Nazi Government might build an
    atomic bomb. In response to that threat, the U.S. Government
    mobilized the combined resources of physicists, chemists, and
    engineers across the United States, and from Europe as well,
    and invested unprecedented amounts of money into the Manhattan
    Project to create a new technology, a technology that had never
    existed before to address an immediate, a clear and present
    danger.
        I think there is a useful analogy there. We have a clear
    and present danger. We pretty much have all agreed upon that
    today. The question with which I agree 100 percent is what to
    do about it, and I am in complete agreement with you that the
    centerpiece of that strategy must be based on technology. So I
    believe that one thing that the U.S. Congress can do is the
    same thing that it did in 1942, which is invest money into the
    engineering resources that will be required to develop those
    new technologies.
        Mr. Gainor. Senator, you are also trying to get at how to
    get the word out. Essentially, there are two problems with the
    media as far as this story goes about some of the things you
    are talking about. One of them is quite simple; the scare story
    is an easier one to tell. There is a lot of media group think
    on this issue, and I thank Senator Boxer for proving my case
    for me. It is really quite simple.
        But the other problem is it is a very technical issue, and
    trying to get journalists to tell something in detail is also a
    challenge. It doesn't make good sound bites in the evening
    news. You will see the morning shows will just give you 5
    seconds of a new study that comes out. The media are letting us
    down because they are trying very heavily on the scare issue,
    but then the other half of the story, it is just difficult to
    tell. Only print media are really well equipped to do that, and
    they are not doing it either.
        Mr. Deming. Senator, perhaps I was napping earlier, but if
    I just heard your question to the panel, it was what is the
    responsible thing to do, and it seems to me the responsible
    thing for us as a society now to do is to encourage more
    greenhouse gas emissions. I find myself in opposition to some
    of the other members of the panel here, I think because I have
    a different perspective. I have the geologic perspective, and I
    think that is a proper perspective when you are dealing with
    natural problems.
        We know that the natural state of Earth's climate for the
    past million years is an Ice Age. Ninety percent of the last
    million years has been spent in an Ice Age during which not
    only is the climate colder, it is also more variable. We are
    now in an unusual period. We are in an interglacial period
    where the climate is warm which is good and it is also
    relatively stable. The greatest danger that we face right now
    is moving into another Ice Age.
        When the Little Ice Age took hold in Europe at the
    beginning of the 14th Century, there were massive crop
    failures. There were famines. People resorted to cannibalism to
    stay alive. We have never had a famine in the United States of
    America.
        Mr. Carter. Mr. Chairman, could I just support that? That
    is indeed the geological perspective. Can I just tease out two
    differences? I spoke of the risks of cooling earlier. There are
    two different risks. The one that Dr. Deming just talked about
    is the longer term glacial-interglacial risk. A higher risk at
    the moment is another Little Ice Age.
        You should be aware, Senator Voinovich, that the NASA about
    6 months ago issued a statement that they predict over the next
    couple of decades, we are likely to head into another Little
    Ice Age. That was supported by a piece of research from the
    Russian Academy of Sciences. So there are two quite respectable
    Agencies giving that advice at the moment, that the most likely
    event over the next 20 years is not continued warming driven by
    greenhouse gases but cooling driven by lack of solar activity.
        Mr. Schrag. Excuse me, that is not the consensus.
        Mr. Carter. I didn't say it was the consensus. I said it
    was advice that had been given.
        Mr. Schrag. Fair enough.
        Senator Inhofe. I am afraid time has expired for this
    round. We will go ahead and start with our second round of
    questions.
        I agree with Mr. Gainor. Senator Boxer, I appreciate your
    exhibits that you used because that does make my case. The
    point I am saying is that we have had such a bias in the media,
    and that is what this hearing is about, and I think that does
    pretty well make the case.
        Dr. Deming, I would like to ask you what you think of Dr.
    Oreskes' claim that 100 percent of the scientific consensus is
    on the global----
        Ms. Oreskes. I didn't claim 100 percent.
        Senator Inhofe. Let me read your statement here. The answer
    surprised me. Not one scientific paper in the random sample
    disagreed with the consensus position.
        Ms. Oreskes. In my analysis; I am not saying that there is
    no one on this Earth.
        Senator Inhofe. OK, that is fine. I am asking Dr. Deming.
        Mr. Deming. I read Dr. Oreskes' study. It was published in
    Science, and I am also under the impression that what she said
    was 100 percent.
        I think there are some problems with the study. I think
    there are three primary problems. If we have time, I will
    describe all of them.
        First of all, I am 52 years old now, and it is my
    experience in my life, as probably many people here, that when
    you get a large group of people, if you get 900 scientists or
    any group of 1,000 people together, you are not going to get
    100 percent agreement on anything. In fact, the only other
    examples besides Dr. Oreskes' study that I know of, of 100
    percent agreement, was the last election in Iraq where Saddam
    Hussein received 100 percent of the vote. Now, if you believe
    that was an honest election, perhaps you also believe that Dr.
    Oreskes' study was valid.
        However, I think the fact that she got the results she did
    should have suggested to her that it was an artifact of her
    methodology.
        Senator Inhofe. Dr. Deming, let me again try to stay within
    the timeframe here. I said I would let you respond to Senator
    Boxer's question that she was trying to get a yes or no. What
    would be your best answer to that question?
        Mr. Deming. I believe she asked me if I agreed with the
    statement it was likely that the majority of the warming that
    has been observed is due to human activity, and I guess I would
    say I disagree.
        Senator Inhofe. All right, thank you very much.
        Mr. Deming. Simple answer.
        Senator Inhofe. Yes, Dr. Schrag, again getting back to the
    politics of this, no; I will save that until last here.
        Dr. Carter, you commented about some of the things in the
    past, the cooling periods and the fact that the temperature
    sometimes or always precedes the release. You guys are smart,
    and we are not up here, and we don't have the background you
    have. When I look and see--and I don't think you disagree--that
    in recent history, the largest discharge of CO2 took
    place in the middle forties right after World War II. As I
    understand, it was something like an 85 percent increase.
        Now, that being the case, one would think that would have
    precipitated a warming period when, in fact, it precipitated a
    cooling period. Do you agree with this? Would that be a good
    example to use, Dr. Carter?
        Mr. Carter. That is a correct statement. Whether it is a
    good example to use is a separate question. The explanation for
    that then, because the implication under the greenhouse
    hypothesis, is that because we have had a big burst of carbon
    dioxide, we should have had warming as a result, and plainly we
    don't see that. So you can view that as a test of the
    greenhouse hypothesis, and you can say quite fairly the
    greenhouse hypothesis fails that test.
        But then you may seek other explanations. The explanation
    that a large number of people have come to and this word,
    consensus, keeps coming up. I do not believe in the use of
    consensus of science. Science is not about consensus. But
    nonetheless, a significant number of scientists have argued
    that it is due to aerosols in the atmosphere over that time
    which after the War were also increasing because of industrial
    activity, and they have the function of reflecting the incoming
    radiation from the Sun, and therefore they cool the Earth. By
    happy coincidence, that just explains the temperature curve.
        Senator Inhofe. All right, thank you very much.
        One real quick yes or no question, Dr. Oreskes, for
    clarification, in your original Science magazine study, I think
    you made a correction, and I just want to see if this is right.
    You claimed that you use the search term, climate change, and
    found 928 papers, but my understanding is that using that
    search term, climate change, pulls up almost 12,000 papers and
    you later published a correction noting that error, is that
    correct?
        Ms. Oreskes. That is correct. It was a typographical error
    on the part of Science magazine that the word, global, was left
    out of the original article, and it was corrected shortly
    thereafter.
        Senator Inhofe. Very good; I am coming down toward the end.
        I would only like to say, Mr. Gainor, some might say that
    you are influenced by being a part of the media, a part of the
    pro-business and anti environment and so forth. Since that
    accusation comes occasionally, how would you respond to that?
        Mr. Gainor. Well, they say Al Gore has always focused on
    his carbon footprint, and yet he flies around the world in what
    even he would say is harmful to the environment. He rides in an
    SUV and owns several houses. I live in an apartment; I walk to
    work; and I took Metro most of the way here today and would
    have finished the trip if it hadn't been for problems there.
        You don't have to be in agreement with other members of
    this committee to be pro-environment, to care about what
    happens to the Earth. Unfortunately, that is the bias that has
    crept into the media, that somehow any disagreement means that
    you are a bad person, and that is patently false.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you very much.
        A comment was made by Dr. Schrag, and I appreciate that
    very much, concerning the lack of science behind the movie that
    was produced by Al Gore. I would like to read something.
        Mr. Schrag. Excuse me, that wasn't the movie produced by Al
    Gore. That was the movie, The Day After Tomorrow.
        Senator Inhofe. Oh, The Day After Tomorrow, very good.
        I would like to read something here. Dr. Richard Lindzen,
    who is the Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Atmospheric Science at
    MIT in an op-ed on June 26 of this year in the Wall Street
    Journal said, and he was criticizing Al Gore in this case, in
    the scare tactics and so forth. ``A general characteristic of
    Mr. Gore's approach is to assiduously ignore the fact that the
    Earth and its climate are dynamic. They are always changing
    even without any external forcing. To treat all changes as
    something to fear is bad enough; to do so in order to exploit
    that fear is much worse.''
        I believe this has been a political exploitation. I am only
    sharing that with you and not asking you to respond.
        Senator Boxer, before you came in, I read my opening
    statement which ended with several people who had been very
    strong believers back in the middle nineties about manmade
    gases causing global warming. One of them I used was a
    scientist, Claude Allegre, a French geophysicist. You mentioned
    several times the Academies of Sciences. He is on both the
    French and the United States Academies of Sciences, and his
    quote has been that the ``alarmism has become a very lucrative
    business for some people. In short, their motive is money.''
        I agree that a lot of the motive is money. I would only say
    that when you look at the publications and you see, as I
    mentioned before, the pitiful polar bear stepping on the last
    ice cube in Time Magazine and be worried; be very worried.
    Believe me, this is something that sold a lot of copies. We
    understand that. But then how do you equate that with their
    headlines back in 1975 that another Ice Age is coming and we
    are all going to die?
        Last, put that chart up. Let us assume that I am wrong on
    this, that all this stuff is proven, it is all right, and we
    have to do something. Al Gore enlisted the support of a
    scientist named Tom Wigley back during the time that he was
    Vice President, and he said if all countries of the developed
    world--not China and India, and some of the rest of them--all
    the developed nations signed onto and complied with the
    emission requirements of Kyoto, how would that lower the
    temperature over the next 50 years?
        His answer was this chart. This is not my chart. This is
    Dr. Wigley's chart. He said it could reduce it by as six one
    hundredths of one degree centigrade. Does anyone want to
    comment on that?
        Mr. Schrag. Yes, Mr. Chairman, that is absolutely correct.
    I don't think anybody who negotiated Kyoto, and by the way, I
    am not a fan of Kyoto for a variety of other reasons that we
    don't have to talk about, but Kyoto was viewed as a first step
    which would be followed by a series of additional steps that
    would ultimately reduce emissions by a substantial amount more.
    So showing that Kyoto by itself would only make a small
    difference is sort of irrelevant to the point because
    ultimately Kyoto was only viewed as a small step.
        Senator Inhofe. Yes; I don't want to interrupt you, but I
    would say I agree with that. But it aggressively forces a
    reduction in CO2, and anything that comes after this
    would have to be more aggressive. I will go back to some of the
    financial analyses as to what would happen to this country,
    this great machine that we call America if, in fact, we were
    even more aggressive than that.
        Now I will let you go ahead and take an extra 2 minutes,
    Senator Boxer. I have tried to be very accommodating, and you
    are recognized at this time.
        Senator Boxer. Thank you so much.
        Where to start? I will start with you, Mr. Gainor, because
    I understand you worked for the Washington Times.
        Mr. Gainor. Yes, I did, Senator.
        Senator Boxer. You know I am shocked that a reporter would
    really take the position to criticize a free press. I am
    stunned by it and shocked by it.
        Now I have been skewered by that paper many a time, and I
    fully expect to be skewered by that paper again. You know what?
    That is the breaks. I don't have a committee hearing talking
    about how I am skewered by the Washington Times, so let us get
    over it. It is a free country, and the papers are going to
    report the truth as they see it.
        Then you said, I disproved my own case. I proved my case.
    What I proved by going through these articles that you seem to
    shun is that in the vast majority of cases, almost every one,
    they are quoting reports, they are quoting organizations, they
    are quoting scientists, and most of all these articles, they
    are quoting the Bush administration. So how you can argue that
    that is inappropriate is beyond me.
        I just hope that a message goes out from this hearing that
    we treasure a free press. It may annoy us. Lord knows, it
    annoys me many times. But we treasure a free press, and I hope
    that is what goes, whatever they write on their opinion pages.
    Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal skewered Olympia Snowe and
    John Rockefeller--it was the day before yesterday--because they
    had the temerity to write a letter to the big oil company and
    say: Why are you funding these anti-global warming theories? We
    think it is time to do something about this rather than deny
    it.
        And talk about big bucks, do you want to talk about the big
    bucks on the other side? That would take a whole hearing in and
    of itself.
        I want to make sure that Senator Voinovich understands
    because he hasn't really seen the list of subcommittees. They
    deal with solutions to the problem, solutions to global
    warming, including private sector and consumer solutions.
    Senator Lieberman will work on that, and I am going to be
    looking at in my subcommittee--and I am sure all of us will do
    this on the full committee--what the public sector is doing
    because there have been, I think it is 13 States now that have
    actually acted. Waiting for us to act, they have decided is
    just too risky, and they have gotten out there. That means from
    Governor Schwarznegger, a Republican Governor, to many other
    Republican and Democratic Governors in the West and all
    throughout the country. We will hear from them, and that will
    be exciting.
        This is what I would like to do in closing. First, I really
    want to thank all of you for coming today. You know you are in
    a tough environment here. There is a lot of tension, and I
    understand for scientists in particular. The media guy is used
    to it, but the rest of you are not. So I want to thank the four
    scientists. I think you have all been just terrific for coming
    and in your expression of your views.
        What I am going to do in my last few minutes here is read
    you--you have to listen carefully, just the scientists in this
    one--a list of statements made by various organizations. If you
    believe that these statements have no reasonable scientific
    basis, so it is not just a yes or no, Dr. Deming. If you
    believe that these statements have no reasonable scientific
    basis, I am asking you to put your hand up. Then at the end, if
    I have time, I will ask you to explain why.
        I am going to start with the U.S. National Academy of
    Scientists: It can be said with a high level of confidence,
    that global warming meaning surface temperatures were higher in
    the last few decades of the 20th Century than during any
    comparable period during the preceding four centuries.
        Does anybody believe these statements have no rationale?
        OK, next, 11 National Academies of Sciences: It is likely
    that most of the warming in recent decades can be attributed to
    human activities. We urge all nations to take prompt action to
    reduce the cause of climate change.
        Raise your hand.
        Mr. Deming. Could you repeat that?
        Senator Boxer. No, you are not being asked.
        Mr. Deming. I am sorry. I don't understand what we are
    doing here.
        Senator Boxer. Just the scientists are being asked a
    question to respond. I think you would want to raise your hand
    because you already said you disagreed with it before.
        We will go on. The American Geophysical Union, an
    organization representing more than 45,000 scientists from 140
    countries who are experts on Earth and science: Human
    activities are increasingly altering the Earth's climate.
        Raise your hand if you believe that these statements have
    no rationale, no rationale. Did you raise your hand?
        Mr. Carter. Do they mean global climate or local climate?
    It is completely ambiguous.
        Senator Boxer. We are talking about global warming in this.
    All of these relate to global warming. I will repeat it again.
    American Geophysical Union: Human activities are increasingly
    altering the Earth's climate.
        Raise your hand if you don't agree with that statement.
        U.S. National Assessment Synthesis Team, a Federal Advisory
    Committee, the U.S. Global Change Research Program: Humanity's
    influence on the global climate will grow in the 21st Century.
        Ad hoc study group on carbon dioxide and climate report
    requested by President Carter, delivered to the National
    Research Council of the National Academy of Scientists: Changes
    will result and no reason to believe that these changes will be
    negligible. A wait and see policy may mean waiting until it is
    too late.
        That is what they wrote? Anybody disagree?
        Recent statements from industry, Shell Oil: It is a waste
    of time to debate it. Policymakers have a responsibility to
    address it.
        If you disagree with that, raise your hand.
        Mr. Carter. Address what?
        Senator Boxer. Shell Oil, global warming; this is all about
    global warming climate change. All right, that is interesting.
        Next, British Petroleum: Companies composed of highly
    skilled and trained people can't live in denial of mounting
    evidence gathered by hundreds of the most reputable scientists
    in the world.
        This is all about global warming and climate change, OK.
    Wal-Mart: Global warming is real, now, and it must be
    addressed.
        Anybody disagree with that?
        Mr. Deming. I am really lost here as to what you are doing
    because----
        Senator Boxer. I am reading to you----
        Mr. Deming [continuing]. I am supposed to participate, and
    I don't know if I agree or disagree or if I am being forced
    into one position or another.
        Senator Boxer. Let me repeat what I asked you to do, sir. I
    hope I am not being unfair. I said if you believe that these
    statements have no rational scientific basis, please raise your
    hand. We are in a very big dispute in this committee between--
    --
        Mr. Carter. Mr. Chairman?
        Senator Boxer. Let me just finish here. I want your help
    here. We have a Chairman who says this is all a hoax, all
    right, and we have right now a member, a senior member here
    today who believes it is not a hoax.
        Senator Inhofe. No, let us be sure and characterize my
    statement correctly. We are talking about yes, there is
    increase in temperature. Whether it is the whole globe or not,
    I would disagree because in the Southern Hemisphere, there
    doesn't seem to be a change and the last time I checked, that
    was part of the world.
        But the statement that I have made many times before is we
    recognize there are increases and decreases that have taken
    place, but do not believe that it is due to the cause that you
    believe it is in terms of the release of anthropogenic gases.
    So that is my statement. I don't like to have it shortened.
        Senator Boxer. It may be that the press has misquoted you,
    but that is fair. We are arguing with the press anyway.
        The point I am making is, and I will stop here because
    obviously our witnesses have refused essentially to participate
    in this, and I think there is a reason. I think that everything
    I am reading has merit, has a rational basis. Nobody really has
    disputed that.
        I will continue and I won't ask you to participate in this.
    If you can't do it, I think frankly it says you are not so sure
    of yourself. That is all I am saying. But bottom line here, we
    have DuPont saying: We came to the conclusion, the science is
    compelling and action should be taken.
        We have Swiss Re, the 14th largest insurance company
    saying: Risk of climate change is real. It is here. It is
    affecting our business today.
        We have Fitch Ratings Limited: Global warming is on the
    radar screen of a lot of financial institutions.
        We have AIG, the largest insurance company in the world,
    saying: Climate change is increasingly recognized as an ongoing
    significant global environmental problem with potential risk to
    the global economy and ecology and to human health and well-
    being. AIG recognizes the scientific consensus that climate
    change is a reality and is likely in large part the result of
    human activities that have led to increasing concentration of
    greenhouse gases in the Earth's atmosphere.
        I will conclude here. I am getting close to my time.
    Goldman Sachs: We support the need for national policy.
        So there is consensus, gentlemen and ladies. There is
    consensus. Now there are a few people on the edges, of course.
    That is fine. By the way, they should be listened to. I agree
    with you. That is important that they be listened to and that
    Dr. Carter and Dr. Deming be listened to. But we can't, as
    policymakers, it seems to me, turn our backs on the
    overwhelming scientific evidence and opinion as evidenced in
    the Bush administration's own statements on this as late as
    December 6, when the CDC declared that this is a big problem.
        I feel very sad that we have spent time attacking the press
    today. I am glad we didn't just spend all our time doing that.
    I urge the press, you just do what you think is right. You
    report the news as you see it, and you can have any opinion you
    want. Stick it on the opinion page like the Wall Street Journal
    did.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you, Senator Boxer.
        Senator Boxer. I think that is really very key, and I say
    that as a former journalist.
        Thank you.
        Senator Inhofe. I believe most of those things have been
    answered on the question of consensus.
        Senator Voinovich.
        Senator Voinovich. We are talking about global warming,
    aren't we? We are talking about the media's influence on the
    issue, and there is no question that because of the media, the
    American people are more aware of this problem than they would
    be if the media wasn't involved with all the articles that are
    being written about climate change and so on and so forth.
        The question I have for the panel is this: If we look
    around the world and we see China and we see India and other
    developing nations and we know that they are going to be
    emitting a lot more of this stuff than they are today, what
    kind of environment do we have in the media in China, for
    example, or in India because in all likelihood actions will not
    be taken by those governments unless there is some public
    pressure to do something about it?
        It is expensive for those business that are emitting and
    also expensive in terms of the general economy of the countries
    that they are going to have to allocate more of their GDP to
    dealing with this problem than they are now dealing with it
    today. Where are we globally on this issue?
        I have talked to Tony Blair about this. He talks about
    Kyoto; you have sign it. The fact of the matter is that first
    of all, I think, Dr. Schrag, you pointed out that this is just
    the beginning and it is not going to really make a big
    difference if Kyoto goes forward as the first step. The fact of
    the matter is the countries that have signed aren't even going
    to make the deadlines that they agreed to sign? So where are
    we?
        Mr. Schrag. I think the United States has a key role to
    play, and I think the lack of progress on the countries meeting
    their Kyoto obligations is partially a result of the United
    States not taking a leadership role. We are the technological
    innovators of the world, and we have a critical role to play.
        The good news is the Chinese Government cares about climate
    change. Colleagues of mine at Harvard are working with top
    members of the Chinese Government. They are very concerned
    about the hydrologic changes in China. They worry about a
    peasant uprising, and they are worried about feeding their
    people. Therefore, they worry about climate change.
        However, their official position is they will follow as
    long as the U.S. leads, and I think that is very important. I
    think we have an opportunity to lead here, and we have an
    opportunity, our American businesses have an opportunity for
    huge investment opportunity in rebuilding our world's energy
    infrastructure. That is something that can't be missed. I think
    if you talk to leaders from GE, they will tell you that there
    are huge opportunities.
        I also want to say that there is a window of opportunity
    here. We have about 20 years or so when these rapidly
    developing countries are building powerplants like they are
    going out of style and accumulating cars and infrastructure.
    Once they are finished, it will be much more expensive to
    rebuild it. Therefore, things we do today are going to be much
    cheaper than waiting 20 years and trying to catch up.
        Mr. Gainor. Senator, you were talking about the state of
    journalism in other nations. I have had actually a fair amount
    of contact with Chinese journalists over the last, I guess, 15
    years coming into this country. To characterize China's
    journalist situation as anything other than government-
    controlled would be inaccurate. When you are talking about what
    the media will do in that country, it will not put pressure on
    that government do to anything because it is not a free
    country. India is different.
        But, in general, the American concept of media is
    relatively unique in the world, the concept which I hugely
    support, contrary to Senator Boxer's comments, the concept of
    freedom of the press where American media are supposed to be
    neutral and supposed to not take a position, not to be
    advocates for one side or the other. That is relatively unique
    to America. If you look around the world, much of what is
    reported on this issue in other countries is reported by a very
    activist press that is often politically affiliated. So you
    can't look at that information without a jaundiced eye.
        Mr. Schrag. Mr. Gainor, they are supposed to be accurate,
    not neutral. There is a difference. There is a very important
    difference there.
        Mr. Gainor. There is a difference. They should always be
    accurate. But to skew reporting decidedly where you undercut
    people who say one thing, where you don't report important
    facts, or you don't report people who actually dare to disagree
    with your group think, that is not accurate either. That is
    creating a false painting. You are including lots of important
    and maybe accurate data, but by what you leave out, you create
    an inaccurate picture.
        Ms. Oreskes. Can I jump in here because we have actually
    facts about this question of bias and inaccuracy on the
    coverage of global climate change?
        My colleagues at the University of California, Max and
    Jules Boykoff, did a study of print media coverage of the
    climate issue, and what they were able to demonstrate was that
    the press bent over backwards to give space to dissenting
    opinions and that, in fact, the space that was given to the
    dissenting opinions, the minority opinions, were actually quite
    out of proportion to their population in the scientific
    community. So I think that if the press has been biased here at
    all, it has been biased in the direction of giving attention to
    a very small number of people who are outside the mainstream of
    scientific opinion.
        Mr. Gainor. I will be happy to debate that with a study
    that I personally did about media coverage of climate change
    which showed just the opposite in talking about how the
    networks covered climate change, overwhelming one-sided,
    including very few experts from the other side, and when they
    did--with the exception of Bob Jamieson from ABC News who did a
    good job--almost universally they reported it in a one-sided
    way.
        You can have dueling studies all you want, but the reality
    is all you have to do is turn on the network news and look how
    they covered Hurricane Katrina and the linkage of Hurricane
    Katrina to global warming. I have actually a quote from that,
    from Good Morning America, where: ``Scientists have long warned
    that global warming could make Hurricanes increasingly
    destructive. They couldn't prove it until now.'' They can't
    prove it even now, but it doesn't stop the networks from
    reporting it. As much as I am a First Amendment huge believe,
    these networks--ABC, CBS, and NBC--do use the public airwaves.
    So it is right that we at least discuss this in the bully
    pulpit and try to encourage them to do a better job.
        Ms. Oreskes. But, again, to bring some facts into this
    discussion, it is only in the last year or two that the media
    have really stopped giving a lot of attention to skeptics,
    contrarians, deniers, whatever you want to call them. But if
    the media had represented the scientific community in an
    accurate way, they would have done that probably about 10 years
    ago.
        Senator Voinovich. Chairman, I have no further questions.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you.
        Mr. Carter. Mr. Chairman, may I make a final comment
    regarding some of the things that Senator Boxer said and
    something Senator Voinovich said?
        Senator Inhofe. Yes, you can do it on his time. He has
    another minute.
        Mr. Carter. The difficulty with the quotations that the
    Senator was reading to us is that many of them were not from
    science bodies; they were actually from commercial
    organizations. That doesn't condemn them outright obviously,
    but it means they are not being produced by bodies with science
    credibility. The second problem is because they are chosen
    quotations, nearly all of them are ambiguous. They may not be
    ambiguous in full context, but they are ambiguous as quoted.
        That brings me to you, Senator Voinovich. When you say we
    are all here today to talk about global warming. Now, of
    course, we are, but I am astonished that there has been no
    attempt by anybody to tease that out. No scientist doubts that
    climate change happens. No scientist doubts therefore that
    global warming occurs from time to time.
        But what we are actually here today to talk about is not
    global warming. It is human-caused global warming, and that
    distinction, pedantic as it may seem, is absolutely critical in
    the discussion. The press confused that, not I believe by
    intention but just because that is the way it is, because
    everybody knows we are talking about global warming, that it
    means human-caused global warming. Well, it doesn't.
        To a scientist, global warming means the temperature is
    getting warmer. Why it is getting warmer, that is the question.
    The degree to which the human contribution and nearly all
    scientists will acknowledge there is a human contribution to
    that, but the degree of that with respect to natural climate
    change remains completely unknown and unquantifiable. That is
    where the argument is.
        Ms. Oreskes. May I make a very brief response?
        Senator Inhofe. First of all, in fairness to Senator
    Lautenberg, he is recognized at this time, and I will try to
    give each one of you a little bit of time when it is over.
        Senator Lautenberg. I am willing to have comments repeated
    when Senator Boxer--is she gone? She is finished, OK. I am
    sorry the comments that are critical of her statements are not
    being heard by her.
        Senator Inhofe. Well, Senator Lautenberg, I have to say
    that there was an attempt by almost each member of this panel
    to respond and they were unable to do it. I think it is only
    fair that you let them. They have come a long ways,
    particularly Dr. Carter.
        Senator Lautenberg. Yes, well, we heard. We are pleased
    that they are here, even though there might be some differing
    views and a lot of them are contradictory.
        Let me start off by asking the panel whether or not, I am
    sorry to do this, Mr. Chairman, but I feel compelled to. So I
    will just conclude by saying, wake up America. With all the
    hysteria, all the fear, all the phony science, could it be that
    manmade global warming is the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on
    the American people?
        I will end with the comment, the words that I believe it
    is. Our distinguished Chairman made that speech in July 1903,
    2003, I am sorry.
        [Laughter.]
        Senator Lautenberg. I remember in 1903, we weren't worried
    about global warming.
        Senator Inhofe. Since you are correcting your dates there,
    let me also say I made that on the Senate floor of the Oklahoma
    State Senate in 1975, referring to the coming Ice Age.
        Go ahead.
        Senator Lautenberg. Let us see, OK. Well, it says 03 here,
    so I will throw this away.
        Now, Dr. Deming, I am not Senator Boxer's clone, I promise.
    But in keeping with that, can I ask each one of you your view
    of whether or not this is a bad joke perpetrated on the
    American people, a hoax?
        Mr. Deming. Global warming?
        Senator Lautenberg. Yes.
        Mr. Deming. Well, I wouldn't use the same word that Senator
    Inhofe used. I wouldn't use hoax because hoax implies it is
    deliberate.
        Senator Lautenberg. Implies?
        Mr. Deming. Hoax implies it is a deliberate attempt to
    deceive. Instead, what we are dealing with is a psychological
    phenomenon. It is a mass delusion.
        Earlier, you had mentioned or used the phrase something
    terrible is happening and fire in the house. We have a lot of
    problems in this country and worldwide.
        Senator Lautenberg. You are going to be using more of my
    time than I am feeling applies here.
        Mr. Deming. Let me.
        Senator Lautenberg. Well, then we finished with the
    description of hoax, I think.
        Mr. Deming. OK.
        Senator Inhofe. I kind of like mass delusion. That is a
    good one.
        [Laughter.]
        Senator Lautenberg. Mr. Chairman, no one ever accused you
    of having a lack of words to describe your views, and I always
    enjoy them. It is amazing that we can be good friends and be so
    wrong.
        Anyway, Dr. Schrag, a hoax, I can perhaps ask you.
        Mr. Schrag. A hoax or a mass delusion, I guess if you call
    it a mass delusion, then I would count myself as among the
    deluded. The evidence is so clear. Carbon dioxide causes
    warming. The evidence is absolutely clear that carbon dioxide
    is higher now than it has been for millions of years of our
    history.
        Earlier I heard the geologist on my right and left, and I
    am also a geologist, say that the geological thing to do would
    be to increase greenhouse gas emissions. That is pouring oil on
    fire. That is really big trouble although we today are in an
    Ice Age.
        We have an ice sheet on Greenland. We have an ice sheet in
    Antarctica. We were in a bigger Ice Age 20,000 years ago, but
    we are still in an Ice Age. By warming the Earth as much as we
    are doing over the next century, we risk destabilizing those
    ice sheets, and once they start to go, I am not sure anybody
    can stop them. This sort of thing, this is very serious and it
    is an issue of national security.
        Senator Lautenberg. So you say that it couldn't be a hoax.
        Mr. Schrag. It is certainly not a hoax.
        Senator Lautenberg. Dr. Carter.
        Mr. Carter. I mentioned some of the players in this drama
    earlier, the IPCC, individual scientists, and I can't remember
    the third one, but there are a lot of them. Amongst that range
    of players, yes, there are some people who are deliberately
    perpetrating what they know to be untrue.
        Senator Lautenberg. Do you think that global warming is a
    hoax being perpetrated?
        Mr. Carter. I am answering that, Senator Lautenberg. Yes, I
    think there are some people in the very large group of people
    that are commenting.
        Senator Lautenberg. No; I asked, sir, if you think that it
    is a hoax.
        Mr. Carter. I think that in some cases, people are
    deliberately spreading misinformation on climate change yes,
    but that is not everybody and it is a small number of people.
        Senator Lautenberg. Thank you.
        Ms. Oreskes. And some of them are the people who deny it,
    so we could just say that.
        Global warming is not a hoax, and it is not a mass
    delusion. I am not a psychologist, but if there is a
    psychological factor involved here, it is denial. We have
    overwhelming scientific evidence of the changes taking place on
    our planet, but some of us are reluctant to admit that because
    it has consequences that we need to deal with.
        I am also a geologist, and I worked for several years as an
    exploration geologist in Australia. I think that the great
    insight that Roger Revelle had on this issue was his geological
    insight which is to say that as geologists, we were all trained
    to believe that humans were insignificant compared to the
    vastness of geological time and the magnitude of geophysical
    forces. But what Revelle realized in 1957 was that we had
    reached a historic moment where that was no longer true and
    where human activities were having an impact on a planetary
    scale. We have changed the chemistry of the atmosphere, and
    there are consequences across the board.
        Senator Lautenberg. I think you also do not believe that it
    is a hoax.
        Ms. Oreskes. I do not believe that it is a hoax.
        [Laughter.]
        Senator Lautenberg. Mr. Gainor, I was interested that your
    representation here is not simply as a reporter for the
    Washington Times.
        Mr. Gainor. Sir, I haven't worked for the Washington Times
    for more years than I care to count.
        Senator Lautenberg. Oh, I didn't realize that.
        Whose views do you represent?
        Mr. Gainor. I am director of the Business & Media
    Institute, and that is what it says on the invite. I obviously
    promote and what I am advocating for, I think, is very clear
    which is trying to get more and better journalistic coverage on
    this issue to do a more balanced job.
        Senator Lautenberg. OK, and I heard you describe things
    that you influenced your view in the news. It was that you live
    in an apartment and you don't drive an SUV, and therefore Al
    Gore is discredited a----
        Mr. Gainor. No, I am simply saying, Senator, that----
        Senator Lautenberg. Well, that is what you are saying.
        Mr. Gainor [continuing]. Portraying me as somebody who
    hates the environment runs counter to that whole media mind set
    that everyone----
        Senator Lautenberg. If the ownership of a particular car or
    type of house is the yardstick by which we measure that, I
    think you are on weak ground.
        Last year, Phil Cooney, a career oil industry lobbyist,
    then serving as Chief of Staff at the Council of Environmental
    Quality was caught editing scientific findings on global
    warming to inject uncertainty where none was intended by the
    authors. That is a fairly inappropriate thing for the White
    House to approve, modifying findings of the Federal scientists.
    When we talk about Government control of the press, Mr. Gainor,
    and we talk about Government control of information that was
    produced being redacted or modified before it gets to the
    public, that is Government control also, is it not?
        Mr. Gainor. All governments control the information that
    comes out of their agencies.
        Senator Lautenberg. So then it is all right if China----
        Mr. Gainor. If you try to disagree, you get killed.
        Senator Lautenberg. Well, since you don't want to get
    killed, I don't want my grandchildren to get killed, then I
    don't want people who are affected by climate change to die
    earlier because the air is unsuitable, et cetera.
        Is it correct to say that control by Government is an
    unacceptable condition and control is represented by massaging
    the data that is there in reports, repressing it, from a
    scientist's viewpoint?
        Mr. Gainor. You are asking if the Government Agencies can't
    modify reports from their own agency. I think you are asking
    the wrong person, but as far as injecting uncertainties----
        Senator Lautenberg. Redaction is an acceptable process for
    making sure that the information that is being given to the
    public is modified in some way.
        Mr. Gainor. To cite actually a quote from Dr. Schrag,
    nobody knows what is going to happen about climate change.
        Mr. Schrag. Exactly; nobody knows exactly what is going to
    happen.
        Mr. Gainor. The quote I have is nobody knows what is going
    to happen, specifically.
        Senator Inhofe. Senator Lautenberg, your time has expired,
    and I think we have been fair to everyone.
        Senator Lautenberg. Well, I think it was 30 seconds.
        Senator Inhofe. Well, if you want 30 seconds.
        A reminder, well, there is no one here to remind when we
    are going to have our business meeting.
        [Laughter.]
        Senator Inhofe. Let me do this. I know you have come from a
    long ways. We are actually 25 minutes over the time I said that
    this would come to a conclusion. I hope that hasn't caused an
    inconvenience to anyone.
        I would like to give each one of you another minute, if you
    would like to, to respond to anything that was said here today.
    I would remind you that this hearing is not on the science of
    global warming. We have looked at it. We know that there is a
    differing opinion. We have had many hearings on this, many
    speeches on the floor.
        But insofar as how it is being reported, if there are any
    further comments that this distinguished panel, each member,
    would like to make, I will give you the opportunity to do that
    at this time. Let us start with you, Mr. Gainor, and work the
    other way.
        Mr. Gainor. OK, well, first of all, thank you for this
    opportunity.
        I think the big point that gets lost in all of this
    coverage is that there are competing opinions. You will hear
    journalists periodically admit to this. Andrew Revkin will talk
    about the murk or the uncertainties involved in the science.
    You will hear scientists about it. But somehow or another, we
    are supposed to view that there is a consensus when, in fact,
    there isn't.
        For the scientists who dare disagree or for the pundits or
    public policy people who dare disagree, it is the
    responsibility of the media to do a better job covering that,
    trying to get that side out because this is a democracy and if
    we are going to possibly make the right decision on this issue,
    then we need to do so as well informed as possible.
        I think it is the great opportunity for the committee to
    raise this issue, raise this opportunity for everyone to look
    at it and say this is not being done right; how can we do it
    better?
        Senator Inhofe. Good, thank you.
        Dr. Oreskes.
        Ms. Oreskes. Thank you. I have enjoyed being here, and I am
    thrilled to discover that the U.S. Senate has a sense of humor.
        I just want to say that----
        Senator Inhofe. I could probably put you in front of some
    committees who don't.
        Ms. Oreskes. Please don't.
        I want to just emphasize, as a historian of science, that
    there is always uncertainty in any science, but the task of the
    Government, it seems to me, when it makes policy is to base
    those decisions on the best available scientific information.
    At this point in time, that information says that global
    warming is real and caused by human activities.
        Now, Mr. Chairman, you raised the point of other causes
    such as the heat island effect and deforestation. Those are
    important, and I am in complete agreement with you about those
    causes. We know that those issues have to be addressed as well.
    But it is the consensus of our own United States National
    Academy of Sciences, the most distinguished group of scientists
    in America if not the world, that most, most, not only just a
    little bit but most of the observed warming of the last 50
    years is likely--and they are careful; they are not alarmist;
    they are saying the best they can based on what we know--is
    likely to have been due to the increase in greenhouse gas
    concentrations.
        Thank you.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you very much.
        Dr. Carter?
        Mr. Carter. Senator Inhofe, I would really just like to say
    thank you for the privilege of participating in this discussion
    today, and I would like to pay your tribute to your
    chairmanship, not only today but over the last several years of
    this committee. I would like people to understand that this
    committee worldwide has had an impact, and though Senator
    Inhofe is leaving, it has been instrumental in making sure that
    some of the other side of the story on climate change remains
    in the public domain. I think that is an enormous achievement,
    sir, and I congratulate you for it.
        I hope that under Senator Boxer, the committee is going to
    continue to be looked at worldwide for leadership and advice on
    this issue of climate change, and I wish you well in seeking a
    national policy which is an incredibly difficult thing to do,
    to grapple with this issue.
        Last, I commend to you the partnership that you were
    instrumental in starting, the Asia-Pacific partnership, as one
    of the ways forward. I think that is a very good solution.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you. I commented about that, and I
    believe it is too, and that it brings in the undeveloped
    nations.
        Dr. Schrag.
        Mr. Schrag. Senator Inhofe, thank you.
        The idea that in terms of media reporting, there has been a
    concern that somehow scientists are afraid to speak out if they
    oppose the consensus view, and I think that is important to
    address here. I can only address it in a personal sense which
    is my own career. I am a tenured professor at Harvard, and I
    owe that success in my career partially to speaking out, going
    against my community on several hypotheses, and I was able to
    defend those hypotheses with observations, with calculations
    that ultimately convinced the community that I was correct. So
    it was, in fact, the opposition to the consensus view that
    actually gave me fame and it is why I am here today.
        Therefore, I think it is very important to recognize that
    the motivation for most of the scientific community is not to
    just follow the party line but, in fact, if you can support
    those views, you encouraged to speak out because if you do so,
    you are considered a great hero.
        Senator Inhofe. Well, thank you very much, Dr. Schrag?
        Dr. Deming.
        Mr. Deming. As I make a final comment, I am kind of in
    astonishment. We are sitting here at the apex of 10,000 years
    of human civilization. The United States and the rest of the
    developed world is the most prosperous, most knowledgeable,
    most technological society as ever existed on Earth, and we sit
    here scared to death of something that doesn't even really
    exist.
        Senator Lautenberg talked about something terrible is
    happening, fire in the house. As far as I know, there isn't a
    single person anywhere on Earth that has ever been killed by
    global warming. There is not a single species that has gone
    extinct. In fact, I am not aware really of any deleterious
    effects whatsoever. It is all speculation.
        We have on the other hand, throughout the world and in this
    country, real problems. We have poverty. We have disease. We
    have things that we could do to really help people. Global
    warming is human folly.
        Senator Inhofe. Thank you very much, Dr. Deming.
        Let me thank all five of you for taking the time and for
    extending the time that you committed to make it here and thank
    you for your input.
        We are adjourned.
        [Whereupon, at 12:20 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]
        [Additional statements submitted for the record follow:]

     Statement of David Deming, Ph.D., University of Oklahoma, College of
                                Earth and Energy

        Mr. Chairman, members of the committee, and distinguished
    guests, thank you for inviting me to testify today. I am a
    geologist and geophysicist. I have a bachelor's degree in
    geology from Indiana University, and a Ph.D., in geophysics
    from the University of Utah. My field of specialization in
    geophysics is temperature and heat flow. In recent years, I
    have turned my studies to the history and philosophy of
    science. In 1995, I published a short paper in the academic
    journal Science. In that study, I reviewed how borehole
    temperature data recorded a warming of about 1 C in North
    America over the last 100 to 150 years. The week the article
    appeared, I was contacted by a reporter for National Public
    Radio. He offered to interview me, but only if I would state
    that the warming was due to human activity. When I refused to
    do so, he hung up on me.
        I had another interesting experience around the time my
    paper in Science was published. I received an astonishing email
    from a major researcher in the area of climate change. He said,
    ``We have to get rid of the Medieval Warm Period.''
        The Medieval Warm Period (MWP) was a time of unusually warm
    weather that began around 1000 AD and persisted until a cold
    period known as the ``Little Ice Age'' took hold in the 14th
    century. Warmer climate brought a remarkable flowering of
    prosperity, knowledge, and art to Europe during the High Middle
    Ages.
        The existence of the MWP had been recognized in the
    scientific literature for decades. But now it was a major
    embarrassment to those maintaining that the 20th century
    warming was truly anomalous. It had to be ``gotten rid of.''
        In 1769, Joseph Priestley warned that scientists overly
    attached to a favorite hypothesis would not hesitate to ``warp
    the whole course of nature.'' In 1999, Michael Mann and his
    colleagues published a reconstruction of past temperature in
    which the MWP simply vanished. This unique estimate became
    known as the ``hockey stick,'' because of the shape of the
    temperature graph.
        Normally in science, when you have a novel result that
    appears to overturn previous work, you have to demonstrate why
    the earlier work was wrong. But the work of Mann and his
    colleagues was initially accepted uncritically, even though it
    contradicted the results of more than 100 previous studies.
    Other researchers have since reaffirmed that the Medieval Warm
    Period was both warm and global in its extent.
        There is an overwhelming bias today in the media regarding
    the issue of global warming. In the past 2 years, this bias has
    bloomed into an irrational hysteria. Every natural disaster
    that occurs is now linked with global warming, no matter how
    tenuous or impossible the connection. As a result, the public
    has become vastly misinformed on this and other environmental
    issues.
        Earth's climate system is complex and poorly understood.
    But we do know that throughout human history, warmer
    temperatures have been associated with more stable climates and
    increased human health and prosperity. Colder temperatures have
    been correlated with climatic instability, famine, and
    increased human mortality.
        The amount of climatic warming that has taken place in the
    past 150 years is poorly constrained, and its cause--human or
    natural--is unknown. There is no sound scientific basis for
    predicting future climate change with any degree of certainty.
    If the climate does warm, it is likely to be beneficial to
    humanity rather than harmful. In my opinion, it would be
    foolish to establish national energy policy on the basis of
    misinformation and irrational hysteria.

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

         Statement of Daniel Schrag, Ph.D., Laboratory for Geochemical
       Oceanography, Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Harvard
                                   University
        Thank you to the Senators and to the staff members of the committee
    for inviting me to speak here today. I am a professor at Harvard
    University in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences and in the
    Division of Engineering and Applied Sciences. I also direct the Harvard
    University Center for the Environment, which allows me to work with
    faculty in public health, public policy, economics, business, law and a
    variety of other disciplines.
        The questions before this committee today are whether press
    coverage of global warming in this country has portrayed accurately the
    state of scientific knowledge and whether the press has properly framed
    the issue for the public and for decision makers like yourselves. I am
    hesitant to generalize, as reporting on this issue is quite variable. I
    think it is safe to say that press reports are accurate when they
    present the strong consensus that exists among climate scientists that
    global warming is occurring, and when they describe some of the risks
    we face. When I have taken issue with press coverage of global warming,
    it is usually because the issue is presented as a debate between
    ``believers'' and ``skeptics.'' Articles often give a voice to extreme
    views, rarely evaluating credentials or credibility. The public is left
    trying to decide whether global warming is real based on highly
    technical arguments, and left uncertain whether corrective action is
    necessary.
        I think the proper framing of this issue is quite different: There
    is no serious debate about whether the earth will warm as carbon
    dioxide levels increase over this century--it will. What is difficult
    to predict is exactly how much warming will occur, and exactly how that
    will affect human society. The media does not usually explain this
    distinction very well. I would like to see the press raise the same
    question used for other issues of national security: Are the risks of
    severe consequences sufficient to warrant taking preventative action?
        Humans are changing the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere,
    mostly from burning of coal, oil and gas, with deforestation also
    playing a significant role. The current level, in excess of 380 parts
    per million (ppm), is higher than it has been for at least the last
    650,000 years, and perhaps for tens of millions of years (Fig. 1). To
    put it differently, we are experiencing higher CO2 levels
    now than any human being has ever seen in the history of the earth; and
    over the next 100 years, without substantial changes in the trajectory
    of energy technology or economic development, we will see atmospheric
    CO2 rise to 800 to 1000 ppm, roughly triple the pre-
    industrial level. Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas. Its presence in
    planetary atmospheres causes warming of planetary surfaces; an extreme
    example is the CO2-rich atmosphere of Venus, which is
    responsible for its surface temperature in excess of 460 C.
        The question that confronts us now is how the rise of
    CO2 on this planet will affect our climate, not over
    millions or even thousands of years but over decades and centuries. We
    know that, coincident with the unprecedented rise in CO2
    over the last century, we have seen a rise in global temperatures. We
    know from Lonnie Thompson's work on tropical glaciers that this warming
    is not part of any natural cycle (Fig. 2). But this does not address
    the question of what will happen as CO2 levels continue to
    rise. To answer this question, climate scientists have constructed
    models that represent the best understanding of the climate system from
    the last century of observations. These models tell us that climate
    change in this century may be dramatic, and perhaps even catastrophic.
    These models are not perfect--but this is not surprising as they are
    attempting to make predictions about an atmospheric state that no human
    being has ever seen. They remain an essential tool for exploring future
    scenarios, but we must also consider evidence for climate change from
    the geologic past. This is the major area of my research. I cannot
    cover it today in much detail, but let me simply say that lessons from
    earth history are surprisingly consistent, whether from warm climates
    or cold, whether over millions of years or thousands: our climate
    system is very sensitive to small perturbations (Fig. 3). And human
    activities represent a large perturbation, sending our atmosphere to a
    state unlike any seen for millions of years.
        The important point is that the uncertainty in the climate models
    should not comfort us--just the opposite. Our best observations from
    earth history suggest that the earth is more sensitive to an increase
    in greenhouse gases than most of the models, and therefore that climate
    change may be worse than most of the models predict.
        A good example comes from the question of whether Europe was
    slightly warmer than it is today during the medieval warm period,
    roughly 1,000 years ago. Some have suggested that such natural
    variability means that we don't need to worry about anthropogenic
    climate change in the future. Ironically, the logical conclusion, if
    indeed Europe was slightly warmer 1,000 years ago, is that we should be
    terrified about the next 100 years. We know that the natural forcing
    1,000 years ago, mostly changes in solar and volcanic activity, was
    small relative to the rise in CO2 over the last 100 years,
    and tiny compared to what will happen in the next 100 years. So if
    Europe became much warmer 1,000 years ago in response to such miniscule
    forcing, we are in very, very big trouble.
        Getting back to the question of the media, I think that the press,
    in general, could do a much better job in explaining to the public that
    uncertainty in our predictions of future climate change does not cast a
    shadow on the science, but rather is inevitable given the scale of the
    experiment we are doing on our planet. A notable exception is a recent
    cover article on global warming in The Economist in which the author,
    Emma Duncan, portrays global warming as an insurance problem. We buy
    insurance for our house not because we expect it to burn down, but
    because we could not afford the consequences if it did. Similarly, we
    should take immediate action to protect ourselves from future climate
    change not because we know it will be catastrophic, but because it a
    consensus of experts think that there is a substantial likelihood it
    will be catastrophic if no actions are taken. Moreover, the response
    time of oceans, glaciers, the atmosphere, and even our own energy
    technology means that we are confronting systems with huge momentum,
    and we will not have time to avoid a catastrophe once we are absolutely
    certain that one will occur.
        Many possible tipping points have been identified in the climate
    system, each with large uncertainty about exactly when they will happen
    but also carrying enormous costs to our society. Good examples include
    the collapse of the Greenland Ice Sheet, causing more than 20 feet of
    sea level rise (Fig. 4), the early melting of mountain snow that
    provides the natural water storage for a large fraction of the world's
    population (including most of our western states), or the melting of
    permafrost in the tundra which might release hundreds of billions of
    tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere currently stored in frozen
    soils.
        In light of these dangers, and in light of the growing evidence
    that serious harm from human-caused climate change is already
    occurring, I'd like to ask the climate skeptics here today this
    question: Do you really expect us to gamble our planet, our entire way
    of life, on your arguments that climate change will be gentle on our
    society? What are the consequences if you are wrong? If the Greenland
    Ice Sheet began to show signs of abrupt collapse, do you really think
    we could engineer a way to stop it? Whatever the probability, and I
    fear that it is much higher than many people think, the point is that
    it represents an unacceptable risk.
        A more responsible question would be to ask what is the insurance
    premium? How much do we have to sacrifice today to prevent a
    catastrophe in the future? We do this sort of analysis all the time
    with homeland security and other issues that, like global warming, also
    affect our national security. With terrorism, we cannot be sure when,
    where, or even if an attack will occur, but we make great effort to
    reduce the risk at a huge cost to our economy. Relative to these costs,
    the price of climate change mitigation through investment in our energy
    infrastructure is minor, probably amounting to a continuing investment,
    over time, of less than 1 percent of our gross domestic product. And
    like many such actions, there are additional benefits to our military
    and to our economy that we obtain as we reduce our dependence on
    foreign sources of oil and gas. Developing and implementing advanced
    energy technologies that do not put carbon dioxide into the atmosphere
    is a grand challenge facing our society, but is also a remarkable
    business opportunity. America should lead in this new global market; we
    cannot afford to do otherwise.

    [GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]

          Statement of Robert M. Carter, Ph.D., James Cook University,
                             Townsville, Australia
                               biographical notes
        I am an Adjunct Research Professor at James Cook University
    (Queensland). I have 35 years training and experience as a
    palaeontologist, stratigrapher, marine geologist and environmental
    scientist, and hold degrees from the University of Otago (New Zealand;
    BSc Hons) and the University of Cambridge (England; Ph.D.). During my
    career I have held tenured academic staff positions at the University
    of Otago (Dunedin) and James Cook University (Townsville), where I was
    Professor and Head of School of Earth Sciences between 1981 and 1999.
        I have wide experience in research management and administration,
    including service as Chair of the Earth Sciences Discipline Panel of
    the Australian Research Council, Chair of the national Marine Science
    and Technologies Committee, Director of the Australian Office of the
    Ocean Drilling Program, member of the international Planning and
    Technical Operations Committees, and Co-Chief Scientist on ODP Leg 181
    (Southwest Pacific Gateways).
        My current research on climate change, sea-level change and
    stratigraphy is based on field studies of Cenozoic sediments (last 65
    million years) from the Southwest Pacific Ocean region, especially the
    Great Barrier Reef and offshore eastern New Zealand, and includes the
    analysis of marine sediment cores collected during ODP Leg 181. I am
    involved in helping to plan future IODP drilling legs to collect high-
    resolution climate data from the Pacific Ocean.
        Throughout my career, my research has been supported by grants from
    competitive public research agencies, especially the Australian
    Research Council (ARC). I have received no research funding from
    special interest organisations such as environmental groups, energy
    companies or government departments.
        I am the author of more than 100 papers in refereed scientific
    journals. I also contribute regular letters, opinion pieces and
    interviews to newspapers, national magazines and other media, and
    regularly engage in public speaking on matters related to my research
    knowledge. In 2005 I was appointed by the Australian Minister of the
    Environment to the judging panel for the Eureka Prize in Environmental
    Journalism, awarded annually by the Australian Museum, Sydney.
                                    abstract
        There is a strong conflict between current public alarm regarding
    human-caused climate change and the science justification for that
    alarm. The media serve to convey to the public the facts and hypotheses
    of climate change as provided by individual scientists, government and
    international research agencies and NGO lobby groups. In general, the
    media have propagated an alarmist cause for climate change, and they
    have certainly failed to convey to the public both the degree of
    uncertainty that is characteristic of climate science and many
    essential facts that are relevant to considerations of human causation.
    Ways in which the public debate is directed along alarmist lines are
    discussed. It is concluded that natural climate change is a hazard
    that--like other similar natural hazards--should be dealt with by
    adaptation. Attempting to mitigate human-caused climate change is an
    expensive exercise in futility.
              introduction--the three realities of climate change
        Climate change knows three realities. Science reality, which is
    what working scientists deal with on a daily basis. Virtual reality,
    which is the wholly imaginary world inside computer climate models. And
    public reality, which is the socio-political system within which
    politicians, business people and the general citizenry work.
        The science reality is that climate is a complex, dynamic, natural
    system that no one wholly comprehends, though many scientists
    understand different small parts. Science provides no unambiguous
    empirical data that dangerous or even measurable human-caused global
    warming is occurring (e.g. Khilyuk & Chilingar, 2006). Second, the
    virtual reality is that deterministic computer models predict future
    climate according to the assumptions that are programmed into them.
    There is no ``Theory of Climate'', and the potential output of all
    realistic GCMs therefore encompasses a range of both future warmings
    and coolings. The difference between these outputs can be changed at
    will, simply by adjusting such poorly known parameters as the effects
    of cloud cover. And third, public reality in 2006 is that there exists
    a widespread but erroneous belief amongst citizens, businessmen and
    politicians that dangerous global warming is occurring and that it has
    human causation.
        Three main agents have driven the public to believe in dangerous
    global warming. They are reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on
    Climate Change (IPCC), incessant lobbying by environmental NGOs and
    allied political groups, and the obliging conveyance of selectively
    alarmist information by the media. Alarmist writing displays two
    invariable characteristics. First, it is mostly concerned with the
    minutiae of meteorological measurements and trends over the last 150
    years and the absence of a proper geological context. Second, there is
    an over-reliance on the outputs of unvalidated computer model scenarios
    and attribution studies, i.e., virtual reality is favoured over
    empirical testing.
        I summarise first several arguments against the conventional IPCC
    view that dangerous warming is occurring. I then comment on ancient
    temperature records, greenhouse theory and computer modeling, and
    conclude by discussing the role of the media in relaying science
    information about global warming to the public.
          four arguments against dangerous human-caused global warming
        IPCC concentrates its analyses on climate over the last few hundred
    years, and fails to give proper weight to the geological context of
    modern climate change. The following facts, most of which draw on
    geological data, all militate against the IPCC argument that dangerous
    greenhouse warming is being caused by the accumulation of industrial
    carbon dioxide in the atmosphere:

              1. As recorded in Antarctic ice cores, changes in temperature
            precede parallel changes in carbon dioxide by many hundred
            years or more (Mudelsee, 2001).
              2. As recorded in the Greenland GRIP core (Grootes et al.,
            1993), the late 20th century warm period corresponds to a
            cyclic warming peak within a 1500 year periodicity of probable
            solar origin (Bond et al., 2001), and was cooler than the
            preceding Minoan and Mediaeval Warm Periods.
              3. In Antarctica, the late 20th century warming is as much as
            5 C cooler than were recent interglacial climate optimums
            (e.g., Watanabe et al., 2003).
              4. As compared with high quality site-specific datasets such
            as GRIP (Grootes et al., 1993), neither the rate of temperature
            change nor the magnitude of the peak reached at the end of the
            20th century lies outside the limits of recent natural climate
            change (Davis & Bohling, 2001).
              5. Using the global average surface temperature record
            compiled by the Climate Research Unit of the U.K. Hadley Centre
            from thermometer measurements, temperature at the Earth's
            surface has flatlined since 1998 (Fig. 1). Temperature in the
            troposphere is virtually unchanged since 1979 once El Ninos and
            volcanic eruptions are taken into account (Fig. 2) (Gray,
            2006).
                 the importance of ancient temperature records
        The modern radiosonde and satellite MSU data provide an accurate,
    truly global temperature statistic. But to compare the late 20th
    century warm period with earlier geological warm events requires the
    use of local proxy data, for no truly global temperature statistics are
    available pre-1958 (or perhaps pre-1860, if you wish to trust the
    earlier parts of the surface thermometer record). Meaningful
    comparative judgements about climate change cannot be made on the basis
    of the trivially-short, 150-year-long thermometer surface temperature
    record, much less on the 26-year-long satellite tropospheric record,
    for long-term climate change occurs over spans of many thousands to
    millions of years.
        One of the highest resolution proxy datasets that extends over an
    adequate period of time to record natural climate change is the oxygen
    isotope record from the Greenland ice core (Grootes et al., 1993).
    These data show, first, that the 1-2 C/century rate of late 20th
    century warming in Greenland falls well within the Holocene envelope of
    rates of temperature change between ^2.5 and +2.5 C/century (Fig. 3).
    And, second (Fig. 4), that in Greenland the late 20th century warm
    period was cooler than the Mediaeval and Roman warm periods, and
    reflects a regular millennial solar temperature cycle. In addition, ice
    cores from Antarctica (Watanabe et al., 2003) show also that late 20th
    century temperature is up to 5 C cooler there than temperature highs
    associated with earlier but geologically recent interglacial periods
    (Fig. 5).
        Prompted by the invalidation of the Mann et al. hockey stick study,
    there has been much dispute over statements like ``The rate and
    magnitude of 20th century warming is unprecedented for at least the
    past 1,000 years''. A recent report by the National Academy of Sciences
    was able to conclude only that the 20th century warming was the
    greatest for several hundred years, a scarcely surprising conclusion.
        In summary, as judged against ice core and other high resolution
    geological proxy records, the late 20th century warming (which as yet
    has not continued into the 21st century) is unusual in neither rate nor
    magnitude.
                               greenhouse theory
        Carbon dioxide is a colorless, odorless gas that has been present
    in earth's atmosphere through time in trace amounts ranging from a few
    hundred to a few thousand parts per million (ppm). Together with
    oxygen, it is the staff of life for earth's biosphere because the
    metabolism of plants depends upon its absorbtion. Increasing carbon
    dioxide in the range of about 200-1000 ppm has repeatedly been shown to
    be beneficial for plant growth, and to increase the efficiency of water
    use. Atmospheric carbon dioxide is therefore a benefice.
        The currently favoured hypothesis of dangerous global warming
    includes the presumption that the warming is caused mainly by human
    emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide. This theory has failed
    the three main tests that it has been subjected to. Namely:
         late 20th century rates of temperature change and
    magnitude do not exceed previously known natural limits;
         no close relationship exists between the 20th century
    pattern of increasing carbon dioxide and changing temperature; and
         computer models using greenhouse radiation theory have
    proved unable to predict the course of temperature change 1990-2005,
    let alone to 2100.
        Nonetheless, it is the case that carbon dioxide absorbs space-bound
    infrared radiation, thereby increasing the energy available at Earth's
    surface for warming or increased evaporation. This physical theory
    accepted, there are four problems with turning a human-driven increase
    in atmospheric carbon dioxide into global warming alarmism. They are as
    follows.
         The relationship between increasing carbon dioxide and
    increasing temperature is logarithmic, which lessens the forcing effect
    of each successive increment of carbon dioxide (Fig. 6).
         In increasing from perhaps 280 ppm in pre-industrial times
    to 380 ppm now, carbon dioxide has already produced 75 percent of the
    theoretical warming of about 1 C that would be caused by a doubling to
    560 ppm; as we move from 380 to 560 ppm, at most a few tenths of a
    degree of warming remain in the system; claims of greater warming, such
    as those of the IPCC, are based upon arbitrary adjustments to the
    lambda value in the Stefan-Boltzmann equation, and untested assumptions
    about positive feedbacks.
         The ice core data show conclusively that, during natural
    climate cycling, changes in temperature precede changes in carbon
    dioxide by several hundred to a thousand or so years (Mudelsee, 2001).
         In contrast to the 280 ppm levels indicated by averaged
    ice-core results, measurements of fossil plant stomata indicate that
    natural, pre-industrial carbon dioxide levels reached 350 ppm or higher
    during the Holocene (Kouwenberg et al., 2005).
        So, yes, there is agreement that carbon dioxide increases will
    probably cause gentle feedback warming, but opinion remains strongly
    divided as to how great the warming will be for a real world doubling,
    and also whether any such warming is likely, on balance, to be
    beneficial or harmful.
                                computer models
        General circulation computer models (GCMs) are deterministic.
    Because many climate processes occur at a scale below that of the
    modelling grid, these processes have to be parameterized within the
    model. The modellers themselves acknowledge that they are unable to
    predict future climate, preferring the term ``scenario'' to describe
    the output of their experiments. Individual models differ widely in
    their output under an imposed regime of doubled carbon dioxide. In
    2001, the IPCC cited a range of 1.8-5.6 C warming by 2100 for the
    model outputs that they favoured, but this range can be further varied
    to even include negative outputs (i.e. cooling) by minor adjustment of
    some of the model parameters.
        A second use of computer modelling is in climate attribution
    studies, whereby the known 20th century meteorological record is
    simulated using models fed with known or presumed forcings, such as
    increasing carbon dioxide, volcanic eruptions and other aerosols. After
    many years of trials, the IPCC in 2001 reported simulations that
    mimicked the historic temperature record if and only if human emissions
    were included in the forcings. These results have later been widely
    misrepresented as being evidence for human-caused global warming. They
    are, of course, evidence only that a curve matching exercise involving
    many degrees of freedom has plausibly mimicked the 20th century
    temperature curve. They are exercises in virtual reality, and not
    evidence of any type.
        A major problem with all GCMs is that they rest upon the Kelvin
    fallacy, i.e., the assumption that the physics of the system is fully
    known. Though computer modelling and attribution studies are valuable
    heuristic tools, GCMs are not suitable for use as predictive tools for
    climate policy.
        In contrast with GCMs, other empirical computer models have been
    trained using elapsed data up to the present. Such models have been
    constructed using the 150 year-long surface temperature record
    (Klyashtorin & Lyubushin, 2003), 3,500 year-long proxy records from a
    Sargasso Sea marine core and a South African speleothem (Loehle, 2004),
    and the 10,000 year-long Holocene proxy record from the GRIP ice core
    (Kotov, 2001). Virtually all forward projections using these fitted
    models project cooling during the early decades of the 21st century
    (e.g., Fig. 7).
                             the role of the media
        Given the many uncertainties and inadequacies in our understanding
    of climate science, some of which are outlined above, and the lack of
    empirical evidence for human causation, how has it come about that
    public opinion in western nations is convinced that dangerous human-
    caused warming is occurring? The answer is that the public have been
    conditioned by the relentless repetition of alarmist climate messages
    through the media, to whose role I now turn.
        The media play a primary role in reporting the results of
    scientific research to the general public. They do this today against
    the following background:
        1. A rapidly changing media landscape. Formerly, there were three
    neatly separated categories of print, radio and television. With the
    late 20th century development of the world wide web there has been a
    dramatic rise in the number of professional websites and blog sites,
    and the development of parallel printed/web newspaper editions plus
    interactive discussion sites.
        With such a miasma of sources of information now competing for
    public attention, the inevitable result has been an increasing
    shrillness and a loss of nuanced expression across all media. This does
    not serve science reporting well.
        2. Because of the lack of legal libel restraint over blog sites in
    particular, character assassination and ad hominem attacks on so-called
    climate skeptics have become common. In the climate science area, sites
    such as Exxon's Secrets, Source Watch and De Smog Blog have developed
    such denigration into an art form, and apparently a well funded art
    form at that.
        3. Over roughly the same time period as the Internet developed,
    western countries have seen the emergence of the public relations (PR)
    industry as a powerful force in society. It has been estimated that in
    the 1990s the USA had 130,000 media reporters and 150,000 PR personnel.
    The job of these PR people is to ensure that their employers'
    activities figure in the news in a positive way; a polite name for them
    is spinmeisters, and Prime Minister Tony Blair's Alistair Campbell was
    their acknowledged crown prince.
        At the same time that they now employ PR professionals, large
    scientific employers often exert further control over the message that
    reaches the public by forbidding individual scientists to talk to the
    press and requiring that all comment be channeled through chosen PR
    representatives. Thus Nature's correspondent in Australia, Peter
    Pockley, reported (Australasian Science, Dec. 2004, p. 45):
        ``CSIRO's marine scientists have been ``constrained'' on the
    scientific advice and interoperation they can provide to the
    government's conservation plans for Australia's oceans. Likewise,
    climate scientists have been told not to engage in (public) debate on
    climate change and never to mention the Kyoto Accord on greenhouse gas
    emissions.''
        Morrison (2006) reports a survey showing, not surprisingly, that
    science stories provided with hyperbole rated 20 percent higher in
    terms of news-worthiness compared with factual reports on what had
    actually been achieved, and suggested that a Code of Conduct was needed
    to help guide science communicators.
        4. It was learned by all media proprietors long ago that
    sensational or alarmist news sells. As one of Australia's most
    experienced science journalists has remarked (Julian Cribb,
    Australasian Science, August 2002, p. 38):
        ``The publication of `bad news' is not a journalistic vice. It's a
    clear instruction from the market. It's what consumers, on average,
    demand. . . . As a newspaper editor I knew, as most editors know, that
    if you print a lot of good news, people stop buying your paper.
    Conversely, if you publish the correct mix of doom, gloom and disaster,
    your circulation swells. I have done the experiment.''
        It is a rare day that any metropolitan newspaper now fails to carry
    one or more alarmist stories on climate change and other like
    environmental causes.
        5. A belief that good reporting is ``balanced'' reporting, and that
    the balance is discharged by providing ``both'' sides of any particular
    story.
        Unfortunately, though taught in every journalism school, this
    technique is a travesty when applied to matters of science--which deals
    with testable hypotheses not ``balance''. First, because there are not
    two but usually a multiplicity of sides to any complex scientific
    debate, such as that regarding global warming. Second, because--as
    practised--such journalistic balancing quickly becomes an excuse for
    not exercising personal knowledge and judgement about complex topics.
    ``He says, she says'' substitutes for ``I, the reporter, judge that the
    data best support . . .''.
        6. A belief that environmental reporting is different from science
    reporting. Nearly all major media sources today employ an environmental
    reporter, but only a handful have a science reporter as well.
        A little thought shows that there is a critical difference between
    the jobs of these two types of reporters. It goes without saying that a
    science reporter is charged with narrating the science truth, so far as
    that can be identified. But what is the primary role of an
    environmental reporter? Judging from their giddy effusions in the daily
    press, one might infer that their job description reads: ``identify the
    baddies (alleged polluters or desecrators), and support the goodies
    (office-bearers in environmental NGOs) in pursuit of ever stricter
    public environmental regulation of all types''.
        It is my experience that the typical environmental reporter is
    marked less by her scientific expertise and more by her zeal for
    politically correct environmental causes. That is not a good recipe for
    objective reporting.
        The result of this media landscape is that, with some exceptions,
    science reports in the news often lean heavily on PR copy provided by
    the employing agency of the scientists. Busy journalists are
    understandably pleased when they receive an interesting and well-
    written story on a topic identified as of public importance. The
    outcome--which I term frisbee science--is that the results delivered to
    the public carry a strong spin which, in the case of global warming, is
    invariably alarmist in nature.
                        playing the man and not the ball
        The means by which the public has been convinced that dangerous
    global warming is occurring are therefore not subtle. Indeed, the
    combined alarmist activities of the IPCC, crusading environmental NGOs,
    some individual leading climate scientists and many science academies
    can only be termed a propaganda campaign. But because all of these
    interest groups communicate with the public primarily through the
    press, it is the press that carries the prime gatekeeper responsibility
    for the unbalanced state of the current public view.
        When doubts are raised about the legitimacy of a particular piece
    of climate alarmism--say that Tuvalu is being swamped by a rising sea-
    level--it is vanishingly rare for any ensuing press discussion to be
    primarily about the science question at issue. Rather, rhetorical
    devices are used to negate the doubts or the doubter. Assertions
    commonly made about skeptics or their views include the following.
        1. ``The science is settled''; or, there is a ``consensus'' on the
    issue.
        A typical recent statement of this type by Governor Schwarzenegger,
    on Sunday Meet the Press, reads: ``The science is in, we know the
    facts, there's not any more debate as to global warming or not''.
        The Governor is deluding himself, because the science of climate
    change has never been more uncertain. Furthermore, science is about
    facts, experiments and testing hypotheses, not consensus; and science
    is never ``settled''.
        As Margaret Thatcher famously observed (``The Downing Street
    Years'', p. 167):
        ``Consensus is the process of abandoning all beliefs, principles,
    values and policies in search of something in which no one believes,
    but to which no one objects; the process of avoiding the very issues
    that have to be solved, merely because you cannot (otherwise) get
    agreement on the way ahead''.
        2. He is paid by the fossil fuel industry, and is merely repeating
    their desired story.
        An idea is not responsible for those who believe in it, and neither
    is the validity of an scientific hypothesis determined by the character
    or beliefs of the person who funded the research. Science discussions
    are determined on their merits, by using tests against empirical or
    experimental data. Who paid for the data to be gathered and assessed is
    simply irrelevant.
        3. She works for a left wing/right wing think tank, so her work is
    tainted.
        Think tanks serve an invaluable function in our society. On all
    sides of politics they are the source of much excellent policy
    analysis. They provide extended discussion and commentary on matters of
    public interest, and have made many fine contributions towards
    balancing the public debate on climate change. To be associated with a
    high-quality think tank, as I am with the Melbourne Institute of Public
    Affairs, is a privilege and a matter for pride, not shame.
        That think tanks receive funding from industry sources is an
    indication that those that survive are delivering value for money, and
    does not impugn their integrity.
        4. He is just a climate sceptic, a contrarian, a denialist.
        These terms are used routinely as denigratory badges. The first two
    are amusingly silly.
        First, because most people termed climate ``skeptics'' are in fact
    climate ``agnostics'', they have no particular axe to grind as to
    whether or not humans are having a dangerous influence on global
    climate. However, they prefer not to raise unnecessary alarms about
    dangerous climate change unless and until there is some solid empirical
    evidence in support. And, second, because all good scientists are
    skeptics: that is their professional job. To not be a skeptic of the
    hypothesis that you are testing is the rudest of scientific errors, for
    it means that you are committed to a particular outcome: that's faith,
    not science.
        Introduction of the term ``denialist'' into the public climate
    debate, with its deliberate connotations with holocaust denial, serves
    only to cheapen those who have practiced the custom.
        5. ``Six Nobel Prize winners, and seven members of the National
    Academy of Sciences say . . .''.
        Argument from authority is the antithesis of the scientific method.
    That earlier this year the Royal Society of London tried to restrict
    the public debate on climate change through intimidation of Esso U.K.
    is a complete betrayal of all that the Society stands for. As John Daly
    commented on his website regarding a 2001 U.S. National Academy of
    Sciences report on global warming:
        ``The (2001) NAS committee made many assertions, none of which they
    chose to justify or explain other than to state it was ``their view''--
    as if their mere authority as representing the National Academy of
    Science were enough to prevail in the argument.
        Well it isn't. The days when mere `authority' could win an argument
    or debate are long gone. Such deference is more characteristic of a
    mediaeval priesthood, not a modern science where every important claim
    must be justified and explained. Only evidence counts in this modern
    world.''
        6. The ``precautionary principle'' says that we should limit human
    carbon dioxide emissions because of the risk that the emissions will
    cause dangerous warming. Thus the science argument should be
    subservient to the risk argument.
        The precautionary principle is intended to assist governments and
    peoples with risk analysis of environmental issues. First formulated at
    a United Nations environment conference at Rio de Janiero in 1992, it
    stated that ``Where there are threats of serious or irreversible
    damage, lack of full scientific certainty shall not be used as a reason
    for postponing cost-effective measures to prevent environmental
    degradation''.
        In order to take precautions, it is necessary to understand what
    one is taking them against. But at the moment global average
    temperature is flat-lining, and empirical predictions are for cooling.
    As Dick Lindzen recently pointed out in an article in the U.K.
    Telegraph: ``After all, like Hurricane frequency or the price of oil,
    global mean temperature is as likely to go down as up''.
        The precautionary principle is oftentimes a moral precept
    masquerading under a scientific cloak. True scientific principles
    acknowledge the supremacy of experiment and observation, and do not bow
    to untestable moral propositions. Adhering to a moral principle through
    thick and thin is certainly a part of the precautionary principle as
    practiced by many environmentalists, and as such it is a principle of
    the wrong type to be used for the formulation of public environmental
    policy.
        After comprehensive analysis, the Science and Technology Committee
    of the U.K. House of Commons recently came to a similar conclusion,
    commenting that ``we can confirm our initial view that the term
    ``precautionary principle'' should not be used, and recommend that it
    cease to be included in policy guidance''. The committee added that
    ``In our view, the terms ``precautionary principle'' and
    ``precautionary approach'' in isolation from . . . clarification have
    been the subject of such confusion and different interpretations as to
    be devalued and of little practical help, particularly in public
    debate''.
        7. The Kyoto protocol is only a small first step towards a more
    comprehensive carbon emission regimen.
        This argument has always been ridiculous. To expend trillions of
    dollars on measures that are predicted only to delay by 6 years a small
    fraction of a degree rise in hypothetical temperature is irrational
    behaviour. If it is a step, it is a step in the wrong direction, for--
    as Bjorn Lomborg never tires from pointing out--the same monies could
    be applied with much greater effect to other pressing environmental
    problems. The futility of the Kyoto approach has recently been
    underlined by the complete failure of the COP-13 talks at Nairobi to
    make progress towards a post-Kyoto carbon emissions agreement.
        8. It is irresponsible of the press to be playing up the views of a
    small handful of contrarian scientists. In searching for formulaic
    ``balance'', the press overemphasizes the views of a few maverick
    scientists, and thereby delays the public acceptance of essential
    mitigation measures.
        Quite to the contrary. Not only are there thousands of such
    ``mavericks'', including many of high scientific ability, but press
    coverage of climate change is generally dominated by one-sided alarmist
    reports which pay little or no attention to contrary views.
        The small handful of quality newspapers that provide balanced
    coverage of the climate change issue include the U.S. Wall Street
    Journal, the U.K. Telegraph and the Australian. These publications are
    playing both a responsible and an essential role in keeping the public
    informed.
              other techniques used to influence the public debate
        Most of the matters just discussed relate to the denigration or
    neutralization of arguments from climate skeptics. In addition to these
    techniques, environmental writers and editors have developed their own
    armoury of weapons for influencing the public debate on climate change.
    These weapons include the following.
        1. Couldism, mightism and perhapsism, fuelled by computer modelling
        If, could, may, might, probably, perhaps, likely, expected,
    projected . . .
        Wonderful words. So wonderful, in fact, that environmental writers
    scatter them through their articles on climate change like confetti.
    The reason is that--in the absence of empirical evidence for damaging
    human-caused climate change--public attention is best captured by
    making assertions about ``possible'' change. And, of course, using the
    output of computer models in support, virtually any type of climatic
    hazard can be asserted as a possible future change.
        As an example, a 2005 Queensland State Government report on climate
    change used these words more than 50 times in 32 pages. That's a rate
    of almost twice a page. A typical ``could probably'' run in this report
    asserts that Queensland's climate could be more variable and extreme in
    the future ``with more droughts, heatwaves and heavy rainfall'' and
    probably with ``maximum temperatures and heavy downpours . . . beyond
    our current experiences''.
        Reading further into the report reveals that these statements are
    all ``climate change projections . . . developed from a range of
    computer-based models of global climate, and scenarios of future global
    greenhouse gas emissions''.
        In another similar example from Australia, Dr Penny Whetton, Leader
    of the Climate Impacts Group, was quoted in a CSIRO press release as
    saying ``By 2070 Victoria is likely to be 0.7 to 5.0 C warmer,
    compared to 1990. . . . Climate change in Victoria is likely to lead to
    more hot days, fewer frosts, more heavy rainfall and drier conditions
    leading to greater bushfire risk.''
        All this might be well and good if it had been established that the
    models being used possessed actual skill in predicting regional
    changes. That that is not the case is confirmed by the disclaimer that
    the CSIRO puts in all their climate modeling reports (e.g. ``Climate
    Change in Queensland Under Enhanced Greenhouse Conditions'' Final
    Report 1997-2002, 84 pp.).
        ``This report relates to climate change scenarios based on computer
    modelling. Models involve simplifications of the real processes that
    are not fully understood. Accordingly, no responsibility will be
    accepted by CSIRO or the QLD government for the accuracy of forecasts
    or predictions inferred from this report or for any person's
    interpretations, deductions, conclusions or actions in reliance on this
    report.''
        Needless to say, despite such caveats the press treat the outputs
    of modeling exercises as firm predictions of future climate. In truth,
    they are exercises only in virtual reality.
        2. Data that are judged to be harmful to the global warming cause
    are simply ignored.
        From amongst many possible examples, I note the two that I have
    discussed in more detail earlier. They are (i) that ice core data from
    Greenland show that neither the magnitude nor the rate of late 20th
    century warming falls outside previous natural limits; and (ii) that in
    ice cores generally, changes in temperature lead their parallel changes
    in carbon dioxide by at least several hundred years.
        3. Enthusiastic reporting is undertaken of new science with
    alarmist implications, and no reporting of counter arguments.
        In 2005, in a paper in Nature, Bryden and co-authors reported
    observations of flow-speeds in the Overturning Meridional Circulation
    in the North Atlantic ocean, and inferred a significant slowdown of the
    overturning circulation. The paper received wide publicity in the
    press, with much attention to the alarmist possibilities that it opened
    up. This year, papers by Schott et al. (2006) and Meinen et al. (2006)
    have described in more detail some of the natural fluctuations in flow
    strength of the Atlantic DWBC system, and Schott et al. conclude that
    their results ``do not support suggestions of a basin-wide ``slowdown''
    of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation''. This revision of
    interpretation, not raising any alarm, was predictably largely ignored
    by the press.
        A second recent example of press selectivity is provided by the
    enormous press coverage accorded to North Atlantic storms in 2005--a
    year which saw 15 hurricanes develop, including Katrina, accompanied by
    a tremendous amount of alarmist speculation that human-caused global
    warming was the cause. In contrast, 2006, with only 5 hurricanes,
    turned out to be a quiet year both for hurricanes and for press
    speculation about global warming being their cause.
        4. Award winning journalists or public celebrities, mostly with no
    expertise in science, write ignorant polemics that are designed to
    encourage public alarm on climate change.
        For example, Ian Henschke, a current affairs journalist with the
    Australian Broadcasting Corporation, and holder of a Reuters Fellowship
    to study global warming at Oxford University in 1999, wrote recently
    (Adelaide Review, March 2004, p. 7):
        ``The long-term effects of global warming are just beginning to
    become evident. . . . The impact of global warming means a warmer,
    wilder, wetter world where there will be winners and losers. We are
    carrying out an unauthorized experiment with the planet's weather
    system . . . that is and will continue to bleach and kill the Great
    Barrier Reef and gives us even bigger El Nino events that saw our
    national capital's suburbs ablaze last year. The rest of the world will
    also have its own chaotic response, from increasing heat waves in
    Europe to worse snow storms in Texas. Australia has become a pariah on
    this issue. Along with the U.S. we are seen as coming out with
    incoherent and inconsistent policies that make us part of the problem,
    not part of the solution.''
        This farrago of nonsense, which has been customized to stir
    particular local environmental fears, is of a genre that can be read in
    newspapers or watched on television around the world. Such pieces are
    presented by reporters whose political correctness and moral pretension
    greatly outstrips their scientific understanding.
        5. Discrimination is exercised by both the popular and specialist
    scientific press against articles on climate change that are written
    from a balanced, rationalist or skeptical point of view.
        Most long-standing climate skeptics have experienced this type of
    discrimination, and there are many examples listed on the internet.
        Particularly worrisome is that two leading general science
    publications, Science and Nature, have developed a habit of not
    accepting short papers that are critical of earlier (demonstrably
    unsound) environmental papers that they have published. Three more
    popular and very widely distributed magazines, namely National
    Geographic, New Scientist and Scientific American, also display a great
    lack of balance in the material that they publish on climate change
    issues.
                           discussion and conclusions
        I have discussed briefly above a number of arguments and practices
    that are applied widely throughout the public media in order to
    influence the public debate on climate towards alarmism. These
    techniques are used most often by doctrinaire persons who are bereft of
    scientific support for their strong personal belief that damaging,
    human-caused warming is occurring.
        With some rare exceptions, the performance of the media, and
    especially the scientific press, on the global warming issue has been
    lamentable. Editors need to resist the daily temptation for alarmism,
    greatly improve their vigilance over publishing such weak rhetorical
    arguments as those outlined above, and insist that their reporters
    assess mainly the science issues at hand.
        Driven by their addiction to alarmism, and a false belief that the
    causes of climate change are understood, environmental lobby groups
    worldwide urge the adoption of the precautionary principle to solve the
    ``global warming problem''. They argue that the world needs to move to
    a ``post-carbon'' economy as soon as possible, in order to curtail
    drastically the carbon dioxide emissions that they allege are causing
    warming. Yet it is only unvalidated computer models that suggest
    dangerous warming will occur, the observable facts being quite
    implacable that additional carbon dioxide brings mild warming only,
    most of which has already occurred because of the logarithmic nature of
    the relationship between increased carbon dioxide and increasing
    temperature.
        Environmental campaigners for the mitigation of human greenhouse
    emissions appear to be blind to facts such as:
         that no amount of precaution is going stop natural climate
    change;
         that there is a 100 percent risk of damage from natural
    climate events, which happen every day;
         that we cannot measure, much less isolate, any presumed
    human climate signal globally;
         that extra atmospheric carbon dioxide causes mild warming
    only, and given its other properties is at least as likely to be
    beneficial as harmful; and
         that the causes of climate change are many, various and
    very incompletely understood.
        It is a remarkable fact that despite the worldwide expenditure of
    perhaps U.S. $50 billion since 1990, and the efforts of tens of
    thousands of scientists worldwide, no human climate signal has yet been
    detected that is unambiguously distinct from natural variation. After
    the discrediting of the iconic ``hockey stick'' curve of recent
    temperature change, the IPCC's alarmist case for dangerous human
    climate change now rests not on empirical data of any sort but on
    misunderstood computer attribution models, failed greenhouse theory,
    and anecdotal accounts of climate changes--such as glaciers melting--
    that may well be of wholly or largely natural origin.
        A goal to ``stabilise world climate'' is misplaced, not to mention
    unattainable. Climate is a dynamic system within which extreme events
    and dramatic changes will always occur, irrespective of human actions
    or preferences. Witness hurricane Katrina. The real danger of the
    current public global warming hysteria is that it is distracting
    attention and resources away from the need to develop a sound policy of
    adaptation to future natural climate vicissitudes.
        Climate change is as much a geological as it is a meteorological
    issue. Geological hazards are mostly dealt with by providing civil
    defense authorities and the public with accurate, evidence-based
    information regarding events such as earthquakes, volcanic eruptions,
    tsunamis and floods, and by adaptation to the effects when an event
    occurs.
        As for other major natural disasters, the appropriate preparation
    for extreme climate events is to mitigate and manage the negative
    effects when they occur. Careful planning will be needed to identify
    when a dangerous weather or climate event is imminent (or has started),
    and to foster ongoing research for the development of predictive tools
    for both sudden and long term climatic coolings and warmings. Climate
    impacts are generally slower to appear than those of other
    ``instantaneous'' disasters like earthquakes, tsunami, storms, volcanic
    eruptions, landslides or bushfires. This difference is not one of kind,
    and neither should be our response plans.
        NOTE: Opinions, findings and conclusions expressed in this
    testimony are those of the author, and are not attributable to either
    his organization (James Cook University) or research fund provider
    (Australian Research Council).
                                   References
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    Persistent solar influence on North Atlantic climate during the
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        Davis, J.C. & Bohling, G.C. 2001 The search for patterns in ice-
    core temperature curves. In: Gerhard, L.C. et al. (eds.), Geological
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        Gray, V. 2006 Temperature trends in the lower atmosphere. Energy &
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        Grootes, P.M., Stuiver, M., White, J.W.C., Johnsen, S. & Jouzel, J.
    1993 Comparison of oxygen isotope records from the GISP2 and GRIP
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    Atmospheric CO2 fluctuations during the last millennium
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    from long-term geologic data. Ecological Modelling 171, 433-450.
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        Mudelsee, M. 2001 The phase relations among atmospheric
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    Yoshida, N. 2003 Homogeneous climate variability across East Antarctic
    over the past three glacial cycles. Nature 422, 509-512.
                                   __________
       Statement of Naomi Oreskes, Professor, University of California,
                                 San Diego, CA
        Thank you very much. It is an honor to have the opportunity to
    speak to you today about the history of climate science. I am a
    professor of history at the University of California, San Diego, where
    I teach, and research, the history of modern science. I hold a Bachelor
    of Science in Mining Geology from the Royal School of Mines, part of
    the University of London, and a Ph.D., from Stanford University, where
    I completed a graduate special program in geological research and
    history of science.
        In recent months, the suggestion has been made that concern over
    anthropogenic global warming is a just a fad or a fashion. The history
    of science shows otherwise. Scientific attention to global warming has
    lasted over a century, involved thousands of scientists, and extended
    across six continents. It has spanned the disciplines of physics,
    chemistry, meteorology, and oceanography, and included some of the most
    illustrious and trusted scientists of the 20th century. And it has
    included scientific advisors to several U.S. Presidents--both
    Democratic and Republican.
        Let me explain.
        Scientists have been studying carbon dioxide and climate for a long
    time. John Tyndall first established in 1859 that carbon dioxide is a
    greenhouse gas. From this, Swedish geochemist Svante Arrhenius deduced
    in the 1890s that CO2 released to the atmosphere by burning
    fossil fuels could alter Earth's climate. By the 1930s British engineer
    Guy Callendar had compiled empirical evidence that this effect was
    already discernible.\1\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \1\ Callendar, G.S. (1938). ``The Artificial Production of Carbon
    Dioxide and Its Influence on Temperature.'' Quarterly J. Royal
    Meteorological Society 64: 223-40. See also James Roger Fleming (2006).
    The Callendar Effect: The Life and Work of Guy Stewart Callendar, the
    Scientist Who Established the Carbon Dioxide Theory of Climate Change,
    Boston: American Meteorological Society.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Callendar's concern was pursued in the 1950s by American physicist
    Gilbert Plass, a pioneer in upper atmosphere spectroscopy, by
    geochemist Hans Suess, a pioneer of radiocarbon dating who worked
    closely with the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, and by oceanographer
    Roger Revelle, a one-time commander in the U.S. Navy Hydrographic
    Office. By the 1960s, Charles David Keeling's systematic measurements
    demonstrated that atmospheric CO2 was, indeed, steadily
    rising. (For this work, Keeling was awarded the National Medal of
    Science in 2002).
        These basic facts of history are well known.\2\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \2\ James Rodger Fleming (1998). Historical Perspectives on Climate
    Change. New York: Oxford University Press; Weart, Spencer R. (2004).
    The Discovery of Global Warming. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University
    Press.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        What is less well known is that by the mid 1960s, a number of
    scientific advisory panels had expressed concern about global warming,
    and this concern was communicated by some of America's most illustrious
    scientists to Presidents Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, and Jimmy
    Carter.
        One early warning came in 1965 from the Environmental Pollution
    Board of the President's Science Advisory Committee, who warned that
    ``by the year 2000 there will be about 25 percent more CO2
    in our atmosphere than at present [and] this will modify the heat
    balance of the atmosphere to such an extent that marked changes in
    climate could occur.''\3\ Accordingly, President Lyndon Johnson stated
    In a Special Message to the Congress: ``This generation has altered the
    composition of the atmosphere on a global scale through . . . a steady
    increase in carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels.''\4\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \3\ Restoring the Quality of Our Environment, Report of the
    Environmental Pollution Panel, President's Science Advisory Committee,
    The White House, December 1965, on p. 9.
        \4\ President Lyndon B. Johnson's ``Special Message to the Congress
    on Conservation and Restoration of Natural Beauty'' on Feb. 8, 1965.
    see: http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=27285. This
    appears to be the first time ``carbon dioxide'' appeared in a
    presidential speech; thanks to Professor Zuoyue Wang of California
    State University, Pomona, for drawing my attention to this.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        A second warning came in 1966 from the U.S. National Academy of
    Sciences Panel on Weather and Climate Modification, headed by
    geophysicist Gordon MacDonald, who later served on President Nixon's
    Council on Environmental Quality (1970-1972).\5\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \5\ ``Weather and Climate Modification Problems and Prospects,''
    Vol I. Final report of the Panel on Weather and Climate Modification,
    NAS-NRC Publication 1350, Washington, DC: NAS Press, 1966, particularly
    discussion on p. 10. See also ``Scientific Problems of Weather
    Modification,'' A report of the Panel on Weather and Climate
    Modification, Committee on Atmospheric Sciences, NAS-NRC Publication
    1236, Washington, DC: NAS Press, 1964. On Gordon MacDonald, see Munk,
    Walter, Naomi Oreskes, and Richard Muller, 2004. ``Gordon J.F.
    MacDonald,'' National Academy of Sciences Biographical Memoirs 84: 3-
    26.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        In 1974, in the wake of the Arab Oil Embargo, Alvin Weinberg,
    Director of the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, realized that
    climatological impacts might limit oil production before geology
    did.\6\ In 1978, Robert M. White, the first administrator of NOAA and
    later President of the National Academy of Engineering, put it this
    way:
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \6\ Weinberg, Alvin (1974). ``Global Effects of Man's Production of
    Energy.'' Science 186: 205.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
              We now understand that . . . carbon dioxide released during
            the burning of fossil fuels, can have consequences for climate
            that pose a considerable threat to future society.  . . . The
            potential . . . impacts [are] ominous.''\7\
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \7\ White, Robert M. (1978). Oceans and Climate: An Introduction,
    Oceanus 21: 2-3.
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        In 1979 the subject was addressed by the JASON committee--the
    reclusive group of highly cleared scientists who gather annually to
    evaluate scientific and technical problems for the U.S. Government--and
    whose members have included some of the most brilliant scientists of
    our era, including physics Nobel Laureates Hans Bethe and Murray Gell-
    Mann.
        The JASON scientists predicted that atmospheric CO2
    might double by the year 2035, resulting in mean global temperature
    increases of 2-3 C, and polar warming of as much as 10-12 C. This
    report also reached the White House, where Frank Press, Science Advisor
    to President Carter, asked the National Academy of Sciences for a
    second opinion. An Academy committee, headed by MIT meteorologist Jule
    Charney, affirmed the JASON conclusion: ``If carbon dioxide continues
    to increase, [we] find no reason to doubt that climate changes will
    result, and no reason to believe that these changes will be
    negligible.''
        It was precisely these concerns that led in 1992 to the U.N.
    Framework Convention on Climate Change, which called for immediate
    action to reverse the trend of mounting greenhouse gas emissions. One
    early signatory was U.S. President George H.W. Bush, who called on
    world leaders to translate the written document into ``concrete action
    to protect the planet.'' Three months later, the Convention was
    unanimously ratified by the U.S. Senate.
        Since then, scientists around the world have worked assiduously to
    flesh out the details of this broadly affirmed picture. The purpose of
    my 2004 study of the scientific literature, published in the peer-
    reviewed journal Science, was to assess how much disagreement remained
    in the scientific community about the basic reality of global warming
    and its human causes. The answer surprised me: not one scientific paper
    in the random sample disagreed with the consensus position. Scientists,
    my study showed, are still arguing about the details, but the overall
    picture is clear. There is a consensus among both the leaders of
    climate science and the rank and file of active climate researchers.
        I should acknowledge that one skeptic has challenged my study, and
    others have repeated his claim. This man is a social anthropologist in
    Liverpool, who, to my knowledge, has never published his arguments
    regarding my study in a peer-reviewed journal. This past October, he
    admitted that he made significant mistakes in his criticisms, and he
    now agrees with my general conclusion about the state of climate
    science.\8\ In an interview with the Australian Broadcasting
    Commission, he acknowledged, ``I do not think anyone is questioning
    that we are in a period of global warming. Neither do I doubt that the
    overwhelming majority of climatologists is agreed that the current
    warming period is mostly due to human impact.''
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        \8\ This was recently reported by the Australian Broadcasting
    Commission, see http://www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/transcripts/
    s1777013.htm
    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------
        The scientific evidence is clear: the predictions made decades ago
    by Arrhenius, Callendar, Plass, Suess, Revelle, Charney, MacDonald,
    Weinberg, White, the JASON committee, and many others, have come true.
        One prediction, however, did not come true.
        In 1983, the National Academy formed a committee chaired by
    physicist William Nierenberg to look in greater detail at the issues
    raised by the JASON and Charney reports. The Nierenberg committee
    accepted their scientific conclusions, but declined to view global
    warming as a problem, predicting that any adverse effects would be
    adequately remedied by technological innovation driven by market
    forces.
        This prediction, I think it is fair to say, has not come true.
    Technological innovation has not saved the homes of the citizens of
    Shishmaref, Alaska, nor stopped the acidification of the world's
    oceans, nor prevented the melting of polar ice.
        Thank you very much for your time.
                                   __________
        Statement of Dan Gainor, The Boone Pickens Free Market Fellow,
                      Director, Business & Media Institute
        Thank you Mr. Chairman, Senators, ladies and gentlemen. We're here
    to discuss the media coverage of the climate change debate. But there's
    only one problem, there is almost none of that debate actually in the
    media.
        Journalists pledged to be neutral, long ago gave up their watchdog
    role to become lapdogs for one position. The media became alarmist
    claiming the planet is at a ``tipping point'' as if at any moment
    everything would go over the edge. An April 2006 issue of Time magazine
    pushed readers over that edge with 24 pages of advocacy, claiming:
    ``The debate is over. Global warming is upon us with a vengeance.''
        CBS's Scott Pelley, who covers the environment, actually compared
    climate change skeptics with Holocaust deniers and claimed: ``There
    becomes a point in journalism where striving for balance becomes
    irresponsible.''
        In an effort to provide balance to that irresponsible position,
    let's recall the media's record on climate change. Reporters told us
    roughly 30 years ago that a similar fate awaited mankind. Then,
    journalists were convinced we would all freeze to death.
        In an April 1975 article entitled ``The Cooling World,'' Newsweek
    advised us that ``the earth's climate seems to be cooling down.'' A May
    1975 New York Times piece cautioned: ``Scientists Ponder Why World's
    Climate is Changing: A Major Cooling Widely Considered to Be
    Inevitable.''
        The Washington Post, U.S. News & World Report and Science News all
    chimed in that cool was suddenly very hot. One award-winning piece in
    Fortune said if the trend continued, it could ``affect the whole human
    occupation of the earth.''
        The irony of this scare is that just years before, we had been
    warned the earth was warming. In March 1929, the Los Angeles Times told
    readers ``Most geologists think the world is growing warmer, and that
    it will continue to get warmer.'' The New York Times took a similar
    approach with a headline that said ``America in Longest Warm Spell
    Since 1776.'' And less than 10 years before that, the Times had
    detailed the exploits of Capt. Donald MacMillan's Arctic expedition and
    how ``MacMillan Reports Signs of New Ice Age.''
        In more than 100 years, the major media have warned us of at least
    four separate climate cataclysms--an ice age, warming, another ice age
    and another bout of warming. If you count the current catch-all term of
    ``climate change,'' that would be five separate media predictions. Even
    by their count, they're 0-3.
        The hubris that convinces supposedly unbiased journalists they are
    providing the ``truth'' on climate change has led them to criticize
    America for its stance on the issue including the Kyoto treaty. But
    they typically leave out the 95-0 vote against Kyoto by this very
    Senate or the many billions of dollars such an agreement would cost
    America. This attitude has resulted in a media obsession with Al Gore's
    film ``An Inconvenient Truth.'' At least 75 TV shows covered Gore or
    the film in just 3 months this summer--more than 3\1/2\ times the
    length of his movie.
        The Today Show's Matt Lauer even lent his status to a Sci-Fi
    Network program that listed global warming among other potential
    threats to our species including asteroids, aliens and evil robots.
        Scientists who dare question the almost religious belief in climate
    change, and yes, they do exist, are ignored or undermined in news
    reports as are policymakers and pundits who take similar views. The few
    journalists who sometimes give another side, like the New York Times'
    Andrew Revkin, emphasize funding sources for that side of the debate
    and rarely bother to question the billions of dollars that go into
    promoting global warming.
        This goes against the basic tenets of journalism to be skeptical of
    all sides of an issue. It also violates the ethical code of the Society
    of Professional Journalists which urges the media to ``Support the open
    exchange of views, even views they find repugnant.'' That code calls
    for reporters to ``Distinguish between advocacy and news reporting.''
        But that wasn't the media response when Chairman Inhofe read some
    of our report ``Fire & Ice'' on the Senate floor in September. Newsweek
    responded with a roughly 1,000 word clarification of its 1975 global
    cooling report, but added it made the mistake as recently as 1992.
    Newsweek still claimed ``the story wasn't `wrong' in the journalistic
    sense of `inaccurate.' '' But at least it owned up to the error--after
    31 years.
        In the New York Times editorial that responded to Sen. Inhofe's
    comments, the Times summarized: ``Cooling, warming--we never get it
    right.''
        That's the inconvenient truth.
        Thank you.

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