[Congressional Record Volume 157, Number 192 (Wednesday, December 14, 2011)]
[Senate]
[Pages S8589-S8594]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
CLIMATE CHANGE
Mr. FRANKEN. Mr. President, I rise today to address an alarming trend
that I see in our national discourse. As legislators, our decisions
need to be rooted in facts. Science driven by data and rigorous
analysis needs to inform our policymaking.
Scientists are the ones who made the United States the world's
innovator in the last century. Scientists are the people who gave us
antibiotics, for example. Do you like being able to use antibiotics?
Well, then, thank scientists.
Scientists put a man on the Moon--several men, actually--and got him
back safely. These are rocket scientists.
Scientists made it possible for Americans to watch this speech on C-
SPAN--that is C-SPAN, the Cable Satellite Public Affairs Network--also
rocket scientists.
Scientists also came up with such useful things as the Internet.
A scientist from the University of Minnesota, a Noble Price-winning
agronomist named Norman Borlaug, is credited with saving over 1 billion
lives worldwide. He did this by using science to develop a high-yield,
disease-resistant wheat that was planted in Pakistan, India, and
elsewhere around the world.
By engineering our next-generation weapons systems, scientists ensure
that our military will continue to be the most powerful in the world.
We rely on science and scientists, and if we are to progress as a
country, if we and future generations of Americans are to be healthy
and prosperous and safe, we better put science right at the center of
our decisionmaking. Yet, right now, foundations and think tanks funded
by the fossil fuel industry are spreading misinformation about the
integrity of climate science, much as think tanks paid by the tobacco
industry used misinformation to cast doubt about the health hazards of
smoking.
Ignoring or flatout contradicting what climate scientists are telling
us about the warming climate and the warming planet can lead to really
bad decisions on natural energy and environmental policies here in
Congress. So today Senator Whitehouse and I want to take some time to
talk about climate science and about the fact that a scientific
consensus on climate change has been reached. Climate change is
happening and is being driven by human activities.
From the National Academy of Sciences, to the American Meteorological
Society, to the American Academy for the Advancement of Science, all of
the preeminent scientific institutions agree that manmade greenhouse
gas emissions are warming the planet and are a threat to our economy,
to our security, and to our health, and so do the overwhelming majority
of actively publishing climatologists.
This graph, taken from a study published by the National Academy of
Sciences, shows responses to the survey question: Do you think human
activity is a significant contributing factor in changing mean global
temperatures?
What you see here is that as climate expertise goes up, so does the
affirmation that climate change is real and is caused by human beings.
Among the most expert pool of respondents, climatologists who are
actively publishing on climate change, represented by this bar right
here, the rightmost bar, 97 percent of that category of scientists
answered yes. Of course, there are a few articles published by climate
skeptics in peer-reviewed journals, but the vast majority--97 percent--
of the peer-reviewed literature supports the notion that people are
causing the Earth's climate to change.
What are peer-reviewed articles? Well, they are articles scientists
write after conducting experiments. The experimentation is designed to
test a hypothesis. If the hypothesis holds up, the scientist writes a
paper describing the experiment and sends to it a professional journal.
The journal then sends to it other experts in the field--peer
reviewers--who see if they can tear any holes in the theory. They
question the methodology. They check the math. Very often, they send
the paper back with questions. And the researchers will make changes to
satisfy the reviewers' inquires. If in the end the peer reviewers think
the work is sound, they recommend the paper for publication. Then,
after publication, other scientists in the field are free to read the
paper and plug away and disprove it if they can. That is a peer-
reviewed paper.
I repeat, the vast majority of peer-reviewed literature supports the
notion that people are causing the Earth's climate to change, and 97
percent of published climatologists say yes when asked: Do you think
human activity is a significant contributing factor in changing mean
global temperatures?
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, as Senator Franken has pointed out,
despite the efforts to mislead and create doubt, the jury is not out on
whether climate change is happening and being caused by manmade carbon
pollution; the verdict is, in fact, in, and the verdict is clear, as
shown by this group of scientific organizations that signed a letter
supporting our efforts to do something about carbon pollution in the
Senate back in October of 2009: the American Association for the
Advancement of Science, the American Chemical Society, the Geophysical
Union, the Meteorological Society, the Natural Science Collections
Alliance, the Botanical Society of America.
Virtually every significant scientific organization accepts that
these are the facts and that the verdict is in, and, indeed, there is
some recent added support. The scientific community continues to
examine this question.
A recent report by James Hansen and Makiko Sato says:
Climate change is likely to be the predominant scientific,
economic, political and moral issue of the 21st century. The
fate of humanity and nature may depend upon early recognition
and understanding of human-made effects on Earth's climate.
They continue:
Earth is poised to experience strong amplifying polar
feedbacks in response to moderate global warming. Thus, goals
of limiting human-made warming to 2 degrees Celsius are not
sufficient--they are prescriptions for disaster.
Another recent report, ``Climate Change and European Marine Ecosystem
Research,'' reads as follows:
[[Page S8590]]
There is no doubt that rapid global warming and ocean
acidification are real, and very high confidence that both
are forced by human activities and emissions of carbon
dioxide. Climate change effects are especially evident in the
oceans.
I will get into that later on in our colloquy a little bit further.
Levels of atmospheric CO2 are accelerating.
A third report, ``The World Energy Outlook for 2011,'' says:
Global energy-related carbon dioxide emissions reached 30.4
Gt in 2010, 5.3% above 2009, representing almost
unprecedented annual growth. In the New Policies Scenario,
our central scenario, CO2 emissions continue to
increase, reaching 36.4 Gt in 2035, and leading to an
emissions trajectory consistent with a long-term global
temperature increase of 3.5 degrees Centigrade.
What does that mean?
The expected warming of more than 3.5 degrees Centigrade in
the New Policies Scenario would have severe consequences: a
sea level rise of up to 2 metres, causing dislocation of
human settlements and changes to rainfall patterns, drought,
flood, and heat-wave incidence that would severely affect
food production, human disease and mortality.
There are also iconic American companies that have made the
considered business judgment that climate change is real and we need to
prepare. But we can get more on that later in the colloquy.
Mr. FRANKEN. Yet, in spite of all of this--and these are all new
reports on top of this 97 percent number that was established. Yet the
conservative media and some of my colleagues in Congress seem to think
it is just fine to ignore what these scientists are saying.
Let me illustrate this with an analogy. Say you went to a doctor and
the doctor told you: You better start eating more sensibly and start
exercising, because you are tremendously overweight. I see that you
have a family history of heart disease, and your father died of a heart
attack at an early age. You have to go on a diet and start working out
a little bit.
You say: You know what. I want a second opinion. So you go to a
second doctor and he says: OK, you have a family history of heart
disease. Your father died of a heart attack at a young age, and you
weigh over 300 pounds. You smoke three packs a day. Your cholesterol is
out of control, your blood pressure is through the roof. It would be
irresponsible of me as a doctor not to immediately send you to this
place at the Mayo Clinic that I know. I think you have to go there.
You say: Thanks, doctor, but I want a third opinion. So you go to the
third doctor and the third doctor reads the chart and looks at you and
goes: Wow, I am amazed that you are still alive.
You say: You know what. I want a fourth opinion. And then you go to
the fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh doctors. They are all saying the
same thing. But you keep asking for more opinions.
Finally, you go to the 25th doctor. The 25th doctor says: It is a
good thing you came to me, because all this diet and exercise would
have been a complete waste. You are doing fine. Those other doctors are
in the pockets of the fresh fruit and vegetable people. He says: Enjoy
life, eat whatever you want, keep smoking, and watch a lot of TV. That
is my advice.
Then you learn the doctor was paid a salary by the makers of
Twinkies, which, don't get me wrong, are a delicious snack food and
should be eaten in moderation. Am I making sense here?
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. It is actually quite a good example, because we have
some of the phony science that has attacked the science of climate
change, which is actually a pretty good comparison to what the Senator
described.
Take, for instance, the bogus Marshall Institute, which was founded
in 1984 by a physicist who had been the chief scientist behind the
tobacco industry's campaign to convince Americans that tobacco is
actually OK for you, and that there was doubt about whether it would
actually do you any harm. A few years later, he organized something
called the Oregon Petition, which denied that climate change was
happening. They phonied up the Oregon Petition to look like official
papers of the National Academy of Sciences. So the National Academy of
Sciences had to take the unusual step of responding that the petition
``does not reflect the conclusion of expert reports of the academy,''
and further, that it was ``a deliberate attempt to mislead.'' So he is
an ``expert'' saying that tobacco is OK for you. Suddenly, he turns up
as a climate denier, and he phonies up his report to look like----
Mr. FRANKEN. Was he part of a foundation?
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. This is founded by the Marshall Institute. There are
others of these out there. The other example is the Heartland
Institute, another so-called think tank with backers from tobacco and
the fossil fuel industries, founded also in 1984. It has written
reports to try to manufacture doubt about climate science and about the
risks of secondhand smoke. Heartland received nearly $700,000 from
ExxonMobil through 2006. Their bogus policy documents include false
claims that climate change is poorly understood, and simply wrong
assertions, that there is no consensus about the causes, effects, or
future rate of global warming.
Picking these two--but there are others in the constellation of bogus
science--they are commonly funded by the Bradley Foundation, the folks
who brought you the John Birch Society; by the Scaife foundations,
which are constantly behind rightwing causes; the Olan Foundation,
which is against public health causes; ExxonMobil; and by the Koch
brothers. Although it may look like different voices, it is actually
the same money speaking through different fronts.
Mr. FRANKEN. This is actually an interesting area. There is a well-
established link between the scientists who have worked for think tanks
such as George C. Marshall Institute, Heartland Institute, and other
foundations, which were funded at first by tobacco money and, since
then, by the fossil fuel industry. These scientists have been paid to
spread misinformation in order to cast doubt. That is all they have to
do--on a whole host of scientific issues--first, tobacco and acid rain,
the hole in the ozone layer, and now climate change.
Take tobacco, for example. Scientists were paid to testify in court
that there was no proof that smoking caused cancer or was addictive,
even after the industry scientists knew darn well that cigarettes were
addictive and did cause cancer and heart disease. In fact, the tobacco
industry was found guilty in 2004 of plotting to conceal the health
risks and addictiveness of cigarettes from the public. The judge found
that the tobacco industry had ``devised and executed a scheme to
defraud consumers and potential consumers about the hazards of
cigarettes--hazards that their own internal company documents proved
they had known since the 1950s.''
The whole purpose of this scheme was to provide misinformation, to
confuse the public, to manufacture doubt, and that is what is happening
right now with climate change. Public data from the Security and
Exchange Commission and from charitable organization reports to the IRS
report showed that between 2005 and 2008, ExxonMobil gave about $9
million to groups linked to climate change denial, while foundations
associated with the private oil company Koch Industries gave nearly $25
million. The third major funder was the American Petroleum Institute.
All in all, the energy industry spent hundreds of millions of dollars,
even billions of dollars, on lobbying against climate change
legislation between 1999 and 2010, including a large spike in spending
from 2008 to 2010.
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. And it is not enough that they have a stable of paid-
for scientists to create doubt, to create phony science that raises the
level of doubt; they also go out of their way to attack legitimate
scientists. You would not think this would carry much weight in a
proper debate, but amplified by the corporate money behind it, and
designed, as the Senator said, with the purpose not to win the argument
but to create doubt so that the public moves on, it is actually worse.
One example of this attack on lifetime scientists has been the phony
so-called Climategate scandal, which was an effort to derail
international climate science and climate negotiations.
Mr. FRANKEN. Climategate. Sometimes the Senator and I refer to it as
``Climategate-gate.''
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Yes, Climategate-gate. In fact, the real scandal here
wasn't what the scientists did; the real
[[Page S8591]]
scandal was the phony attack on the scientists.
Mr. FRANKEN. I thank my colleague for bringing this up. Let's talk
about that. This is the leak of thousands of e-mails from scientists at
the University of East Anglia Climate Research Unit back in 2009. It
was done right before the Copenhagen conference, right?
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. I believe that is correct.
Mr. FRANKEN. OK. The conservative media--remember, this doubt is
amplified in the conservative echo chamber, talk radio, et cetera. You
know what it is, the Wall Street Journal editorial page, Fox News, et
cetera. Conservative media pounced, taking quotes out of context to
sensational lies like this ``scandal.'' Most of the attacks were
directed at an e-mail by Phil Jones, a climate scientist working with
the East Anglia Climate Research Unit, in which in this e-mail he
referred to using ``Mike's Nature trick of adding in the real temps to
each series for the last 20 years to hide the decline.'' That sounds
very bad, ``trick'' and ``hide the decline.'' That went viral in the
conservative media--evidence that the scientific consensus on climate
change was a giant hoax. We had a Member of this body who said the
science behind this consensus ``is the same science that, through
climategate, has been totally rebuffed and no longer legitimate, either
in reality or in the eyes of the American people and the people around
the world.''
But it turns out that the trick being referred to in the e-mail is
actually a technique to use the most accurate data available. Pre-1960,
temperature data would include measurements from thermometers, tree
rings, and other so-called temperature proxies. Post-1960--this is the
trick--they excluded tree ring data from some specific kinds of trees
that were widely recognized by the scientific community to be
unreliable after 1960. So the decline refers--they refer to it as--it
isn't a decline in global temperatures, as the deniers claim.
Since 1960, we have had pretty good measurement of temperatures
around the world with things such as thermometers. They knew this tree
ring gave an apparent decline in temperature, as measured by these
specific kinds of trees that were known to be inaccurate compared to
all the sensors we have for measuring--and there are thousands and
thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of measurements of
the temperature around the Earth every minute, every day.
So this was the ``trick''--a technique to use the most accurate data
available of global temperatures from things, again, called
thermometers, and one that excluded data widely known to the scientific
community to be inaccurate. That is what the ``trick'' was. That is
all. That is what Phil Jones referred to in his e-mail. Ironically, he
was trying to be precise.
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. And it provoked considerable review afterward because
of the alarmist claims that were made in this phony attack on the
climate science. A number of pretty respectable organizations took a
look at this. One was the university itself, and the university itself
reached the conclusion on the specific allegations made against the
behavior of CRU scientists, ``We find that their rigor and honesty as
scientists are not in doubt. In addition, we do not find that their
behavior has prejudiced the balance of advice given the policymakers.
In particular, we did not find any evidence of behavior that might
undermine the conclusions of the IPCC assessment.'' That was the
university review.
Not enough? The National Science Foundation also----
Mr. FRANKEN. The university could be biased.
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. That is why we go on to the National Science
Foundation, which found no direct evidence of research misconduct and
therefore said, ``We are closing this investigation with no further
action.''
Parliament looked into it as well, because the university was in
Great Britain. And the House of Commons did an investigation. The
Commons' investigation concluded that the challenged actions by
Professor Jones and others ``were in line with common practice in the
climate science community.'' They went on to say:
Insofar as we have been able to consider accusations of
dishonesty, we consider that there is no case to answer.
No case to answer. Finally, they said:
We have found no reason in this unfortunate episode to
challenge the scientific consensus as expressed by Professor
Bennington that ``global warming is happening and that it is
induced by human activity.''
So the studies that looked at whether the climate science was phony
or whether the climategate scandal was phony have all come down
supporting the science and pointing out that climategate should
properly be known as climategate-gate because it was the scandal that
was phony.
Mr. FRANKEN. Now, let's make a distinction between people who are
climate skeptics and people who are climate deniers. This is kind of an
important distinction. There is nothing wrong with skepticism. In fact,
we love skeptics. Scientists are, by nature, skeptical. If someone has
a new idea, they need to prove conclusively they are right before 97
percent of scientists will believe them. This has already happened for
an overwhelming majority of climate scientists who have concluded,
again, that global warming is happening and that it is caused by
mankind. But there are a small number of them who still have questions.
On the other hand, a climate denier is someone who would not be
convinced no matter how overwhelming the evidence. And, as I pointed
out, a lot of these deniers are being paid by polluters to say what
they want.
Now, shortly after climategate, or climategate-gate, a physicist at
the University of California Berkeley, Richard Muller, who was
skeptical of the prevailing views on climate science, decided to test
the temperature records. Muller, a skeptic, started the Berkeley Earth
Surface Temperature Study to reevaluate the record and weed out
scientific biases. This was gold to climate deniers. In fact, among the
funders for the Muller study was the Charles Koch Foundation. But
things didn't work out the way the deniers had hoped.
In late March, Dr. Muller testified before the House Science and
Technology Committee with his initial findings on temperature increases
since the late 1950s. This is what he said:
Our result is very similar to that reported by the prior
groups--a rise of about .7 degrees Celsius since 1957. This
agreement with the prior analysis surprised us.
Because, as I say, they were skeptics. Muller basically recreated the
blade of the so-called hockey stick graph, or the temperature graph,
that had come under attack in climategate.
This graph shows Muller's estimates against the previous estimates.
Muller's Berkeley is black. You will see it is just identical, pretty
much. This past October Dr. Muller's group released its findings, and
to the dismay of skeptics and deniers these findings further confirmed
the prevailing science behind climate change and the work of the
scientists attacked during climategate-gate.
We can see the results on the chart. This gray band indicates a 95-
percent statistical spacial uncertainty. But it is exactly--and his
line is the black line--exactly what the other scientists measured.
The summary of the findings begins by saying, bluntly, ``global
warming is real,'' and goes on to say:
Our biggest surprise was that the new results agreed so
closely with the warming values published previously by other
teams in the U.S. and U.K.
Including East Anglia.
This confirms these studies were done carefully and that
potential biases identified by climate change skeptics did
not seriously affect their conclusion.
So even though these claims that the consensus on global warming is a
hoax have been refuted so convincingly--by a skeptic no less; funded by
Charles Koch, no less--some of the deniers keep repeating it. The
science is settled and climategate, or climategate-gate, was just a big
distraction. So now let's move on and figure out how we are going to
attack the challenge of climate change.
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. The challenge of climate change being extremely real,
one of the things that is so frustrating about this campaign of phony,
manufactured doubt is that in real life we are seeing the predictions
of climate science come true around us.
Climate scientists predicted the atmosphere would warm, and the
atmosphere is warming. Climate scientists
[[Page S8592]]
predicted the ocean would absorb heat, and sure enough, the ocean has
absorbed heat and ocean waters are warming. Climate scientists
predicted the ocean would absorb CO2 and that would then
lower the pH level of our ocean waters. The ocean is now more acidic
than it has been in 2 million years, threatening coral reefs,
shellfish, and the tiny creatures, such as plankton, that make up the
base of the entire oceanic food chain.
Climate scientists predicted glaciers and Arctic sea ice would melt
and, sure enough, we are seeing record melting. We just saw that
notorious leftwing publication, USA Today, report:
Federal Report Arctic Much Worse Since 2006. Federal
officials say the Arctic region has changed dramatically in
the past 5 years for the worse. It is melting at a near
record pace and it is darkening and absorbing too much of the
sun's heat.
Climate scientists predicted ecosystem shifts, and we are seeing
ecosystem shifts, such as the million-plus-acre forests in the American
West--dead to the bark beetle, gone from being green and healthy
forests to just mile after mile of brown and dead trees.
Mr. FRANKEN. Explain why the bark beetle is doing this. What is
happening and how does that relates to climate change?
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. The bark beetle relates to climate change because
what was keeping those trees free from the bark beetle was cold winters
that killed off the bark beetle larvae. As temperatures have warmed,
the larvae lived through the winters, and they attacked the trees. So
trees that were protected by cold winters are no longer protected, and
there are literally millions of acres of forest lost in the West.
On a smaller scale, but more important to me in my home State of
Rhode Island, the preeminent fish that was taken out of Narragansett
Bay was called the winter flounder. My wife wrote her Ph.D. thesis
about the winter flounder. It was a very significant cash crop for our
fishermen and is now virtually gone because the mean water temperature
of Narragansett Bay is up nearly 4 degrees.
Scientists also predicted we would be loading the dice for extreme
weather with climate change, and we are seeing an unusual amount of
extreme weather. The number of billion-dollar disasters has hit a
record. A recent press clip noted:
With an almost biblical onslaught of twisters, floods,
snow, drought, heat, and wildfire, the U.S., in 2011, has
seen more weather catastrophes that caused at least $1
billion in damage than it did in all of the 1980s, even after
the dollar figures from back then are adjusted for inflation.
Serious, grown-up corporate entities, like the biggest insurance
companies in the world, are noticing this and are concerned. Munich
Reinsurance has written the following:
The high number of weather-related natural catastrophes and
record temperatures, both globally and in different regions
of the world, provide further indications of advancing
climate change.
Throughout the corporate world we are seeing this. Here is a list of
companies that have gone public with the need for us to do something
about climate change: American Electric, Bank of America, Chrysler,
Cysco, DuPont, Duke Energy, eBay, Toyota, Timberland, Starbucks,
Google, GM, General Electric, Ford, Siemens, PepsiCo, Nike, Nishiland,
and John Deere. I am picking these at random, but these are not fringe
organizations. These are the core of the American business community,
and they recognize what is going on.
I want to single out one company, which is Coca-Cola. I was going to
bring to the floor the new can of Coca-Cola as an exhibit to
demonstrate this major international corporation--this huge American
success story based in Atlanta--has taken probably the most iconic
product in America--the Coke can--and has redesigned it to reflect what
the climate change is doing in the Arctic and to polar bears.
Unfortunately, my Coke can was confiscated by the cloakroom staff
because I am not allowed to bring exhibits to the floor unless they are
this. I should have snuck it out here, but that is why I don't have it.
Coca-Cola is a serious American business, and here is what they say:
The consensus on climate science is increasingly
unequivocal--global climate change is happening and man-made
greenhouse gas emissions are a crucial factor. The
implications of climate change for our planet are profound
and wide-ranging, with expected impacts on biodiversity,
water resources, public health, and agriculture.
So we put against that the core business community--iconic companies
such as Coca-Cola, putting their very label behind the need to address
climate change--and the phony-baloney-paid-for scientists who are
creating this doubt, and it is time to close this episode.
Mr. FRANKEN. I am glad the Senator brings up the phony-baloney doubt,
especially with this extreme weather we have been experiencing. Some of
my colleagues on the other side have pointed to the extreme
snowstorms--at least one of my colleagues has--in the Northeast over
the last several winters as evidence that global warming is a hoax.
Again, this is completely misleading. Intensifying blizzards aren't due
to the Earth getting cooler, they are due to increased moisture content
in the air. Warmer air holds more moisture.
Now, basically, it doesn't have to be that cold for it to snow. It
just has to be 32 degrees or below. What is snow? It is frozen water.
So it is about water. The atmosphere is now holding more water because
it is warmer. Warmer air holds more water than colder air. The main
point is that these increased natural disasters have real costs.
A few months ago we had a hearing in the Energy and Natural Resources
Committee on the Forest Service's management of the intense forest
fires we had out West this year. In that hearing, Forest Service Chief
Tom Tidwell told me he is seeing longer forest fire seasons out West--
more than 30 days longer than what we used to have even a decade ago.
Forest Service climate experts--and these are scientists--have said
that a major contributing factor to these longer fire seasons and more
intense fires is climate change.
The cost of these fires, passed on to all levels of government and to
society as a whole, is huge. It is something that Members on both sides
of the aisle recognize and are concerned about. Several of my
Republican colleagues in that hearing expressed their concerns about
the cost.
They referred to a report from the Western Forestry Leadership
Coalition, which estimates that the combined direct and indirect costs
of forest fires can be as much as 30 times the cost of fire suppression
alone. We need to factor in the cost of forest rehabilitation, the loss
of tax revenues for local governments, loss of businesses that depend
on forest resources from property losses, not to mention the
immeasurable cost of lives which are lost due to the fires.
I wish to underscore for Members of this body that when we have
discussions about important issues such as cost of wildfire response,
we are talking about the cost of responding to climate change. If
forestry specialists at the U.S. Forest Service tell us these fires are
getting worse due to climate change, we should be listening to them.
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. If the Senator doesn't mind, if I change elements
from fire to water since I represent an ocean State, another place
where climate change is creating dangerous consequences is in our
oceans. Let me cite a few reports that have come out recently.
Climate Change & European Marine Ecosystem Research says:
Close to one-third of the carbon dioxide produced by humans
from burning fossil fuels and other sources has been absorbed
by the oceans since the beginning of industrialization, and
that has buffered the cause and effects of climate change.
A resulting lowered pH--
When carbon goes into the ocean, it acidifies it. It lowers the pH.
A resulting lowered pH and saturation states of the
carbonate minerals that form the shells and body structures
of many marine organisms makes these groups especially
vulnerable. The growth of individual coral skeletons and the
ability of reefs to remain structurally viable are likely to
be severely affected. Continuing acidification may also
affect the ability of the oceans to take up CO2.
So they will not be absorbing the one-third that they have absorbed
any longer. It will stay in the atmosphere and atmospheric
concentrations will increase even faster.
The Annual Review of Marine Science reports that:
[[Page S8593]]
Growing human pressures, including climate change, are
having profound and diverse consequences for marine
ecosystems. These effects are globally pervasive and
irreversible on ecological time scales. Direct consequences
include increasing ocean temperature and acidity, rising sea
level, increased ocean stratification, decreased sea ice, and
altered patterns of ocean circulation, precipitation, and
fresh water.
The context for this is a pretty astounding one; that is, when we
look back through history, we don't look at changes in terms of decades
or even generations. We look at changes in terms of millions of years.
There is a special issue of Oceanography with a feature on ocean
acidification, and it is called ``Ocean Acidification in Deep Time.''
We have now an atmosphere that already contains more carbon
dioxide than at any time in the last 800,000 years of earth
history and probably more than has occurred in several tens
of millions of years.
We have had agriculture as humans for about 10,000 years, to give you
an idea of what 800,000 years or several tens of millions of years
means. The report goes on:
There are no precedents in recent earth history for what
will be the immediate and direct consequences of the release
of CO2 into the atmosphere and its concurrent
dissolution in the ocean's waters.
But we are playing with very dangerous effects when we ignore climate
change at the behest of a tiny minority of scientists and their
polluter industry funders behind them.
Mr. FRANKEN. There are folks who get the cost of inaction, and that
includes the Department of Defense.
In its 2010 Quadrennial Defense Review--or QDR--the DOD identified
climate and energy as among the major national security challenges that
America faces now and in the future.
To give you a perspective on the significance of this, ``Crafting a
Strategic Approach to Climate and Energy'' was alongside other
priorities laid out in the QDR with titles like, ``Succeed in
Counterinsurgency, Stability and Counterterrorism Operations,'' and
``Prevent Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction.''
This is serious stuff. It matters for DOD because climate change is
predicted to increase food and water scarcity, increase the spread of
disease, and spur mass migration and environmental refugees due to more
intense storms, floods, and droughts.
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. We had similar testimony in the Senate Intelligence
Committee. The witness who testified before us released his testimony
before the House Intelligence Committee and very much the same
conclusion:
We judge that global climate change will have wide-ranging
implications for U.S. national security interests over the
next 20 years.
The factors that would affect U.S. national security interests as a
result of climate change would include food and water shortages,
increased health problems, including the spread of disease, increased
potential for conflict, ground subsidence--the Earth lowering--
flooding, coastal erosion, extreme weather events, increases in the
severity of storms in the Gulf of Mexico, disruptions in U.S. and
Arctic infrastructure, and increases in immigration from resource-
scarce regions of the world.
There are probably climate deniers who say: That is all part of the
conspiracy. The Defense Department is in on it. All those companies are
in on it. The intelligence community is in on it.
But if there is a hoax, what is more mainstream than National
Geographic? Is National Geographic in on it too? They would have to be
because they did a special report a few years ago on climate change and
they showed a polar bear stranded on the melting ice. Here is what they
said:
It's here. Melting glaciers, heat waves, rising seas, trees
flowering earlier, lakes freezing later, migratory birds
delaying their flight south. The unmistakable signs of
climate change are everywhere.
How do we know this? We know this because of the science. What do
they say about the science?
How do we know our climate is changing? Historical records,
decades of careful observations and precise measurements--
As the Senator said, with things such as thermometers--
around the globe along with basic scientific principles.
If you think National Geographic is in on it and you can't have faith
in the Defense establishment and you can't have faith in the corporate
establishment and you can't have faith even in National Geographic,
perhaps you can have faith in the Pope, who said recently:
I hope that all members of the international community can
agree on a responsible, credible, and supportive response to
this worrisome and complex phenomenon, keeping in mind the
needs of the poorest populations and of future generations.
The press release from Catholic News Service then quotes one of his
bishops, Cardinal Rodriguez, who says:
Our climate is changing. Urgent action is necessary.
He called on our political leaders around the world ``to curb the
threat of climate change and set the world on a path to a more just and
sustainable future.''
Mr. FRANKEN. OK. Well, the Pope--I mean, didn't the Catholic Church
go after Galileo?
Look, between the science supporting climate change and the reality
of the dangers that climate change brings, we have to ramp up our
efforts to master this challenge, and that means wise investments in
clean energy R&D and deployment. They are just a good place to start.
Plus, these investments encourage the growth of domestic clean energy--
a domestic clean energy economy which would create jobs--and has
created jobs--grow our manufacturing base, and keep us competitive in
global energy markets. That is so important because Germany, China,
Denmark, and countries all over the world are winning this race.
One of the great parts about this job is spending half the time here
and half the time home in Minnesota. Minnesota is a national leader in
clean energy.
In 2007, Minnesota passed the highest renewable energy standard in
the country at the time, and all our utilities are on track to meet the
goal of 25 percent renewable by 2025.
Our largest utility, Xcel Energy, is on its way to 30 percent by
2020. We have universities such as the University of Minnesota Morris
which is pushing the frontiers of innovation in greening its campus
through a biomass gasification system which provides heating and
cooling and electricity, wind turbines that produce power, and LEED-
certified buildings. Our farmers have led the country in biofuels, and
our universities are leading R&D efforts for the transitions to
cellulosic and other advanced biofuels.
By the way, the first commercial cellulosic plant that is scaled up
to commercial levels is being built right now. St. Paul has the largest
district energy system in North America. It is heating and cooling all
of downtown St. Paul with woody biomass. SAGE Electrochromics is a
manufacturing plant in Minnesota that has cutting-edge window glass
technology that uses a little photovoltaic cell to control and turn
these--these windows turn completely opaque and block out all UV during
the summer. During the winter, they are these beautiful, huge windows
that let in all the light. It isn't like a Polaroid. It is an
incredible technology.
The University of Minnesota has just received two grants from the
Advanced Research Projects Agency at the Department of Energy, ARPA-E,
that was patterned after DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects
Agency that created the Internet. Across the State, businesses and
cities are working together to make our buildings more energy
efficient, using Minnesota-made technologies such as Marvin and
Anderson windows. Minnesota, by the way, is the Silicon Valley of
windows. We have 3M window films or McQuay heating and air-conditioning
systems.
Just last month, I partnered with our cities and counties to launch
the Back to Work Minnesota Initiative, aiming to break down barriers in
financing retrofits, retrofitting public and commercial buildings
across Minnesota. What is great about that, this pays for itself. You
finance this and you retrofit a building; it puts people in the
building trades to work who are in a depression, and it puts
manufacturers that build energy-efficient materials and equipment,
geothermal furnace systems and furnaces, heat exchange furnaces, pumps,
and you save energy.
[[Page S8594]]
The energy efficiency pays for the retrofit in 4 or 5 years and you can
capitalize this and we are finding innovative ways to do that. It pays
for itself and you lower our carbon footprint. You use less energy,
create jobs, save money. It is win-win-win-win. This is something we
have to do. It is insane not to.
Mr. WHITEHOUSE. We are proud of what is going on in Rhode Island as
well. We plan to meet 16 percent of our energy needs through renewable
energy sources by 2020, and that is on top of a goal to cut energy use
by 10 percent. So we will cut energy use by 10 percent and, of the
remaining 90, get 16 percent of that out of renewable energy sources.
Everybody is getting involved--utilities, towns, the State, the private
sector. One of our cities, East Providence, is right now converting a
brownfield which has been vacant for 40 years, nearly, into New
England's largest solar institution. As my colleague says, there will
be a payback and they will earn money on that for their taxpayers.
Our State of Rhode Island has been the national leader at how you map
and prepare for offshore wind development. In the State and Federal
waters off the coast of Rhode Island we are positioned to lead the
country in offshore wind siting, with all the jobs that building those
giant wind turbines and assembling them and erecting them offshore
creates.
We have exciting companies such as BioProcess Algae, of Portsmouth,
RI, which opened a spectacular facility in Iowa, which takes the
exhaust from ethanol plants and runs it through algae farms and creates
biofuels. They are at the cutting edge of that technology.
When you see these great technologies and these great opportunities--
in this colloquy, we are ending on what I hope is a very strong,
positive note for the economy. If we can pull away from the lies and
the phony science and the polluter-paid nonsense that has so far
distracted us from doing our duty as a nation, we can get into the race
that is going on in this world for the energy future. The economy of
this century is going to be driven by the $6 trillion clean energy
industry. We do not want to fall out the back of that race and leave it
to the Chinese and the Europeans. We want to be winning that race and
the jobs and the economic success that can bring that not only can
power our homes and our factories, it can power our economy back to
security for all Americans.
I thank Senator Franken for inviting me to join him in this colloquy.
I think our time is coming close to expiring, so I yield the remainder
of our time to you, and I ask unanimous consent Senator Franken be
allowed as much time as he needs to conclude. This has been a wonderful
opportunity for me.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. FRANKEN. Mr. President, I thank Senator Whitehouse for his
leadership. Algal--by the way, algal is the pronunciation of this.
Algal energy is amazing. We are fueling jet fighters with jet fuel made
from algae.
Both the President and Energy Secretary Chu have said we are in
America's Sputnik moment. They are absolutely right. Fifty years ago we
were in a global space race. Today we are in a global clean energy
race. Whichever country takes the most action today to develop and make
clean energy technologies will dominate the global economy in this
century.
That means supporting financing for clean energy and energy
efficiency projects. It means tax credits for clean energy
manufacturing, providing incentives for retrofitting residential and
public and commercial buildings. It means supporting basic research and
keeping alive initiatives that support clean energy technology
innovation. These need to be our priorities as we make energy policy
and budget decisions.
We can pay for these investments by cutting expensive, outdated
subsidies for oil companies that are making record profits. There is a
lot more to be done if we are going to win this global clean energy
race, but it is not going to be easy. It means unifying as a country
and starting to do things differently than we have been doing them.
Albert Einstein said:
We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking
we used when we created them.
I am convinced we can win this race. No other country is better
positioned. But first people need to understand the stakes. Climate
change is real, and failure to address it is bad for our standing in
the global economy, bad for the Federal budget, and bad for our
national security. We can do better than that for our children and our
grandchildren and posterity.
Mr. President, I thank Senator Whitehouse and I yield the floor.
I suggest the absence of a quorum.
Mr. CARPER. Will the Senator withhold?
Mr. FRANKEN. I take that back.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. The Senator from Delaware.
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