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Room for debate on climate change

Climate change is absolutely certain – it’s been changing since the earth was born – climate warming is not

Mr. Secco’s letter published Dec. 19 criticizing another writer’s opinion that climate “change” is not certain is also subject to criticism (they used to call it “climate warming” – for anybody confused with changing terminology).

Mr. Secco also cherry picks data. Yes, the last 17 years (since 1998) may have been the warmest on record, but temperatures have not increased since 1998, and in any event it’s the future we’re worried about.

Climate activists like to call the lack of an increase in temperatures over the last 17 years a “pause” but that implies that a rise in temperature will most certainly occur in the future, again based on IPCC models.

The problem is that the IPCC models absolutely failed to predict this “pause”, or plateau, if we use a neutral term, and while proffering multiple  suggestions, cannot actually explain why it occurred. In fact, they say their models are 95 per cent certain that a pause/plateau longer than 10 years in duration was impossible – but here we are.

The only alternate (they acknowledge) was that their models predicting rising temperatures were wrong. It’s interesting to note that over the years and reports done by the IPCC their prediction as to the actual future temperature increases has actually been falling. Climate change is absolutely certain – it’s been changing since the earth was born – climate warming is not, and now we know why they don’t use that phrase any more.

Yes rising greenhouse gases are a concern and all things being equal, should cause raising temperatures, but whether all things are equal, or how much temperature increase it will cause (if any), is very much up in the air – shown by the IPCC’s constantly changing predictions as to actual rise in temperatures.

In any event, the elephant in the room is population increase. The UN mid-range prediction is that by 2050 there will be an additional 2.5 billion people (a 36 per cent increase), mostly in Third World countries. All will want western-style living standards – which means energy consumption. Why isn’t anybody talking about this?

Happily, the warming climate has also caused a significant greening of the earth as reported by satellite observations, and these plants will take CO2 out of the air and will provide more food. So it’s not all bad.

Terry Sturgeon

Oak Bay