Saturday, April 25, 2009

So, seriously, have these people never even heard of the tobacco industry?

For more than a decade the Global Climate Coalition, a group representing industries with profits tied to fossil fuels, led an aggressive lobbying and public relations campaign against the idea that emissions of heat-trapping gases could lead to global warming.

But a document filed in a federal lawsuit demonstrates that even as the coalition worked to sway opinion, its own scientific and technical experts were advising that the science backing the role of greenhouse gases in global warming could not be refuted.

"The scientific basis for the Greenhouse Effect and the potential impact of human emissions of greenhouse gases such as CO2 on climate is well established and cannot be denied," the experts wrote in an internal report compiled for the coalition in 1995.
"Oh, and, uh... doubt is our product," the experts added.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Mike,
The data in question is out of date. "the experts wrote in an internal report compiled for the coalition in 1995." Recently published peer-reviewed science has cast considerable doubt on the theory that anthropogenic emissions of CO2 are having a significant impact on climate change. Yes, the climate is changing. Yes, we are in a warming trend (past 200 years). But are humans burning fossil fuels the cause? Based on my reading of the science, I say no.

Stephen