Global Warming Overview & Information

Overview

Global warming and climate change have received increased public awareness in recent years as a result of scientific analyses and media reporting of melting ice caps in the Arctic and Antarctic and Greenland, of melting glaciers in such places as Alaska, Glacier National Park in Montana and the Himalayas, of warmer summers in places and colder winters,, of hurricanes and tornados, and of floods and droughts.

Proponents of human causes for global warming cite the rise in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere as correlating with temperature change. Opponents question the measurements and the correlations while also citing other natural causes such as ocean currents, increased solar activity and cosmic rays as well as the historic natural cycles of earth’s heating and cooling.

Global Warming Overview (wikipedia)
Global Warming Controversy (wikipedia)

Supporting Viewpoints

The principle argument cited by numerous scientists worldwide is that human generated green house gases and to a lesser degree deforestation have acted to change the climate and raise the average air temperature of the planet by 1.3º F over the last 100 years. The greenhouse gases, primarily CO2, are a result of burning fossil fuels. Measurements of atmospheric CO2 over the last 48 years on the Mauna Loa volcano in Hawaii have shown a distinct upward trend from 316 ppm in 1959 to a current level of 384 ppm.

These CO2 levels of the past 48 years are the highest ever measured in the past 650,000 years. The history of past CO2 level measurements is recorded in ice cores from Greenland and the Antarctic. Scientists using computer models predict that continued rises to CO2 levels will lead to melting ice caps, rising sea levels and a host of other problems by the end of the century.

The effort promoting global warming theories has been led by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC - website link below). This group was jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 along with Al Gore for their efforts to build up and disseminate greater knowledge about man-made climate change, and to lay the foundations for the measures that are needed to counteract such change. Perhaps one of the most comprehensive and noteworthy, but also controversial source for understanding climate change issues is the IPCC, Working Group I Report, “The Physical Science Basis” (122 pages). . Regardless of what one’s position is on global warming, this report contains valuable explanations of the processes involved in climate change.

Supporting Websites

Environmental Protection Agency, Climate Change	Environmental Defense
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change	IPCC Report
National Academy of Sciences	National Climatic Data Center (NCDC)
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)	National Resource Defense Council
Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS)

Opposing Viewpoints

Those scientists who disagree with the IPCC findings have cited questionable correlations between CO2 levels and temperature, inaccuracies in the computer models used to extrapolate trends into the future and just what level of CO2 and temperature is unacceptable for society. Some scientists look for natural causes, citing earth’s natural cycles over millions of years of global warming and cooling as evidence that that the current warming cycle is just another of earth’s natural cycles. Economists cite the enormous costs to our economy by shifting away from fossil fuels, and question the necessity of doing so when the arguments for global warming theories are not that sound.

One of the most compelling arguments opposing the conventional global warming theories is presented by the Arthur B. Robinson, Noah E. Robinson, and Willie Soon in the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine website Petition Project: Environmental Effects of Increased Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide

Instead of looking at just the recent period of the Industrial Revolution, the authors compiled temperature data for the past 3,000 years. The graphical analysis shows the Medieval Climate Optimum and the Little Ice Age in relation to the current trends. The current 2006 temperature is equivalent to the 3,000 year average of natural cycles.

Opposing Websites
Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine
Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP)
Competitive Enterprise Group - Skeptics Guide to Inconvenient Truth
Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide & Global Change
Envirotruth
Heartland Institute
GlobalWarming.org