Free Republic

One of the country's top physicists, who served as the Department of Energy Undersecretary during the Obama administration, is out with a new book that pushes back on climate change hysteria and debunks the politically charged statement that the science is "settled" on the issue. "Physicist Steven Koonin kicks the hornet’s nest right out of the gate in “Unsettled.” In the book’s first sentences he asserts that 'the Science' about our planet’s climate is anything but “settled.” Mr. Koonin knows well that it is nonetheless a settled subject in the minds of most pundits and politicians and most of the...

Last month, I published a book, “Apocalypse Never,” which debunks popular environmental myths. Among them: that humans are causing a sixth mass extinction and that climate change is making natural disasters worse. While I expected my book to be controversial, I didn’t expect CNN’s top climate reporter to compare it to an advertisement for cigarettes. Or to have an environmental journalist with nearly half a million followers on Twitter ­accuse me of promoting “white supremacy.” I’m hardly a climate denier. In fact, I have been a climate activist for 20 years and an environmental ­activist for more than 30. Governments,...

“On Behalf of Environmentalists, I Apologise for the Climate Scare,” said an article published in Forbes magazine by Mike Shellenberger. At least it did, till Forbes caved to furious green activists and pulled it within hours of publication. By arguing that climate change is real – but “not the end of the world” and “not even our most serious environmental problem,” Shellenberger had been found guilty of wrongthink.

University of Washington atmospheric scientist Cliff Mass has been called plenty of names, including climate “denier,” but it wasn’t until he came out against the state’s proposed carbon tax last month that he was accused of being a racist. Since then, Mr. Mass said he has been upbraided by the university’s diversity dean and subjected to a faculty “inquisition,” events that have stoked alarm about the threat posed by campus climate-change activism to academic freedom. “I’m really worried about the intolerance that has developed at the university,” Mr. Mass told The Washington Times. “It’s really a minority of graduate students...

Al Gore recently had a telling altercation with a journalist. The Spectator’s Ross Clark wanted to ask him about Miami sea-level rises suggested in the new film, “An Inconvenient Sequel.” The reporter started to explain that he had consulted Florida International University sea-level-rise expert Shimon Wdowinski. Gore’s response: “Never heard of him — is he a denier?” Then he asked the journalist, “Are you a denier?” When Clark responded that he was sure climate change is a problem but didn’t know how big, Gore declared, “You are a denier.” I was recently on the receiving end of a similar rebuff...

The Climate Change Business Journal has calculated that global warming is now a $1.5 trillion a year industry. The Business Journal’s report is not available for free online, but its findings are reviewed by the Insurance Journal. They are eye-opening, to say the least: The $1.5 trillion global “climate change industry” grew at between 17 and 24 percent annually from 2005-2008, slowing to between 4 and 6 percent following the recession with the exception of 2011’s inexplicable 15 percent growth, according to Climate Change Business Journal. The San Diego, Calif.-based publication includes within that industry nine segments and 38 sub-segments....

The EPA may be making some major changes to its carbon dioxide emissions regulatory scheme, the details of which have been leaked to the media just days ahead of its expected release date. The EPA will be getting rid of its energy efficiency building block of its Clean Power Plan over legal concerns the agency was overstepping its bounds by controlling how efficiently people used their electricity, reports The Wall Street Journal. The Journal also reported the Clean Power Plan will encourage nuclear power production. An EPA spokeswoman would not confirm the reported changes to the rule as it has...

You may have a "green" car, but it could be causing black rain in China from the graphite mined and used in its lithium ion battery. Two academics at Toronto's York University, Carla Lipsig-Mumme and Caleb Goods, applaud many of the new advances in green technology in recent years, but at the same time warn that those very technologies may come with a host of environmental issues. The pair issue a caution about “superindustrialization” in which the answer to climate change is a matter of “technological adjustment.” In an article recently published in The Conversation and picked up by the...

Bumblebees, a linchpin of the global food supply, are vanishing across huge swaths of North America and Europe as a result of climate change, a new study says. The findings, published Thursday in the journal Science, apparently solve a mystery that's alarmed farmers, experts, policymakers and environmental advocates worldwide, as well as bedeviled researchers. While habitat destruction and potent pesticides known as neonicotinoids have destroyed some bumblebee populations, researchers concluded climate change has played the greatest role in the mass disappearance of bumblebee species, which pollinate plants and crops that are part of the food supply for both animals and...