Free Republic

How could carbon dioxide have become so important scientifically, economically, and politically without greenhouse-warming theory ever having been verified by experiment, a cornerstone of the scientific method? I have now completed experiments showing that air with more than 23-times normal concentrations of carbon dioxide is heated no more than 0.2 degrees more than normal air when exposed to the same infrared radiation. Air with more than 10-times normal concentrations of carbon dioxide covered Earth 400 million years ago when ice ages were common. Atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide have been rising steadily since 1945 at ever increasing rates. These rates...

When greenies get their way, poor people suffer. Global warming hysteria tends to be an affliction of the affluent, who don’t have to worry about where their next meal is coming from or how they will keep the lights on at night. But for those lacking the leisure to hypothesize a crisis that keeps getting stuck on pause, the costs of green energy can wreck lives. It is happening in Australia, in the State of Queensland, ironcally rich in coal deposits: The Sunday Mail of Brisbane explains in an editorial: TODAY’S confronting revelation that more than 464 Queenslanders a week...

Not long after Secretary of Energy Rick Perry announced a 60-day review of green energy policies impact on electric grid reliability, the wind industry’s lobbying arm devised a strategy to push back against the study, according to a leaked memo. Perry’s April announcement worried the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) and others that the requested study could be used to bash subsidies and policies that allowed wind energy production to rapidly grow in recent years. AWEA laid out a plan to engage with federal lawmakers, regulators and the media to push back against a study they saw as “supporting baseload...

In a recent article for the Daily Signal, Professor Walter Williams of George Mason University wrote how each Earth Day is “accompanied by predictions of doom.” He points to the first Earth Day in 1970 when Professor George Wald of Harvard proclaimed that “civilization will end within 15 to 30 years”, and how Professor Paul Ehrlich of Stanford repeated the Malthusian claim that the world population would overrun the food supply. Earth Day has consistently been marked by apocalyptic environmental prophecies that never come to fruition. This year’s Earth Day was no different. The Huffington Post warned us that we...

The Hollywood Reporter is reporting that President Obama and actor Leonardo DiCaprio will meet on October 3 to discuss climate change. The meeting will take place at the White House as part of the inaugural South by South Lawn: A White House Festival of Ideas, Art, and Action. It will include a screening of DiCaprio’s new environmental documentary “Before the Flood,” which will be in theaters October 21. The president and the Oscar-winning actor will take part in a conversion with climate scientist Dr. Katharine Hayhoe about "the importance of protecting the one planet we've got for future generations."

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit will hear oral arguments Tuesday in West Virginia v. EPA, the legal challenge to President Barack Obama’s signature global warming initiative, the Clean Power Plan (CPP). The litigation is massive in scale — nearly every state in the union is involved in some capacity. West Virginia is leading a coalition of 27 states who are challenging the rule, while 18 states have come to the Plan’s defense. Each side is joined by activist and industry groups, electric companies, academics, lawmakers, tech companies, and retired dignitaries who together have filed over 70...

As the Paris climate agreement edged closer to entering into force – which many advocates hope will occur before the possibility of a Trump presidency – Secretary of State John Kerry on Wednesday thanked what he called “warriors for the planet” as the second-to-last hurdle on the path to that achievement was cleared. Addressing the U.N. General Assembly in New York, Kerry said he was “absolutely confident” that the most ambitious climate deal yet negotiated will enter into force before the next U.N. climate megaconference, which starts in Marrakech, Morocco on November 7 – one day before the U.S. election....

One of the main lines of evidence used by the Obama administration to justify its global warming regulations doesn’t exist in the real world, according to a new report by climate researchers. Researchers analyzed temperature observations from satellites, weather balloons, weather stations and buoys and found the so-called “tropical hotspot” relied upon by the EPA to declare carbon dioxide a pollutant “simply does not exist in the real world.” They found that once El Ninos are taken into account, “there is no ‘record setting’ warming to be concerned about.” “These analysis results would appear to leave very, very little doubt...

In a move reminiscent of a wild-eyed, 1950s Commie hunt, EcoWatch has published a list of the most dangerous heretics from climate change orthodoxy, including Donald Trump, Congressman Joe Barton (R-TX), and Marc Morano. For the crime of questioning the science behind current global warming theories, especially regarding human causality and radical proposals of CO2 reduction, EcoWatch writer Michael Mann has branded these freethinking skeptics as “deniers”—in an intentional reference to those who repudiate the Jewish Holocaust. Gone are the days when intelligent inquiry was lauded as a prized element of serious science. Mann accuses the skeptics of “clouding the...

“Dangerous changes in our climate, caused mainly by human activity; dead zones in our ocean, caused mainly by pollution that we create here on land; unsustainable fishing practices; unprotected marine areas, in which rare species and entire ecosystems are at risk -- all those things are happening now. They’ve been happening for a long time. So if we’re going to leave our children with oceans like the ones that were left to us then we're going to have to act. And we're going to have to act boldly…. “One of the reasons I ran for President was to make sure...

National security insiders and environmentalists believe the next U.S. president must create a new cabinet position to confront so-called man made global warming. An environmentalist think tank and former members of the military brass argued in a report Wednesday that future presidential administrations must tackle global warming by crafting a cabinet level position to deal with the effects climate change have on national security. The document, which also describes global warming as a “significant and direct” threat to the U.S. military, is the brainchild of Washington-based think tank Center for Climate and Security, as well as senior military officials including...

Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein said she vandalized a bulldozer at an anti-oil protest earlier this week to show solidarity with those working to rescue the planet from global warming. Stein told a crowd at the Metropolitan Community College’s Fort Omaha campus Thursday that she had no other choice but to spray paint the words “I approve this message” on a bulldozer blade at the protest. She said she did it because the Native American protesters asked her to. “I felt like it was the least I could do in front of these Indian leaders, as they were putting...

The Communist legislature of China voted to ratify the Paris climate accords yesterday, leading to President Xi declaring the agreement now in effect in China. Meanwhile, President Obama also declared the ratification of the climate deal – but sort of forgot to take it to the Senate to get its approval. He just waved his scepter, and ratification came into being. Did you ever think you'd see the day when Communists would teach America a lesson about the democratic process?

Many climate scientists claim 2016 is on track to be the warmest year on record, but satellite-derived temperature data tells a different story. Satellite data compiled by scientists at the Earth System Science Center (ESSC) at The University of Alabama in Huntsville show global average temperature for the first eight months of 2016 show this year has been the second warmest year on record. “While global average temperatures peaked higher this year than they did in 1998, temperatures fell faster this spring and summer to levels that are cooler than they were at this same time of year in 1998,”...

First there was Brexit, now there’s Clexit – or “Climate Exit”. The Clexit Coalition represents a growing movement of individuals no longer buying that the “science” behind climate change is settled. They argue that all harmful, costly and unscientific climate treaties should be torn up and are on a mission to have their voices heard and their opinions represented fairly in the media. Viv Forbes, Founding Secretary of “Clexit” (Climate Exit), writes:

Antarctica has confounded scientists, defying the dire predictions of scientists the South Pole would shrink and exacerbate sea level rise in the coming decades. Climate models predicted Antarctic sea ice would shrink as the world warmed, and that warming would boost snowfall over the southern continent. Neither of those predictions have panned out, and now scientists say “natural variability” is overwhelming human-induced warming. “Truth is, the science is complex, and that in most places and with most events, natural variability still plays a dominant role, and undoubtedly will continue to do so,” Chip Knappenberger, a climate scientist with the libertarian...

Just when U.S. airlines are experiencing an active summer travel season, with four percent more passengers expected than last summer’s banner year, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) weighs in on the industry. Their recent verdict: “planet-warming pollution produced by airplanes endangers human health by contributing to climate change.” Such is the basis for their “endangerment finding” under the Clean Air Act, which now triggers the legal requirement to impose the first-ever government regulations of aircraft emissions and extend the EPA’s reach into yet another segment of the U.S. economy. The announced plan to reduce aircraft emissions takes place as President...

President Obama's carbon emission regulations are still in court and will be for several years. But that hasn't stopped the president from getting ready to propose new regulations to combat his notion of "climate change" - even if some of them apparently have little to do with global warming. The Hill: “We know that 2015 surpassed the hottest year on record – and 2016 is on pace to be even hotter,” Obama said in his weekly address. “There’s still so much more to do. “And if we keep pushing, and leading the world in the right direction, there’s no doubt...

No one could watch the games without plastics for computers, cameras, monitors, cell phones, dish antennas, banners and other equipment that promote, record and transmit the events. Neither athletes nor fans could get to the games without airlines, vehicles and fossil fuels. In short, virtually nothing we make, grow, eat, use or do is possible without fuels and materials that come out of holes in the ground somewhere on our planet. But radical greens want it all put off limits. They would rather see billions of acres of croplands, rainforests and wildlife habitats cleared and plowed – and trillions of...

Antarctica has way fewer rocky outcroppings than scientists previously estimated, according to a new study that found less than half a percent of the South Pole is not covered by snow and ice. The British Antarctic Survey (BAS) found “a 21,745 km2 total area of rock outcrop, equivalent to 0.18 ± 0.05% of the continent’s land area and 48% of the previous estimate.” Previous estimates put rocky outcroppings at 0.37 percent of the continent. “This is a significant decrease and highlights an overestimation in the current predictions of rock outcrop extent in Antarctica,” BAS scientists wrote in their new study....