In the religion of global warming, you are a heretic if you dare commit a wide panoply of climate-denying sins: questioning a climate scientist’s methodology, doubting a government’s environmental program, or exposing the hypocrisy of Al Gore and his congregation. A new iniquity has ostensibly been added to the Gore commandments: thou shalt not cite the often-cited Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)’s scientific assessments.
Oakland and San Francisco are suing some of the world’s largest oil companies for their greenhouse gas emissions that they contend are contributing to global warming. On Wednesday, at the U.S. District Court of Northern California, there was a five-hour climate science “tutorial,” and the only defendant that participated in the event was Chevron.
But something remarkable happened during the court proceedings: Chevron did not challenge the IPCC assessment. In fact, the oil giant’s attorneys agreed with the group’s findings, which were published in 2013 and 2014, on global warming science.
Displeased by Chevron’s placid behavior, environmentalists employed a contradictory measure: they dismissed the study, calling the latest evaluation misleading and outdated. Activists even accused Chevron of taking a page out of the “climate-denier playbook” by agreeing with the international body.
Shaye Wolf, a Center for Biological Diversity climate scientist, told Earther:
“Chevron’s lawyer plucked his strategy right from the climate-denier playbook. He overemphasized and inflated narrow areas of uncertainty about global warming’s impacts. And he bobbed and weaved his way out of acknowledging the role of fossil fuels.”
Some were quick to point out the irony:
This tweet indicates how much the climate debate has changed.
An oil company is invoking the IPCC consensus as their opponents, environmental activists (including some climate scientists), deny the IPCC consensus.
Bizzaro world!⬇️ https://t.co/M8lbeZHlQi— Roger Pielke Jr. (@RogerPielkeJr) March 21, 2018
So, to summarize: Big Oil concurs with the IPCC, environmentalists have thrown the IPCC under the bus, and anyone who uses the IPCC as a source is now a climate denier.
Are we residing in bizarro world? Is this an episode of The Twilight Zone? Are we in a parallel universe?
IPCC: The Science is Settled
The science is settled. The debate is finished. Ninety-seven percent of scientists agree that the time for talk is over and the time for action is now!
These words are usually spouted by global warming preachers and climate researchers itching for more public funding. Over the years, there have been numerous individuals and entities trying to hold discussions with Gore about a myriad of other data to suggest concerns are overblown or the catastrophic predictions have been wrong. These talks never come to fruition – you can’t blame Gore, though, because billions of dollars are at stake.
When Gore and his followers do appear on network television or in front of friendly audiences, they usually allude to the IPCC as evidence that there is a consensus on global warming.
Why has the IPCC been the paragon of scientific environmental virtue for so long? Why is it the “gold standard” of manmade global warming discipline?
In 2007, Gore and the IPCC were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize 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.”
Another explanation for the 30-year-old IPCC being the authority of climate science is that it’s repeatedly touted as such. The bigger the lie the more people will believe it…
Many of the climate policies – proposed or enacted – outlined by our esteemed representatives have originated from the IPCC. Everything from emission trading to national emission targets, politicians regularly champion and cite the organization in their announcements. If our brilliant officials are using the IPCC as inspiration, then it must be a respectable, reputable, and revered institution!
Your credibility is heightened even further if you start listing predictions that make a Roland Emmerich film seem tame.
In 2014, the panel issued its “final warning”:
“We have little time before the window of opportunity to stay within the 2C of warming closes.
We have the opportunity, and the choice is in our hands.
We have the means to limit climate change. The solutions are many and allow for continued economic and human development. All we need is the will to change.”
In other words, without more government, more taxes, more bureaucrats, and more cronyism, the planet is doomed!
The Environmentalists Are Right
Lord Stern of Brentford, who chaired the British government’s review of the economics of climate change, stated that the IPCC’s report “shows that there is no real intellectual basis for denying the risks of climate change.”
Using the logic of those who slammed Chevron for citing the IPCC, is Lord Stern a climate denier?
The environmentalists are correct for finally tossing the IPCC to the wolves. The IPCC is a governmental organization, not a scientific one. It is merely a political outfit trying to market itself as a scientific entity.
It was established in 1988 by two United Nations parties: the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). To make up the fabric of the IPCC, governments choose scientists to compose reports. But many of these scientists are not objective, neutral participants. Many of them belong to the green lobby or are climate activists – past or present. You will find representatives from the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) or Greenpeace. One of these individuals is Bill Hare, an ex-spokesperson for Greenpeace, who was the lead author in a 2007 paper.
Here you have two concerning issues: governments will tap scientists who will advance a cause, and politically-motivated contributors will unlikely put forward or highlight a contradictory finding.
Free Market Will Cure Climate
The climate is changing. It always has been changing. The extent to which it’s man-inflicted isn’t settled.
Mankind has only been industrious for nearly two centuries. In that period, we have done some harm to Mother Nature – from air pollution to ocean contamination. But humans are solving a lot of environmental hazards, too: species have been rescued, ocean plastic pollution is being cleared, and deforestation is becoming a thing of the past. Budyko’s Blanket theory could even be used to reverse warming trends.
What does this mean? Give us time. It took us millions of years to invent the wheel, toast bread, and learn that Hillary Clinton really is a killer robot (well, not yet anyway). The planet doesn’t need a bunch of IPCC bureaucrats telling us the solutions to our eco woes are higher tax rates and bigger government. John D. Rockefeller saved the whales, the free market saved the bees, and the entrepreneurial spirit will save Earth.
What do you think of the IPCC? Let us know in the comments section!
