(http://www.buzzflash.com/reviews/06/01/rev06015.html)

Well sorry, activist cinema has no place in science and scientific discussions. His supporters go on to say that Gore wrote "An Inconvenient Truth" from a “passionate conviction” that the future of our environment is in grave danger. Sorry again, but passionate convictions won’t get you a “C” in freshman physics, let alone a responsible position in the climate change discussions.

Nobel Laureate Richard Feynman describes the bases for settling scientific disputes. These depend solely on experimentation and observation, not, I might add, computer models, which of course do not produce data at all. Feynman says “In general, we look for a new law by the following process. First, we guess it. Then we compute the consequences of the guess to see what would be implied if this law that we guessed is right. Then we compare the result of the computation to nature, with experiment or experience; compare it directly with observation to see if it works. If it disagrees with experiment it is wrong. It’s that simple statement is the key to science. It does not make any difference how beautiful your guess is. It does not make any difference how smart you are, who made the guess, or what his name is -- if it disagrees with experiment it is wrong. (“The Character of Natural Law,” The MIT Press, 1965, p. 156).

Feynman’s admonition is as simple as it is stern and must be obeyed. Data, or observations, must settle the disputes, not assertions, not wishes, not passionate convictions, and not flashy movies. There are plenty of climate data showing a little warming, a little cooling, and no changes for 100 years. There is little surprising in the actual temperature data, except these are not mentioned by Al.

For example Dr. Robert Balling professor of climatology at Arizona State Univ. writes (http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=052406F) “Gore discusses glacial and snow pack retreats atop Mt. Kilimanjaro, implying that human induced global warming is to blame. But Gore fails to mention that the snows of Kilimanjaro have been retreating for more than 100 years, largely due to declining atmospheric moisture, not global warming. Gore does not acknowledge the two major articles on the subject published in 2004 in the International Journal of Climatology and the Journal of Geophysical Research showing that modern glacier retreat on Kilimanjaro was initiated by a reduction in precipitation at the end of the nineteenth century and not by local or global warming. Not exactly doomsday is it, and not exactly fossil fuels as the cause, either.

Balling also writes (http://www.tcsdaily.com/article.aspx?id=052406F) “Gore claims that sea level rise could drown the Pacific islands, Florida, major cities the world over, and the 9/11 Memorial in New York City."

No mention is made of the fact that sea level has been rising at a rate of 1.8 mm per year for the past 8,000 years; the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) notes (http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/013.htm) that "No significant acceleration in the rate of sea level rise during the 20th century has been detected." If one snorkels around the Hawaiian Islands he’ll see evidence of older sea levels both above and below the current sea levels. Not exactly doomsday either. Gore’s movie is obviously targeting the non-scientific in our midst, as well as his green supporters, the Hollywood elites, and other sympathizers with Gore’s politics. This is ok if science fiction is your bag, it just isn’t science.

What Gore seems to have missed is that far more likely than global warming is the impending demise and Death of Environmentalism. A tract with this same name was written several months ago by two young environmentalists, Michael Shellenberger and Ted Nordhaus. They also wrote that "modern environmentalism, with all of its unexamined assumptions, outdated concepts and exhausted strategies, must die so that something new can live." As an ex-green myself I agree with much of what they wrote.

Former Greenpeace founder Patrick Moore has described today’s environmentalists as being much different from what they were 35 years ago. He said to a conference in Hawaii several months ago that they:

• Tend strongly to be anti-human
• Anti science and technology
• Anti-trade and anti-capitalism
• Anti-business
• Anti-civilization
• Invariably misleading

A good reading of Ecological Sanity by Klaus and Bollander, Hard Green by Peter Huber, or The Green Crusade by Charles Rubin, and many, many others, will show that environmental movement has been scientifically aimless for many years.

Nicholas Kristoff writes (http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1361281/posts) “When environmentalists are writing tracts like "The Death of Environmentalism," you know the movement is in deep trouble.”

Kristoff continues “The fundamental problem, as I see it, is that environmental groups are too often alarmists. They have an awful track record, so they've lost credibility with the public.” Kristoff certainly got that right.

The forces which drive the Earth’s climate are very complex, and they have been in operating for millions of years and we still can’t identify them. We don’t even know if they’ll have warming effects, or cooling effects, or no effects, or their magnitudes, and variances. In other words Gore and friends don’t know what they are talking about, simply because they can’t know all about the forces of climate. No one does.

Scenic movies and wild assertions with doomsday voice-overs have no place in science classes, and most assuredly have no place in serious science policy debates.

Michael R. Fox, Ph.D., is the energy and science analyst for the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii and the energy and science writer for Hawaii Reporter. He has nearly 40 years experience in the energy field. He has also taught chemistry and energy at the University level. His interest in the communications of science has led to several communications awards, hundreds of speeches, and many appearances on television and talk shows. He can be reached via email at: mailto:foxm011@hawaii.rr.com

This editorial is intended to provoke thought, discussion and an examination of issues. It does not reflect official policy of the Grassroot Institute of Hawaii. See the GRIH Web site at: http://www.grassrootinstitute.org/

HawaiiReporter.com reports the real news, and prints all editorials submitted, even if they do not represent the viewpoint of the editors, as long as they are written clearly. Send editorials to mailto:Malia@HawaiiReporter.com

Offshoots

TILTING AT WINDMILLS

Daily Policy Digest

ENERGY ISSUES Cape Wind -- a project to put 130 wind turbines on 26 square miles off Nantucket Sound -- has generated a lot of hot air in Massachusetts, says William Koch, president of the Oxbow Corporation. In 2002, preliminary estimates showed that the project would cost $825 million to build, the turbines would operate at 40 percent and 1.5 million kilowatt-hours of electricity per year would be produced, says Koch. However, those estimates have changed, says Koch:

Today, it will cost $1.6 million to build, operate at only 30 percent and deliver only 126 megawatts. To earn the 20 percent return needed for financing, Cape Wind would have to sell electricity at 18 cents per kwh instead of 6.6 cents per kwh, which is twice the current market rate. This would increase the price of electricity by $105 million per year over the current market.

So what's driving this dramatic increase, asks Koch?

Steel and construction costs have increased dramatically, and wind turbines must be built with steel to withstand a harsh, corrosive maritime environment. Nantucket Sound has a construction window of only three to four months a year due to weather, and the technology for offshore wind turbines in the United States has not been fully developed. It's estimated to cost $10 million to $15 million in R&D to build offshore wind turbines that are noncorrosive and produce 110 volt cycle power.

Moreover, any power plant developer needs a willing market to sell electricity and southeastern Massachusetts has a 50 percent excess power capacity and won't need more for perhaps the next decade, says Koch. When you do the math, it's clear that every other form of power generation would be cheaper to build, produce more electricity at a consistent rate and save consumers more money, says Koch. Source: William Koch, "Tilting at Windmills," Wall Street Journal, May 22, 2006. For text (subscription required): http://online.wsj.com/article/SB114825818509759134.html For more on Energy: http://eteam.ncpa.org/issues/?c=energy-and-the-environment

Sprout of the Day

"Gvernment machinery has been described as a marvelous labor saving device which enables ten men to do the work of one."

- John Maynard Keynes

Sprig

During the past three decades, Hawaii has consistently had one of the nation’s highest tax burdens. Estimated at 11.7 percent of income, Hawaii’s state/local tax burden percentage ranks 5th highest, well above the national average of 10.6%. Taxpayers in the Aloha state pay $4,1496 per-capita in state and local taxes.

Source: The Tax Foundation

Grassroot Perspective...