Beware of hot air on global warming

Letters

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Friday, February 22, 2008

In her article 'What's happening to our climate?' (Belfast Telegraph, February 18), Linda McKee falls into the same traps occupied by so many of her colleagues in the media.

In the first instance, she confuses local climate variations with global warming.

Global mean temperatures have been more or less static since 1998 and the temperatures that year were exceeded during the 1930s.

The Northern Hemisphere, apart from Western Europe, has been experiencing its coldest winter for many years while Antarctic summer ice was at the highest ever recorded extent for January.

Ms McKee quotes Geoff Nuttall, of the World Wide Fund for Nature, referring to the latest IPCC report (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) claiming overwhelming evidence for human activity causing climate change.

However, the IPCC report has come under sustained criticism from the world's scientists.

Last December, in a report to the US Senate, over 400 prominent scientists from more than two dozen countries voiced significant objections to major aspects of the so-called 'consensus' on man-made global warming.

These scientists, many of whom are current and former participants in the UN IPCC, criticised the climate claims made by the UN IPCC and former Vice President Al Gore.

I recommend this report to any journalist.

It is essential that all parts of the UK reduce their dependence for energy on fossil fuels.

However, the main driver for this action should be the need to avoid increasing reliance on unstable countries for our energy. Reducing carbon dioxide emissions to avoid an unproven climate effect is a dangerous red herring.

Efficient extraction methods for indigenous UK coal supplies must be developed to fill the gap until there is sufficient nuclear generating capacity (for about 50% of total needs).

Northern Ireland does not have huge amounts of indigenous coal supplies, so progress towards local nuclear generation, perhaps in co-operation with the Republic, must be accelerated.

Alan Love, Energy and Environment Policy Committee, United Kingdom Independence Party, Lisburn