Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1,500 Years, Updated and Expanded Edition
Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1,500 Years, Updated and Expanded Edition – Review
Authors meet the case: 1. Global warming is real. 2. Global warming is mild, not severe, as the “climate alarmists” claim. The main points for the “Man-made Warming activists” are based on Computer modeling results and surface temperature measurements. The temperature measurement problem is challenged in chapter 9 and 11, and alternative long-term temperature theories are presented in Chapter 9, from proxies such as ice cores, tree rings, marine sediment deposits, et al. The Computer Modeling problem is challenged in Chapter 11. 3. Global warming is slow, not rapid, as the “climate alarmists” claim. Trend is up by 0.125 degrees C per decade. (Pg. 11) 4. Global warming is not primarily caused by CO2. (Both the “Roman Warming” of 200BC – 600AD and the “Medieval Warming” of 900AD – 1300AD were warmer than the current “Modern Warming” of 1850AD to present. Since “about eighty per cents of the carbon dioxide from individual activities penetrated the air after 1940″. Therefore, those earlier warming periods were NOT usually caused by slowly burning fossil fuels and thus not closely related to greatly increased CO2 levels. The Greenhouse Theory of man-induced high CO2 levels as the cause of the Modern Warming is thus explained to be most unlikely. 5. Global warming periods (and global cooling periods) are primarily caused by energy out-put changes from the regional star. (The main problem with this theory is that humans know very little about the long-term variations in stellar properties.) One scientist “reported that the sun’s radiation has greatly increased by nearly 0.05 percent per decade since the late 1970’s.” He has “used data from three different NASA ACRIM satellites watching the sun to assemble a twenty-five year release of total stellar radiation from 1978 to 2003. The trend is significant because the full energy output is so huge. A difference of 0.05 percent in its output is equal to all individual energy use.” (pg. 192) 6. The solar heat radiance fluctuations are extremely small, one per cent over 20 years, but this slight variance is electrically amplified by earths’ atmosphere. This amplification process is “by at least two factors: (1) cosmic rays producing further or fewer of the low, cooling clouds in the earth’s atmosphere; and (2) solar-driven ozone changes in the stratosphere effectively creating more or less heating of the lower atmosphere.” Pg. 192. 7. The solar heat fluctuations are cyclic, and are roughly corresponding to a 1470 year climate cycle. This cycle is actually related to the known sun-spot cycles of 87 and 210 years respectively. 8. The 1470 year climate cycle is experimentally verified by historical evidence, and by technical evidence such as ice cores, tree rings, marine sediment deposits, et al. The certain parts of this book are: 1. Many scientists and technical organizations and their works are frequently quoted and referenced. The Chapter Endnotes total 524. 2. The history is interesting. 3. The authors are scientists not journalists, per se. 4. The writing is clear, and the highest points are easy to grasp. 5. There are no cheap-shots or name-calling toward persons or groups that are in the so-called “climate alarmists” camp. There are only a few minor rhetorical swipes that, in my view, are fully warranted. The destructive aspects are: 1. Too much ground to cover. (Although I could say this was a positive, since its sometimes limited explanations finally allowed reliable readability.) 2. Too little unequivocal support of the solar-influence-on-climate theory, but that evidence may not be available until after hundreds or thousands of years of sun-study. Overall: Highly recommended.