Publics Want More Government Action on Climate Change: Global Poll

http://www.worldpublicopinion.org/pipa/articles/btenvironmentra/631.php?nid=&id=&pnt=631&lb=

WORLD'S LARGEST SCIENCE GROUP REJECTING MAN-MADE CLIMATE FEARS
Marc Morano
July 31, 2009
NewsWithViews.com

An outpouring of skeptical scientists who are members of the American Chemical Society (ACS) are revolting against the group's editor-in-chief -- with some demanding he be removed -- after an editorial appeared claiming “the science of anthropogenic climate change is becoming increasingly well established.”

The editorial claimed the "consensus" view was growing "increasingly difficult to challenge, despite the efforts of diehard climate-change deniers.” The editor now admits he is "startled" by the negative reaction from the group's scientific members. The American Chemical Society bills itself as the "world's largest scientific society."

The June 22, 2009 editorial in Chemical and Engineering News by editor in chief Rudy Baum, is facing widespread blowback and condemnation from American Chemical Society member scientists. Baum concluded his editorial by stating that “deniers” are attempting to “derail meaningful efforts to respond to global climate change.”

Dozens of letters were published on July 27, 2009 castigating Baum, with some scientists calling for his replacement as editor-in-chief.

The editorial was met with a swift, passionate and scientific rebuke from Baum's colleagues. Virtually all of the letters published on July 27 in castigated Baum's climate science views. Scientists rebuked Baum's use of the word “deniers” because of the terms “association with Holocaust deniers.” In addition, the scientists called Baum's editorial: “disgusting”; “a disgrace”; “filled with misinformation”; “unworthy of a scientific periodical” and “pap.”

One outraged ACS member wrote to Baum: "When all is said and done, and you and your kind are proven wrong (again), you will have moved on to be an unthinking urn for another rat pleading catastrophe. You will be removed. I promise."

Baum 'startled' by scientists reaction

Baum wrote on July 27, that he was "startled" and "surprised" by the "contempt" and "vehemence" of the ACS scientists to his view of the global warming "consensus."

"Some of the letters I received are not fit to print. Many of the letters we have printed are, I think it is fair to say, outraged by my position on global warming," Baum wrote.

Selected Excerpts of Skeptical Scientists:

“I think it's time to find a new editor,” ACS member Thomas E. D'Ambra wrote.

Geochemist R. Everett Langford wrote: “I am appalled at the condescending attitude of Rudy Baum, Al Gore, President Barack Obama, et al., who essentially tell us that there is no need for further research?that the matter is solved.”

ACS scientist Dennis Malpass wrote: “Your editorial was a disgrace. It was filled with misinformation, half-truths, and ad hominem attacks on those who dare disagree with you. Shameful!”

ACS member scientist Dr. Howard Hayden, a Physics Professor Emeritus from the University of Connecticut: “Baum's remarks are particularly disquieting because of his hostility toward skepticism, which is part of every scientist's soul. Let's cut to the chase with some questions for Baum: Which of the 20-odd major climate models has settled the science, such that all of the rest are now discarded? <...> Do you refer to 'climate change' instead of 'global warming' because the claim of anthropogenic global warming has become increasingly contrary to fact?"

Edward H. Gleason wrote: “Baum's attempt to close out debate goes against all my scientific training, and to hear this from my ACS is certainly alarming to me...his use of 'climate-change deniers' to pillory scientists who do not believe climate change is a crisis is disingenuous and unscientific.”

Atmospheric Chemist Roger L. Tanner: "I have very little in common with the philosophy of the Heartland Institute and other 'free-market fanatics,' and I consider myself a progressive Democrat. Nevertheless, we scientists should know better than to propound scientific truth by consensus and to excoriate skeptics with purple prose."

William Tolley: "I take great offense that Baum would use Chemical and Engineering News, for which I pay dearly each year in membership dues, to purvey his personal views and so glibly ignore contrary information and scold those of us who honestly find these views to be a hoax."


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William E. Keller wrote: “However bitter you (Baum) personally may feel about CCDs (climate change deniers), it is not your place as editor to accuse them—falsely—off nonscientific behavior by using insultingly inappropriate language. <...> The growing body of scientists, whom you abuse as sowing doubt, making up statistics, and claiming to be ignored by the media, are, in the main, highly competent professionals, experts in their fields, completely honorable, and highly versed in the scientific method?characteristics that apparently do not apply to you.”

ACS member Wallace Embry: “I would like to see the American Chemical Society Board 'cap' Baum's political pen and 'trade' him to either the New York Times or Washington Post."

Physicists Dr. Lubos Motl, who publishes the Reference Frame website, weighed in on the controversy as well, calling Baum's editorial an "alarmist screed."

“Now, the chemists are thinking about replacing this editor who has hijacked the ACS bulletin to promote his idiosyncratic political views," Motl wrote on July 27, 2009.

Baum cites discredited Obama Administration Climate Report

To “prove” his assertion that the science was “becoming increasingly well established,” Baum cited the Obama Administration's U.S. Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) study as evidence that the science was settled.
Baum also touted the Congressional climate bill as “legislation with real teeth to control the emission of greenhouse gases.”

The American Chemical Society's scientific revolt is the latest in a series of recent eruptions against the so-called “consensus” on man-made global warming.

On May 1 2009, the American Physical Society (APS) Council decided to review its current climate statement via a high-level subcommittee of respected senior scientists. The decision was prompted after a group of 54 prominent physicists petitioned the APS revise its global warming position. The 54 physicists wrote to APS governing board: “Measured or reconstructed temperature records indicate that 20th - 21st century changes are neither exceptional nor persistent, and the historical and geological records show many periods warmer than today.”

The petition signed by the prominent physicists, led by Princeton University's Dr. Will Happer, who has conducted 200 peer-reviewed scientific studies. The peer-reviewed journal Nature published a July 22, 2009 letter by the physicists persuading the APS to review its statement. In 2008, an American Physical Society editor conceded that a “considerable presence” of scientific skeptics exists.

In addition, in April 2009, the Polish National Academy of Science reportedly “published a document that expresses skepticism over the concept of man-made global warming.” An abundance of new peer-reviewed scientific studies continue to be published challenging the UN IPCC climate views. (See: Climate Fears RIP...for 30 years!? - Global Warming could stop 'for up to 30 years! Warming 'On Hold?...'Could go into hiding for decades,' peer-reviewed study finds ? Discovery.com —March 2, 2009 & Peer-Reviewed Study Rocks Climate Debate! 'Nature not man responsible for recent global warming...little or none of late 20th century warming and cooling can be attributed to humans' —July 23, 2009 )

A March 2009 a 255-page U. S. Senate Report detailed "More Than 700 International Scientists Dissenting Over Man-Made Global Warming Claims." 2009's continued lack of warming, further frustrated the promoters of man-made climate fears. See: Earth's 'Fever' Breaks! Global temperatures 'have plunged .74°F since Gore released An Inconvenient Truth' ? July 5, 2009

In addition, the following developments further in 2008 challenged the “consensus” of global warming. India Issued a report challenging global warming fears; a canvass of more than 51,000 Canadian scientists revealed 68% disagree that global warming science is “settled”; A Japan Geoscience Union symposium survey in 2008 reportedly “showed 90 per cent of the participants do not believe the IPCC report.” Scientific meetings are now being dominated by a growing number of skeptical scientists. The prestigious International Geological Congress, dubbed the geologists' equivalent of the Olympic Games, was held in Norway in August 2008 and prominently featured the voices of scientists skeptical of man-made global warming fears.

Selected Excerpted Highlights of American Chemical Society Scientist's Reaction to Baum's Editorial: (For full letters see here.)

Instead of debate, members are constantly subjected to your arrogant self-righteousness and the left-wing practice of stifling debate by personal attacks on anyone who disagrees. I think ACS should make an effort to educate its membership about the science of climate change and let them draw their own conclusions. Although under your editorial leadership, I suspect we would be treated to a biased and skewed version of scientific debate. I think its time to find a new editor. <...> How about using your position as editor to promote a balanced scientific discussion of the theory behind the link of human activity to global warming? I am not happy that you continue to use the pulpit of your editorials to promote your left-wing opinions.

Thomas E. D'Ambra
Rexford, N.Y.

Baum's remarks are particularly disquieting because of his hostility toward skepticism, which is part of every scientist's soul. Let's cut to the chase with some questions for Baum: Which of the 20-odd major climate models has settled the science, such that all of the rest are now discarded? Do you refer to "climate change" instead of "global warming" because the claim of anthropogenic global warming has become increasingly contrary to fact?

Howard Hayden
Pueblo West, Colo.

I was a geochemist doing research on paleoclimates early in my career. I have tried to follow the papers in the scientific literature. <...> I am appalled at the condescending attitude of Rudy Baum, Al Gore, President Barack Obama, et al., who essentially tell us that there is no need for further research—that the matter is solved. The peer-reviewed literature is not unequivocal about causes and effects of global warming. We are still learning about properties of water, for goodness' sake. There needs to be more true scientific research without politics on both sides and with all scientists being heard. To insult and denigrate those with whom you disagree is not becoming.

R. Everett Langford
The Woodlands, Texas

Your editorial in the June 22 issue of C&EN was a disgrace. It was filled with misinformation, half-truths, and ad hominem attacks on those who dare disagree with you. Shameful!

Are you planning to write an editorial about the Environmental Protection Agency's recent suppression of a global warming report that goes against the gospel according to NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies Director James Hansen? Or do you only editorialize on matters in keeping with your biased views on global warming?


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Trying to arrest climate change is a feeble, futile endeavor and a manifestation of human arrogance. Humankind's contribution to climate change is minuscule, and trying to eliminate even that minute effect will be enormously expensive, damaging to the poorest people on the planet, and ultimately ineffective.

Dennis Malpass
Magnolia, Texas

I can't accept as facts the reports of federal agencies, because they have become political and are more likely to support the regime in power than not. Baum's attempt to close out debate goes against all my scientific training, and to hear this from my ACS is certainly alarming to me.

Edward H. Gleason
Ooltewah, Tenn.

Having worked as an atmospheric chemist for many years, I have extensive experience with environmental issues, and I usually agree with Rudy Baum's editorials. But his use of "climate-change deniers" to pillory scientists who do not believe climate change is a crisis is disingenuous and unscientific. <...> Given the climate's complexity and these and other uncertainties, are we justified in legislating major increases in our energy costs unilaterally guided only by a moral imperative to "do our part" for Earth's climate? I am among many environmentally responsible citizen-scientists who think this is stupid, both because our emissions reductions will be dwarfed by increases elsewhere (China and India, for example) and because the models have large uncertainties. <...> I have very little in common with the philosophy of the Heartland Institute and other "free-market fanatics," and I consider myself a progressive Democrat. Nevertheless, we scientists should know better than to propound scientific truth by consensus and to excoriate skeptics with purple prose.

Roger L. Tanner
Muscle Shoals, Ala.

I would like to see the ACS Board cap Baum's political pen and trade him to either the New York Times or Washington Post.

Wallace Embry
Columbia, Tenn.

In the interest of brevity, I can limit my response to the diatribe of the editor-in-chief in the June 22 edition of C&EN to one word: Disgusting.

Louis H. Rombach
Wilmington, Del.

I am particularly offended by the false analogy with creationists. It is easy to just dismiss anyone who dares disagree as being "unscientific."

Daniel B. Rego
Las Vegas

While Baum obviously has strong personal views on the subject, I take great offense that he would use C&EN, for which I pay dearly each year in membership dues, to purvey his personal views and so glibly ignore contrary information and scold those of us who honestly find these views to be a hoax.

William Tolley
San Diego

I appreciate it when C&EN presents information from qualified supporters of either, and preferably both, sides of an issue to help readers decide what is correct, rather than dispensing your conclusions and ridiculing people who disagree with you.

P. S. Lowell
Lakeway, Texas

I am a retired Ph.D. chemical engineer. During my working years, I was involved in many environmental issues concerning products and processes of the companies for which I worked. I am completely disgusted with the June 22 editorial. I do not consider it to be very scientific to castigate skeptics of man-made global warming. <...> not of particular concern because "the ocean is a very large sink for carbon dioxide." <...> The overall problem here is that there is already an abundance of scientific illiteracy in the American public that will not be improved by Baum's stance in what should be a scientific magazine. Theories are not proven by consensus—but by data from repeatable experimentation that leaves no doubt of interpretation.

Charles M. Krutchen
Daphne, Ala.

Please do not keep writing C&EN editorials according to the liberal religion's credo—"Attack all climate-change deniers, creationists, conservatives, people who voted for George W. Bush, etc." It is a sign of weakness in your argument when you attack those who disagree. <...> Your choice of terminology referring to skeptical scientists who don't toe your line as CCD, climate-change deniers, and putting them in association with Holocaust deniers, is unworthy of an editorial in a scientific periodical. Who don't you go head-to-head with the critics? Please don't keep doing this. Find a scientific writer for the editorial page. We get plenty of this pap from the mainstream media and do not need it in C&EN.

Heinrich Brinks
Monterey, Calif.

Your utter disdain of CCDs and the accusations of improper tactics you ascribe to them cannot be dismissed. However bitter you personally may feel about CCDs, it is not your place as editor to accuse them—falsely—of of nonscientific behavior by using insultingly inappropriate language. The growing body of scientists, whom you abuse as sowing doubt, making up statistics, and claiming to be ignored by the media, are, in the main, highly competent professionals, experts in their fields, completely honorable, and highly versed in the scientific method—characteristics that apparently do not apply to you. The results presented by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which you call the CCD's "favorite whipping boy," do indeed fall into the category of predictions that fail to match the data, requiring a return to the drawing board. Your flogging of the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change is not only infantile but beggars you to contribute facts to back up your disdain. Incidentally, why do we fund climate studies by U.S. Global Change Research Program if the problem is settled?

William E. Keller
Santa Fe, N.M.

For all of the letters send in repsone to Baum's editorial see here.

© 2009 Marc Morano - All Rights Reserved

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Marc Morano is the executive editor and chief correspondent for ClimateDepot.com, a global warming and eco-news center founded in 2009. Morano served for three years as a senior advisor, speechwriter, and climate researcher for U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee as he also managed the award-winning communication operations of the GOP side. Morano, who has spent years researching climate change, environmental, and energy issues, traveled to Greenland in 2007 to investigate global warming claims. Morano was featured in a profile in the New York Times in April 2009. As Senate staff, Morano also attended the United Nation's climate eco-conferences held in Kenya, Indonesia, and Poland in 2006, 2007, and 2008. Morano authored and compiled the 2007 groundbreaking report of 400-plus dissenting scientists and the follow-up 2009 report of 700-plus scientists dissenting from man-made global warming fears.

Morano has held both White House and Capitol Hill Press credentials and a former member of the Society of Professional Journalists. He has attended and reported on numerous international eco-conferences as well as the 2002 UN-sponsored Earth Summit in Johannesburg, South Africa. Prior to joining the Senate, Morano worked for well over a decade as an investigative journalist, documentary maker, radio talk show host and national television correspondent. In 2000, his investigative television documentary "Amazon Rainforest: Clear-Cutting the Myths" created an international firestorm. His reporting has made international news, including appearances and coverage on CNN, Fox News Channel's The O'Reilly Factor and Hannity & Colmes, BBC TV, The New York Times, The Washington Post, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Post, US Weekly Magazine, web links from the Drudge Report, the entertainment show Extra TV, and Politically Incorrect w/ Bill Maher.

Web site: ClimateDepot.com

E-Mail: Morano@ClimateDepot.com

In fact, his site comes up first when Googling that!
http://www.google.com/search?q=WORLD%27S+LARGEST+SCIENCE+GROUP+REJECTING+MAN-MADE+CLIMATE+FEARS
:sarcasm:
But seriously, this is stuff from the chemtrails and New World Order realm. Why are you posting it here?

Public Policy Statement
2007-2010
The American Chemical Society is a non-profit scientific and educational organization, chartered by Congress, with more than 160,000 chemical scientists and engineers as members. The world’s largest scientific society, ACS advances the chemical enterprise, increases public awareness of chemistry, and brings its expertise to state and national matters.

American Chemical Society, 1155 Sixteenth Street NW, Washington DC 20036, 202-872-4386, www.acs.org/policy

GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE
ACS POSITION
Careful and comprehensive scientific assessments have clearly demonstrated that the Earth’s climate system is changing rapidly in response to growing atmospheric burdens of greenhouse gases and absorbing aerosol particles (IPCC, 2007). There is very little room for doubt that observed climate trends are due to human activities. The threats are serious and action is urgently needed to mitigate the risks of climate change.

The reality of global warming, its current serious and potentially disastrous impacts on Earth system properties, and the key role emissions from human activities play in driving these phenomena have been recognized by earlier versions of this ACS policy statement (ACS, 2004), by other major scientific societies, including the American Geophysical Union (AGU, 2003), the American Meteorological Society (AMS, 2007) and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS, 2007), and by the U. S. National Academies and ten other leading national academies of science (NA, 2005). This statement reviews key global climate change impacts and recommends actions required to mitigate or adapt to currently anticipated consequences.

CLIMATE CHANGE IMPACTS
The effects of projected unmitigated climate change on key Earth system components, ecological systems and human society over the next fifty years will be profound and, quite possibly, irreversible (IPCC, 2007). Higher surface temperatures will severely impact many land-based life forms, damaging vulnerable ecosystems and endangering key plant and animal species. Sea level is rising and the ocean is acidifying; the first threatens coastal habitations and ecosystems, the second will have profound effects on marine ecosystems. Snowfall and snowmelt patterns are changing and rainfall patterns may also be unstable, threatening fresh water supplies in vulnerable regions. Increases in severe weather events are very likely, with increasing damage due to floods, drought, and heat waves. We are, in effect, in the midst of a vast experiment with the Earth’s climate—with uncertain, but likely quite unpleasant, outcomes.

The costs of unchecked climate change in economic loss, human misery, and loss of ecosystem services are likely to be enormous. The United Nations Environment Programme estimated that climate change could cost world gross domestic product from $150 to $300 billion annually unless strong efforts are made by developed and developing nations to curb greenhouse gas emissions (UNEP, 2002). More recently, the Stern Review suggested that: "the overall costs and risks of climate change will be equivalent to losing at least 5% of global GDP each year, now and forever" (Stern, 2007). Additional costs due to climate driven increases of refugees, illness, malnutrition, and conflicts over water, energy and food resources could easily dwarf the more easily estimated GDP losses. The costs of lost ecosystem services are difficult to compute, but may ultimately threaten the planet's capacity to sustain the current, much less the projected, population density (Daily et al, 2000).

RECOMMENDATIONS
1. Earth Systems Science
Successfully addressing the challenges of global climate change requires enhanced understanding of Earth system dynamics. Climate change is a very complex phenomenon involving the coupled physical, chemical and biological processes affecting the atmosphere, land surfaces and the oceans. The U.S. has been a leader in Earth system and climate change research, but funding for these activities has dropped dramatically over the past five years, slowing progress in vital areas of atmospheric chemistry, dynamics and radiation transport, cloud and aerosol chemistry and physics, ocean biogeochemistry and dynamics, glacial, ice cap and sea ice dynamics, hydrology, ecology, soil microbiology, multi-scale Earth system modeling and other key disciplines. The ability to quantify trends in climate parameters and resulting impacts on geological and ecological systems will require the enhancement and maintenance of sophisticated Earth observation satellites as well comprehensive in situ atmospheric, oceanic and ecological sensor systems.

Recommendation 1 - Re-invigorate and fully fund a comprehensive U.S. research program to better predict the impacts of climate change on regional, national and global scales and to allow the systematic analyses needed to effectively design and evaluate mitigation and adaptation strategies. Cooperation and collaboration with other nations on both an aggressive Earth systems research agenda and the necessary Earth observing systems should be emphasized.

2. Greenhouse Gas Emission Reduction
Progress to reduce U.S. and global greenhouse gas emissions to mitigate the scale and impact of accelerating climate change must start now using current technological capabilities. Opportunities to reduce CO2 emissions include enhanced fuel economy for on-road and off road vehicles, better insulated and more efficiently heated and cooled buildings, more efficient lighting, and more convenient and available mass transit.

Opportunities also exist to reduce CO2 emissions from fossil fuel combustion by substituting more sustainable biomass based fuels and by adopting non-combustion energy sources based on solar thermal, solar photovoltaic, wind, or tidal power. Successful deployment of enhanced energy conservation and fossil fuel substitution technologies will be expedited by increased research and development funding and shifts in government subsidies and incentives away from fossil fuel producers and users and to energy conservation efforts and more sustainable energy sources. Coal-fueled and nuclear electrical power generation systems may also be part of CO2 reduction strategies if effective and economic means to sequester CO2 emissions from coal combustion or advanced coal processing are developed for the former and if fuel diversion, spent fuel disposal, and power plant security issues are resolved for the latter.

Successful efforts to reduce petroleum and natural gas consumption through conservation or sustainable-fuel substitution will not only reduce net CO2 emissions, but also reduce reliance on fuel sources that are increasingly insecure for both economic and geopolitical reasons. Reduction in reliance on combustion driven energy systems will also contribute to both better air quality and reduced warming.

Many opportunities exist to reduce non-CO2 greenhouse emissions, including biogenic CH4 from landfills, agriculture and other land use practices and biogenic N2O from agricultural and non-agricultural fertilizer use, air pollutant deposition and waste disposal. Geological CH4 emissions associated with natural gas, petroleum and coal production, refining and distribution can also be reduced. Key knowledge needed to design, evaluate and implement better controls for theses non-CO2 greenhouse gases is likely to come from the enhanced Earth systems research called for in Recommendation 1. Reducing CH4 emissions also reduces secondary O3 and CO2 production and reducing N2O emissions reduces stratospheric ozone depletion.

It is certain that there will be no single solution to climate change challenges. Individual technologies may make more sense in particular situations or locales (e.g., solar or wind power). Others may merit national implementation (fuel efficiency standards). With adequate R&D funding, we may also be able to develop additional novel technologies and processes to mitigate climate change. For example, success in green chemistry and nanotechnology may dramatically reduce energy and materials use in the future. Several U.S. states and major municipalities have already set significant greenhouse reduction goals and implemented steps to meet them. The federal government needs to catch up with these forward-looking regions.

Enhanced research in the fields of energy efficiency and conservation, alternative and renewable energy sources, climate change adaptation, pollution prevention, and carbon sequestration also serves other important national goals, including economic prosperity, a high quality of life, and environmental protection. Developing and deploying these technologies will likely reduce energy costs, increase productivity, improve the nation’s energy independence, improve air and water quality, and reduce environmental hazards, in addition to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. These benefits are also sought by other nations opening up the potential of new export markets that could improve our nation’s trade balance.

Recommendation 2a – The U.S. should immediately adopt nationwide goals for rapid and deep reductions in CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions and develop effective economic drivers to achieve these goals. Options such as emission cap and trade regimes, carbon taxes, or emissions taxes need to be devised, tested and implemented on a national basis. The U.S. should work closely with all major greenhouse gas emitter nations to secure their commitment to similar greenhouse gas emission reductions.

Recommendation 2b – The U.S. should significantly raise its public and private sector investments in
technologies to mitigate climate change through economically viable energy conservation, biomass fuel substitution for fossil fuels, carbon sequestration and non-fossil fuel based energy sources. Key actions include:
1) Federal government revaluation of subsidies and incentives to allow advanced energy technologies to operate on an even playing field with the current, heavily subsidized energy sources.
2) Enhanced federal R&D funding to develop both innovative energy sources with low net greenhouse
gas emission and energy-efficient technologies and processes for the industrial, agricultural and transportation sectors.
3) Business and industry should be encouraged to use private sector funding for development of enhanced
low-emission, energy technologies and energy-efficient processes. Additional venture funding must be provided to commercialize new energy-efficient technologies. The growing international demand for advanced, sustainable energy and energy-efficient process technologies in both developed and developing countries represents a major market that U.S. based companies should make every effort to serve, reaping economic benefits for themselves and environmental benefits for everyone.
4) Comprehensive evaluation of the life cycle environmental, health, safety, economic and social impacts of new technologies and processes before and during their implementation to ensure they help solve climate change issues without creating unanticipated societal and environmental problems.

3. Adaptation to Global Change
The current levels of long-lived atmospheric greenhouse gases and the levels of increased CO2 and heat absorbed by the world’s oceans ensures that the climate will continue to warm for decades, even if greenhouse gas and absorbing particle emissions are scaled back to more sustainable levels (IPCC, 2007). Thus, our nation and the world must adapt to inevitable changes in water supplies, agricultural productivity, severe weather patterns, sea-level rise and ecosystem viabilities. In order to devise and implement effective adaptation
strategies we need to know more and to better communicate what we know to all levels of human society.
The enhanced research and development activities called for in Recommendation 1 will help us better predict the circumstances to which we must adapt. Additional research will be needed to understand how to enable society to survive and thrive under new climate conditions. The public will need to recognize and understand the challenges that need to be faced and to summon the social and political will to identify, evaluate and implement appropriate responses. Public media and educational institutions at all levels will need to be able to explain current and anticipated global change effects and potential response strategies.

Recommendation 3a – Collaboration at every level of government and with other nations should be encouraged to assess current global climate change impacts at regional, national and global scales and to share ways to successfully cope with climate change effects.

Recommendation 3b – The federal government should fund research on methods of adapting to climate change-induced conditions affecting infrastructure, agriculture, and the basic habitability of severely affected areas.

Recommendation 3c – Printed, video and web-based curricular materials examining global climate change and Earth system science, natural and societal impacts of global climate change, and ways individuals and organizations can adopt to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and adaptation options available to regions, states and municipalities should be developed and utilized at all educational levels, from elementary school through college. Media materials addressing these topics should also be developed and posted on continuously updated web sites that are widely advertised. Annual reports on global change issues should be prepared for the Congress and the Nation to stimulate and support informed dialog about how to best deal with climate change.

REFERENCES
AAAS, 2007, AAAS Board Statement on Climate Change, American Association for the Advancement of
Science, http://www.aaas.org/news/press_room/climate_change/mtg_200702/aaas_climate_statement.pdf

AGU, 2003, Human Impacts on Climate, American Geophysical Union,
http://www.agu.org/sci_soc/policy/positions/climate_change.shtml

AMS, 2007, Climate Change, American Meteorological Society,
http://www.ametsoc.org/POLICY/2007climatechange.html

Daily, G.C., et al., 2000, The Value of Nature and the Nature of Value, Science 289, 395-396.

IPCC, 2007, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, http://www.ipcc.ch/
NA, 2005, Joint science academies’ statement: Global response to climate change,
http://www.nationalacademies.org/onpi/06072005.pdf

Stern, N., 2007, The Economics of Climate Change, Cambridge University Press.

UNEP, 2002, Climate Change & the Financial Services Industry, United Nations Environment Programme,
July 2002.

http://www.ametsoc.org/policy/2009geoengineeringclimate_amsstatement.html

http://www.nationalacademies.org/includes/G8+5energy-climate09.pdf

China needs to make deep, meaningful cuts

Five men sit in a leaking rowboat. One in the front, and four in the back. Each end has a hole of roughly the same size. They all face drowning, and the one in the front says to the four in the back, "I'm not going to patch my hole until you do something about yours!"

Five families live in a woods. One rich family has a old drafty house, with many old fireplaces. Four poor families have moved to the same woods. Each one of the poor families burns a little more than ¼ as much wood as the rich family. No efforts have been made to replant the woods, and they are slowly being depleted. The rich family says to the poor families, "We're not going to do anything about our house, until you do something about yours!"