What a breath of fresh "cooling" air in what has become a heated and uninformed debate. The author's credentials and practical experience deserve respect.

Christopher Monckton in his piece in the "Sunday Telegraph" 5 Nov 2006, has a reference to a .pdf "discussion calculations and references" which I doubt many have bothered to read; pity, because it contains some interesting scientific pointers to an underlying cause that is not greenhouse gas emissions or Co2. He posits the question:

"What role has the Sun played in recent warming?"

His reference "(Solanki and Fligge(2003) deduced that in the past half century the Sun has been hotter, and for longer, than at any time in the past 11,400 years" is worth following up. His conclusion: "...that the Sun is very likely to have contributed rather more to the past century's warm period than the UN has assumed, and that assumptions about the contribution of greenhouse gases to warming should be revised downwards accordingly"

I was taught by IBM "never assume it makes an ass out of you and me", and would discount the UN view accordingly, especially as it contains data that has been shown to be scientifically flawed. Any suggestions as to how we can turn down the Sun's heat will be read with interest and skepticism.
Richard42

Will someone please send out the contractors to lasoo them NewZealund icebergs.

Its like the old saying: Water water everywhere, but nary a drop to drink.

A thoughtful and valuable article.

Climate/weather is a staggeringly complex issue. The idea that human produced Carbon Dioxide is the 'cause' of global warming ALL BY ITSELF is childishly simplistic.

I am reminded of the old saw that 'every problem has a simple solution. And it is always wrong'.

A very common way of arguing is never to deny or admit anything just keep plugging away with ideas some of which may have value as a question to be considered, many just argumentative, others with deliberate intent.
Climate change has been argued thus. The deliberate intent to refute delay or disrupt has been vociferous. The parties involved have used as reference ‘opinion’ from those having no expertise in the area. Demeaning of those with honest endeavour and credential to impressive to ignore as being self serving creating their own jobs.
A criticism which with some validity might be levelled at say advertising for here untruth distortion is excused as necessary for the economic paradigm prevailing.
So to here. The Telegraph report has been dismissed by scientists as has the Climate lobby and other popular commentators.
That is the points raised have been addressed and found wanting.
I would need to go back and check that Lake Eire algal blooms and eutrophication was due to CO2.rather than phosphorous, I doubt. This exemplifies the above. The author quotes expertise and therefore must be checked.
Sure some contamination is due to natural factors. DDT has I think proved to have detrimental effects on the ecology and granted the jury is still out on humans, age, state of nutrition amongst other factors need to be considered when asking is it safe.
The point is made that interfering with natural events, made over long periods of time and surviving only because such events were a compromise amongst all the contending factors operating, can be dangerous , to us!. Change one of these factors and consequences unfavourable to us can ensue.
So the sun’s energy output could have changed it has in the past the Earths orbit could have altered , water vapour content could have increased and be causal.
Scientists have considered these and available evidence is they are not causal factors.
In all such debates one must ask who wins and who loses by the delay or change consequent.
Is the climate lobby really dead or is some profit yet to be made?

I was going to shell out to buy a greenhouse to grow tomatoes. Now I realise it's not the greenhouse but something else. Guess I'll save my money.

There is nothing new about climate change being complex. Nothing new at all.

Climate scientists know all about the complexity and the multiple variables feeding into it. That's exactly why is has taken so long to get the science right.

The IPCC and Al Gore's film have necessarily had to convey the nub of the problem, the whole population can not, and can't be expected to delve into the whole complex stuff that feeds into climate change.

But the absolute consensus that has emerged from the scientific community is the climate change is real; we humans are the major cause; carbon dioxide (amongst a number of other pollutants) is a major culprit; cutting back on these emissions is essential in order to stabilise our planetary atmosphere; if we don't we are in big trouble.

As amateur scientists each one of us is apt to interpret the science to suit our desired stance on the issue, but as An Inconvenient Truth went to some pains to point out, the scientific community is not at loggerheads over these major findings.

Because there are very large vested interests at stake there are, of course, some challenges to the consensed view, but no peer-reviewed science articles can stand a chance against the insurmountable evidence that has piled up to the proverbial ceiling.

When people face the fact that the Chinese are not going to reduce their emissions no matter what, a sense of reality will return to discussions on this subject. The media, however, is not interested in rational discussion, but rather in emotional allegations, sensation, doomsaying, and all the other old tricks that sell newspapers. Remember always that Australia doesn't matter, that 89% of the world population lives in the northern hemisphere, and that they generate 96% of the world's pollution. Note also that the media, like many political parties and religions, must make demands that cannot be satisfied.

How handy it is to have all-seeing seers like plerdsus to predict the future with absolute certainty. Who's gonna win the Ashes in 2012?

Blaming China is
a) hilarious: should smokers keep smoking until all other smokers quit first? Should burglars keep burgling till all other burglars quit? Should Aus keeping f**king the climate till all other countries tire of the same irresponsible game? Yes say the amoral economic fundamentalists in media and government.
& b) obscene: as it takes no account of the very much higher historic and current per capita emissions of Aus and other first world nations. Pointing to China is an intrinsically racist argument, presuming each Chinese has less right to emit than each Australian. Racism in RightThink? No, really?!?! Gosh, who'd a thunk it..

If Australians had a clue we'd realise China's emissions depend just a little bit on Australian coal, iron ore and gas exports. But we don't (have a clue).

In response to richard42's comments, I would direct him to http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/953353.stm where the notion of the Sun being the major cause of global warming is seriously questioned.

To me this argument is yet another distraction from the real issue... what are we going to do about our damaging impact on our planet? Whether we cause 70% or 30% is a moot point. It can not be debated though that we are having a significant impact on the flora, fauna and delicate balance of our ecosystems. We ignore this at our peril.

Regarding Frederic Jueneman's article, yes I would agree that carbon dioxide is an indicator (as well as part of the problem). It is an indicator of the way we are treating our environment and the unpredictable consequences of that.

Absolute scientific consensus on Global warming, my ass, Gecko et al. The only reason the climate wonkers continue to claim this absolute consensus is that it does not exist. It is like a child molester talking up the rights of children. Pure smoke screen and highly dishonest.

There is no such thing as "absolute consensus". Concensus means, 1; majority of opinion.
2; general agreement or concord; harmony.

There is consensus in the scientific community regarding global warming.

Alan Moran is paid (via the Institute for Public Affairs) by companies that will lose profits if Australia realises its arse is on fire and implements tight emissions caps & trading (preferably via tradeable energy quotas for all citizens).

What a coincidence that he floats a fantasy where Business decides what is best for all. Just like the coincidence of Gunns funding and prologging confabulations. Or WMC funding and pronuclear mendacity. Perhaps, like his collegues role in starving the Murray River of water http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Institute_of_Public_Affairs, it will come back to haunt him. Luck for his kids, Moran is a fairly common name.

Your reporting of that link, Bondo, is highly misleading. For a start the author was an "environment reporter", a class of pond life not known for its dedication for truth or accuracy.

More importantly, the article distorted the story. It turned a conference on the impact of solar radiation into yet another bit of green bollocks. The headline was taken from the line that some scientists at the conference were questioning the findings and the journalist then turned this questioning by a few of the people present and portrayed it as if the entire conference had major doubts about the role of solar forcing.

This is clearly not the case.

But it is standard sleazy stuff, same old gonzo green journalism, same old subsequent misquoting by people like yourself as if it were an established fact. Goebells would be proud of you. Shame on you. Do you have no respect for readers right to know the facts and make up their own minds?

thank you Perseus. I am still ploughing my way through the 77 pages of responses to Christopher Monckton's "Sunday Telegraph" articles, they make fascinating reading.. recommended. On the influence of the Sun, it has an 11 year cycle, but then reverses its magnetic field each time, so you need to use a 22 year cycle not 11, writes one reader, Christopher M replies "satellite data..have so far not completed two full 10.6 year cycles. The solar minimum towards the end of next year will be particularly interesting..." UC Irvine researchers on Nov 21 state that levels of methane-an important greenhouse gas-have remained steady for the past seven years instead of rising, as many scientists assumed (there is that word again..)they would.
A final comment from another respondent (an Engineer) ..I suggest the following statement "It is an incontrovertible scientific fact that if carbon dioxide is 500ppm of the atmosphere the quantity of heat it can account for is 0.05%. This is based on simple proportion of mass (with Specific Heat and Temperature constant). This means that any temperature variation due to the presence of Carbon Dioxide is insignificant when compared to the multitude of other factors which influence the Earth's climate"

As for "consensus", check out the 17,000 scientists who signed a petition against the "global warming" hysteria www.oism.org
Richard42

I've been debating climate change for thirty years. I'm used to every argument being countered by a differing view trawled up from within the scientific community. That is how science works. There is never complete agreement, and with an issue as complex as our planets ecosystem to expect that is silly. Governments have used that complexity to delay responding for all that time and, sadly, will continue to do so.

There is however now consensus within the scientific community though it has been a long time coming. That is not because it is now politically correct to jump on the global warming train but because the predictions made by scientists 30 or more years ago are proving correct and because research from so many disciplines point in the same direction. That is how science works... hypothesis, experiment, results, debate, consensus.

We can now decide that perhaps the causes of those results may be more complex and that more study is required, but it would be foolish in the extreme to look for other causes simply because that would be more convenient when there is already a working hypothesis for what the Earth is experiencing.

It behoves us to act on the information we have and respect the scientific process that has led to the current consensus on global warming.

A study taking place in the Nederlands, on a well known glacier, on the movement and retreat of it, had to be abandoned due to the massive retreat of the glacier not ever seen its history.

Measuring equipment was now at the bottom of the river that had been created by this massive thaw.

So Bondo has a selective retention deficit in respect of the meaning of consensus and Subdootwo is yet to discover that the Netherlands doesn't even have mountains, let alone Glaciers.

In such company it hardly rates mentioning that Glaciers could actually be melting due to increased albedo or reflection of suns energy which produces increased daytime temperatures that melt the ice while night time temperatures are lower but, obviously, dont make the glaciers grow from the bottom. And increased albedo is evidence of global cooling as less of the suns energy is absorbed by the earth.

Richard42 wrote:
As for "consensus", check out the 17,000 scientists who signed a petition against the "global warming" hysteria www.oism.org"

Most of the OISM 'scientists' are actually MD's, DDS's, and DVM's (doctors, dentists and veterinarians)! The whole thing was debunked years ago...

"The OISM petition also came under fire for being deceptively packaged: The petition was accompanied by an article purporting to debunk global warming that was formatted to look as though it had been published in the journal of the respected National Academy of Sciences. The resemblance was so close that the NAS issued a public statement that the OISM petition "does not reflect the conclusions of expert reports of the Academy."
Theres more.. http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Oregon_Institute_of_Science_and_Medicine

Richard42, i'm embarrassed for you regurgitating these eight year old lies, right when Lord Monkton has minted some nice fresh lies too. Stick to the Coal-ition song sheet man!

Liam, do you seriously believe these people could be duped that easily? Give us a break. And what about the 42 odd Canadian climate scientists that cautioned their government about accepting green claims on face value? On ya bike and take your increasingly squalid looking consensus with you.

.... check out the 17,000 scientists who signed a petition against the "global warming" hysteria
17,000, ALL FROM THE USA, hardly representative of our planet!
I am sure further investigation would isolate the true scientist from the junk scientist.

Whilst denialist continue to drag the debate to a slow level (why, is beyond me?) the planet continues to heatup and the possibilities of rectifying the problem become further from our reach.
Soon it will be too late for action, only consequences.