At today's MIT clean energy forum is was made clear by Obama's camp that climate science is driving an energy revoltion that will save us all from ourselves and from recession.
"Curiosity--It is both our station campaign and the heart of what drives scientists. Asking questions about the natural world is core to my personality and has been honed by my academic training. I ask questions and seek scientific evidence to support a clearer understanding of the natural world in action. I have been taught to peer beyond "consensus." It is my job. And as a weather forecaster, I feel compelled to share my curiosities about the state of climate science. Best hold on--my "curiosity" may leave you scratching your head, shaking a fist or saying "ah-ha."
I start with a question. Is our current "war" on climate change any different than the war in Iraq? What??? When you "drill down"--pun intended--both really represent a battle for "energy independence" by breaking ties to foreign oil. President Obama is betting the bank on a clean energy future that will neatly fix our climate woes while pulling us out of recession in one giant wave of economic reorganization.
At the MIT forum I attended today, there was no discussion of climate science. The globe is warming and humans are to blame--all that is taken as truth. But is it all really so certain?
As a humble weather forecaster for almost two decades, here is what I know to be some atmospheric "truths" or as close as we can come to that, knowing there is always some "uncertainty" lurking. Climate change happens. It has always happened--our climate is dynamic. Where we live (the Boston area) has been much warmer in the past and has also been stuck under a mile of ice.
We are able to model the atmosphere using mathematical equations of motion and thermodynamics. This enables us to forecast and although we are far from perfect, we do pretty well out to 7 days. Weather forecasting can be viewed as one of the greatest human achievements of our time. But if you ask me about this summer--I really don't know. Hotter than average? A wet July? Even the best weather minds in the government and private sector recognize that seasonal forecasting is business that pretty much eludes us. Every November, our weather team places bets on how much snow we are going to get over the winter. It's kinda like picking the Final Four--loosely based on educated guesses. How will the winter play out? Honestly, we really don't know in advance--we largely go week by week. Sometimes trends 10 to 14 days out can be captured--stormy, colder, warmer. That's about as good as it gets.
Weather modification has largely escaped us too. We can't control hurricanes or make it rain with any certainty. Yet somehow, the climate system, which is influence by even more variables than what goes into daily forecasts is somehow predictable decades out? And in details far beyond the grid spacing of Global Climate Models?
So we cannot modify the weather but we can shape our climate with greenhouse gases. The biggest offender is CO2 making up 1/25 of 1% of the constituents in our atmosphere. We breath out CO2--plants live on CO2. Is it really a pollutant??? Certainly urbanization has created some warming in our living spaces (more to come on that topic in May), but who is to say what our optimum climate is? Are temperatures right now the best for human civilization? Does everyone win at 350ppm (parts per million) of CO2? And if we do bring CO2 emissions under "control" is there a guarentee that the climate stays as is?? That certainly has not been the case in the past. To ensure a climate "steady state" we will have to also manage energy output from the sun and control ocean circulations--both are climate drivers.
There are some scientists that believe we are heading in just the opposite direction--into a period of global cooling largely driven by our very quiet sun cycle (featuring few sunspots). Colder times as recent as the 17th Century linked to decades of minimal sunspot activity made for extreme hardship. Advancing glaciation would really put human innovation to the test.
Don't get me wrong. I am DELIGHTED that our Earth and atmosphere are getting so much attention and that there are plans in place to hold us all accountable. We can only be better stewards of our ONE home. But is our changing climate really the correct basis for alarm and action? I'm curious? Are you???
