Annual Energy Summit

Chamber’s Energy Summit refutes Cap & Trade, global warming
By Laura Ford Hall

The Pike County Chamber of Commerce with CEDAR and sponsor EQT presented an Energy Summit on Climate Change on Thurs., Nov. 5 at the Mark V. Over 240 people were in attendance to hear keynote speaker Tom Harris, the Executive Director of the International Climate Science Coalition (ICSC) speak on the truth of climate change and how the public is mislead by politicians and the media.

“The only constant thing about climate is change,” Harris said. “The Earth is going through a natural cycle that is driven by the sun. We have no solid proof that climate change is driven by human behavior.”

The ICSC is an international association of scientists, economists, and energy and policy experts working to promote better public understanding of climate change science and policy worldwide. The ICSC is committed to providing a highly credible alternative to the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), thereby, fostering a more rational open discussion about climate issues.

Harris’ speech was very informative and included a slide presentation full of factual graphs, charts, and scientific data to prove his point. “Climate models used by the government fail to reproduce known past climates without manipulation and therefore lack the scientific integrity needed for use in climate prediction and related policy decision making,” he said.
According to Harris, the information provided to the media and the public by policy makers does not take into consideration the fact that the Earth is still warming from the Ice Age, an era that we factually know occurred. “The Earth began warming from the Ice Age way before humans were ever emitting carbon dioxide and greenhouse gasses. The Earth’s warming has now begun to level off, and as of the year 2004, has not seen a significant increase in warming,” he said. “In fact, the Earth is beginning to cool off and by true scientific evidence, we could be in the next Ice Age by the year 4000.”

If the Ice Age were to occur, it would not destroy the Earth, but would cause people who live in the northern hemisphere to move further south. Then, according to Harris, the Earth would begin a warming cycle again. “The cooling of the Earth is much more dangerous than the warming of the Earth,” he added.

“Whatever the public is thinking is right, the government will go along with. They will support the belief of the public to get votes,” Harris said. “They are driven by the poles, and instead of politicians being driven by votes, the concentration should be more on the true scientific fact to understand that the changing climate will never be eliminated because it is not the fault of humans.”

“We should not spend trillions of dollars on a problem that is most evidentially not even caused by us or is now possibly not happening at all,” Harris added to his comments on global warming.

Harris sighted political leaders such as President Obama and Al Gore, with scientific argument against the melting of the polar icecaps, the dwindling population of polar bears, and the rise of the ocean onto our land masses. “Polar bears are surviving. They have been through this before, and currently are not even on the endangered species list. There are quadruple the number of polar bears now than there were 40 years ago,” Harris said.
“Claims that ‘consensus’ exists among climate experts regarding the causes of the modest warming of the past century are contradicted by thousands of independent scientists,” He added.

The audience’s interest peaked further when Harris began discussing the Cap & Trade, Waxman Markey Bill which would force factories, and companies such as our coal companies, to purchase credits for the amount of greenhouse gasses emitted into the air. Thus, causing our coal companies to halt or slow production due to the need for more credits, if they cannot be traded or purchased from other sources. Harris said that the Cap & Trade Legislation would cause the US Coal Industry to cut production by half by the year 2030 and that more than 10,000 coal jobs would be lost.

“Those who argue against Cap & Trade based only on costs are going to lose the argument,” said Harris, “because when it comes down to it, no one wants to see the planet destroyed… including those people who work in the coal industry.” He explained that if we are causing global warming, everyone would come together to do everything they could to save the planet; that people of every political party, every country, and every continent would find a way to work together, but overall, the scientific proof is not strong enough to prove that global warming is caused by humans and that recent changes are not unusual.

“It is not even possible to reliably predict how climate will change in the future, beyond the certainty that multi-decadal warming and cooling trends and abrupt changes will all continue,” Harris concluded. “Since science and observation have failed to show that human-caused carbon dioxide emissions are causing dangerous global warming, it is premature to consider introducing financial or regulatory schemes to attempt to limit ‘greenhouse gas’ emissions.”

In addition, Harris provided graphical data that illustrated the recorded history of the glacial decay. This data showed that the glaciers were melting prior to the industrial revolution and that even today the glaciers are melting at that same rate. Thus, CO2 emissions have increased immensely since the late 1800’s and it has had no impact on the rate of glacial decay. With this data, how can we say beyond a doubt that humans are causing climate change?

The International Climate Science Coalition strives to reach out to the public to help them understand the science behind climate change, rather than them simply believing everything they hear and see in the newscasts. With over 200 scientists worldwide: from South Africa, to Australia, to Germany, France, and the U.S., the ICSC wishes to reach as many people as possible to stop the ‘scare’ about global warming, not denying that it is an occurrence, but that it is a natural one that will resolve itself. To find out more about the ICSC and their scientific findings, visit www.climatescienceinternational.org.