Posted: 10/25/2004
Hansen's Climate Change Criticisms Contradict His Own Research
NCPA: “Dr. Hansen’s Changed Position Prime Example of Scientific Uncertainty”
October 26, 2004 – According to the New York Times, Dr. James Hansen, director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in Manhattan is set to criticize the White House’s policy on climate change in a speech tonight in Iowa. Experts with the National Center for Policy Analysis (NCPA) note that Dr. Hansen’s criticisms are contradicted by his own research and demonstrate the folly of rushing to implement public policy based on uncertain science.
Dr. Hansen claims the “Bush Administration has ignored growing evidence that sea levels could rise significantly unless prompt action is taken to reduce heat-trapping emissions from smokestacks and tailpipes.” And that “delay of another decade…is a colossal risk.”
“Dr. Hansen is quite wrong, and is contradicted by his own research in which he has argued mainly for quickly limiting emissions of methane – rather than CO2,” said NCPA Adjunct Scholar S. Fred Singer, president of the Science and Environmental Policy Project. “Smoke stacks and tailpipes don’t emit methane; cattle and rice fields do.”
“Dr. Hansen’s willingness to change his position based on his most current view of climate science is laudable, but also demonstrates why its dangerous to listen to any one scientist, however highly placed in the government he may be,” said NCPA Adjunct Scholar Kenneth Green, director of the Centre for Studies in Risk, Regulation and Environment at the Fraser Institute.
Green noted that Dr. Hansen told former Vice President Al Gore that he predicted high-end estimates of warming, and attributed that to emissions of CO2. More recently, Hansen has embraced lower-end estimates of warming, and suggested that we should control methane emission more than CO2. “Had Congress listened to him the first time, whatever money was spent would have largely been wasted. Now, with the prospects of a possible Kyoto friendly administration, his alarm bells are ringing again, this time on sea level rise. Policy should be set on sound science, not science that bends to the political winds.” said Green.
According to the NCPA, empirical evidence has demonstrated that there has been no acceleration of sea level rise during the strong warming in the early 20th century. Evidently, a warming leads to faster evaporation from the oceans and an increased rate of ice accumulation on the Antarctic continent – producing a drop in sea level that mostly offsets the rise from the thermal expansion of the oceans.
“While sea level is rising, and has for a long time, cause and effect is much more difficult to establish,” said Singer. “It’s had to see how ‘prompt action’ of any kind could affect sea level in the foreseeable future.”