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Countdown to Kyoto, Part 1: The Science of a Global
Climate Change Agreement
October 7, 1997
Testifying were:
- Dr. Roy W. Spencer,
Senior Scientist for Climate Studies, NASA Marshall
Space Flight Center
- Dr. Aristides A. Patrinos,
Director, Office of Biological and Environmental
Research, DOE; Member, Interagency Subcommittee
on Global Change Research
- Dr. Alan Robock,
Professor of Meteorology, University of Maryland
- Dr. Ronald G. Prinn,
Professor of Atmospheric Chemistry and Director,
Center for Global Change Science, MIT
The witnesses described the current status of knowledge
regarding Global Climate Change. Witnesses were cautious
about the extent of future warming and the possibility
that human activity is having an impact on global
warming.
All agreed that today's projections of climate were
uncertain and this uncertainty was due primarily to
the current limited state of climate modeling. According
to Dr. Spencer of NASA, "the physics contained in
current general circulation models (GCM's -- used
to predict future fluctuations in climate) are still
insufficient to have much confidence in their predicted
magnitude of global warming." According to Dr. Prinn
of MIT, also noted that there may be fundamental limitations
to our ability to predict climate due to chaotic processes
such as we already see in weather prediction.
Dr. Patrinos of DoE, noted the recent improvement of
the GCM's and noted also the findings of a Forum on
Global Change Modeling -- convened by OSTP and GAO
-- that were in general agreement with the findings
of the 1995 IPCC report. However, Patrinos acknowledged
that "there are still significant uncertainties in
GCM predictions". He said that investments by DoE,
NSF and other agencies like NOAA and NASA are "improving
our ability to predict global climate. So far, Patrinos
said, there have been promising new developments,
including the development of the Parallel Climate
Model (PCM) by a team at NCAR led by Dr. Warren Washington.
Noting that the science of global climate change is
less than certain, many members voiced concern over
the Clinton Administration's negotiations at the Kyoto
conference on global climate change. According to
subcommittee Chairman Ken Calvert (R-CA), "[i]t was
made clear from testimony today that, although scientists
agree on the warming effect of "greenhouse gasses",
there are a wide variety of views on how such basic
climate influences such as clouds, water vapor, and
even the sun affect the process", Calvert said in
a prepared statement.
Much discussion occurred over more recent climate projections
and that show the rate of global warming in the future
to be much less than originally predicted only a few
years ago. Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-CA) derided predictions
of rapid global warming as "ridiculous", saying that
no one can predict the what the weather will be 10
days from now, much less many years from now. Full
Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner (R-WI) also
noted the recent "cooler" climate projections and
also criticized the climate science establishment
for not providing timely, useful information about
global climate change that could be translated into
policy. Sensenbrenner asked rhetorically how Members
of Congress could ask their constituents to make significant
sacrifices in energy and transportation use for the
purpose of reducing greenhouse gasses when the science
behind global climate change is anything close to
definitive.
Even though the science of global climate change was
less than certain, Dr. Prinn said that it would be
foolish to take no action now. "Scientists cannot
presently rule out rapid warming forecasts" Dr. Prinn
said, it would be irresponsible to ignore such as
risk." Prinn did not call for drastic measures however,
noting that reducing emissions through efficiency
would not reduce predicted global temperature increases
by too much. Noting that fossil fuel will likely remain
the primary source of the world's energy, Prinn argued
that the U.S. should invest much more heavily in energy
technology that could reduce carbon emissions from
fossil fuel use. He also said that use alternative
energy sources must be expanded including expansion
of nuclear energy use.
Rep. Mike Doyle (D-PA) agreed with this assessment
saying that any solution to greenhouse gas emissions
must go beyond regulation: "I urge the Administration
to look at emissions reduction as a challenge to our
scientific and technological know-how, not as an opportunity
to burden major segments of our economy", Doyle said.
There was some discussion over the future of global
change research especially the need for continued
investment in climate modeling research. Members --
including Subcomittee Chair Calvert -- voiced support
for continued research and witnesses noted that limitations
in climate models were due to limited research funds,
among other factors. Insufficient computing power
was also cited by Dr. Spencer and Dr. Robock as an
obstacle to creating more accurate climate models.
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