Top physics group shows crack in warming 'consensus'

Lord Monckton (DailyTech.com)

In another strike against the conventional assertion of a consensus on global warming, a publication of an organization representing more than 50,000 physicists acknowledges many members of the scientific community don't believe humans are the primary cause of climate change.

The editor of Physics & Society, a newsletter of the American Physical Society, says that with his July issue he wants to kick off a debate concerning one of the main conclusions of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the IPCC.

The IPCC was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize last year along with former Vice President Al Gore for sounding the alarm about alleged man-made global warming.
Yesterday, in a speech at Constitution Hall in Washington, Gore challenged the U.S. to make a "man on the moon" effort to produce all of the country's electricity from renewable resources within 10 years.

But Physics & Society Editor Jeffrey Marque says there's a "considerable presence within the scientific community" of experts who don't agree with the IPCC's contention human-produced CO2 emissions likely are the primary cause of global warming that has occurred since the Industrial Revolution.

The publication's July issue features a paper by Lord Christopher Monckton, the science advisor to Britain's Margaret Thatcher administration. Monckton concludes the IPCC's modeling has grossly overstated the rate of temperature change caused by greenhouse gas.

Monkton's paper is preceded by a disclaimer, however, that states: "The following article has not undergone any scientific peer review. Its conclusions are in disagreement with the overwhelming opinion of the world scientific community. The Council of the American Physical Society disagrees with this article's conclusions."

Also, the American Physical Society responded to a report by the Daily Tech blog today that said the society had reversed its stance on global warming.

On its website, the society said the society reaffirms the position on climate change adopted Nov. 18 by its governing body, the APS Council: "Emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities are changing the atmosphere in ways that affect the Earth's climate."

Monckton insists there is substantial support for his results in peer-reviewed literature, the Daily Tech reported.

He concludes in his paper that the IPCC's modeling has grossly overstated the rate of temperature change caused by greenhouse gas.

Monckton, who believes natural variability is the cause of most recent warming, told the DailyTech he was "dismayed" to discover the IPCC's 2001 and 2007 reports did not properly explain the method used to reach its conclusions.

"When I began to investigate, it seemed that the IPCC was deliberately concealing and obscuring its method," he said.

Larry Gould, professor of physics at the University of Hartford and chairman of the New England Section of the APS, called Monckton's paper an "expose of the IPCC that details numerous exaggerations and "extensive errors," the DailyTech said.